JPJ wrote:Well knowing his sense of humour I would have been disappointed if he would have said anything else!
Yes, I was very much hoping that he'd say "3" - but was very grateful that you'd already confirmed which one was
actually correct beforehand! I started off the interview with that, as I hoped it would simultaneously put him in a good mood and tacitly suggest that I knew his back catalogue pretty well.
Michael,I could be wrong about this but I have a hazy memory of an old article or interview where he claimed that he actually translated one of his early films(can't remember which one) in english himself,and the film was released theatrically in UK with his subtitles!I noticed that you mentioned you worked for his UK distributor so if this was true I assume you'd know about it?
I don't remember, but it could well have been
Leningrad Cowboys, since that needs very few subtitles - but that was the one Kaurismäki film I wasn't involved with. (Typically, it was the only one that made any money...)
By the way,how was the interview?Kaurismäki seems like a completely unpredictable man.I remember when Lights in the dusk opened and some poor writer tried to interview him about his new movie and all he wanted to discuss was politics.
He was great - thanks to a combination of a scheduling mix-up and me arriving 15 minutes early out of paranoia I got 75 minutes with him as opposed to the allotted 45, so we covered a huge amount of ground, and he was in a very chatty mood. He claimed to remember me, which was very flattering as we hadn't been in the same room in over twenty years.
And since I was reasonably certain that we'd covered all the essential
Le Havre bases in the first half hour, I basically let him ramble on about whatever he wanted - Cold War spy thrillers, the situation in Europe (he lives in Portugal and my parents-in-law live in Crete, so we're both keenly aware of how the eurozone crisis affects people at the sharp end), the imminent death of cinema as we know it (he's a 35mm man through and through, and would shoot everything in black and white nitrate if this was even vaguely possible), and his willingness to cut any part of his budgets apart from the catering costs, as people who work on his lousy films need a reason to keep going.
It should be in the May
Sight & Sound, out in the first week of April (coinciding perfectly with
Le Havre's opening) - I don't know how big a piece it will be yet, but I know editor Nick James is a huge fan of the film, so it's unlikely to be buried.