Travels (29 page)

I am the director of a film called
The Great Train Robbery
, loosely based on an actual train robbery that occurred in Victorian England. We are shooting in England and Ireland. The cast includes Sean Connery, Donald Sutherland, and Lesley-Anne Down.

A secret, lifelong desire is fulfilled. I am an international film director, shooting in foreign locations with big movie stars! What a thrill! Put on the safari jacket and hang the director’s finder around your neck!

But I am also secretly terrified. This is only my third movie, and I’m not really an experienced director. I’ve never shot in a foreign location. I’ve never made a period picture. I’ve never worked with a foreign crew. And although I’ve worked with good actors, I’ve never directed such big stars.

To direct a movie you must be authoritative, and I don’t feel authoritative at all. On the contrary, I feel isolated and under intense pressure. I am alone in Dublin; Loren is back in America finishing law school. There are only three Americans on the show: myself; the producer, John Foreman; and the stunt coordinator, Dick Ziker. John is experienced in foreign filming and I rely on his judgment, but in the end I am the director and I must do the job myself. And I’m afraid.

I’ve never known what to do with these fears of new undertakings. There doesn’t seem to be anything to do but live through them, get past
them. At least some of the terror of new undertakings is justified; at least some degree of anxiety will actually improve performance. But here in Dublin, I am not exerting my authority well. It just isn’t working. John Foreman has told me the English film crews call the director “governor” or “guv.” Nobody calls me “guv.” Nobody calls me “sir.” They don’t call me anything.

Even though I am thirty-five years old, the crew thinks I am too young to know what I am doing. The company tries to second-guess me, to do things behind my back. I ask for something to be done a certain way, and they go off and do something else. We have lots of arguments.

Then, too, there are many differences between British and American filming procedures. In America, the director plans shots with the cameraman; in England, with the camera operator. Scenes are numbered differently. Technical terminology is different. English crews take four food breaks in a day, but Americans break only for lunch. If you want to work overtime, the British crew has to meet and vote.

Even the most basic signals seem to get crossed. In America, I am considered a laconic director, but the English find my energy level bizarrely high. My assistant director, who is openly critical of me to the point of insolence, finally asks if I am taking something. He means drugs, speed. I am astonished and ask him why he should think so. He says the whole crew thinks so, because I do everything so fast. I assure him I am not on drugs.

The first few days of shooting go badly. We have a split crew, half English and half Irish, and the two halves dislike one another, reflecting an ancient antagonism. Whenever something goes wrong, each side blames the other. Our progress is slow. Nobody listens to me. I set up the camera in a certain place and the crew moves it. They always move it, even if it’s just six inches. I move it back to where I want it. The weather is terrible. It seems we are always on a food break. We fall behind schedule.

Each night I drag myself home to my Dublin hotel room. It looks like the anteroom to a tuberculosis sanatorium. The floors are uneven, the wallpaper stodgy Victorian. I’d like to call home, but there is a telephone strike. Then a mail strike. I am entirely isolated.

I ask John Foreman what to do. He says, “Talk with Geoff. Geoff likes you.”

Geoffrey Unsworth is the lighting cameraman. He’s very courtly and distinguished. Everyone adores him. Each day Geoff and I drive to the location together, so there’s plenty of time to talk. Geoff seems to understand
my difficulties, but it’s not easy to discuss the matter frankly. He has his British reserve, and I feel awkward. How can I ask him why I’m not getting any respect? That’s a Rodney Dangerfield line. So we talk about technical things: why we’re not making more setups, how to get things to run more smoothly.

Geoff keeps saying, “I’d like to see one of your films.” I think he’s just being polite. My last film,
Coma
, is still in release in America, and it will be difficult to have a print shipped to Ireland.

Meanwhile, the problems continue. After a week or so, Geoff says, “You know, I think the crew would enjoy seeing one of your films.” I tell him again of the difficulties of getting a print. But I manage to telex MGM in Los Angeles and order one.

Our problems get worse. The situation is deteriorating. Sometimes there are shouting arguments between the Irish and English crew members. As a group we have no cohesion, and I know it is because we have no leader. We are painfully slow. The work is good, but it is taking far too much time. The film is a negative pickup deal, which means that when the money runs out we will have to shut down production, whether we have completed the film or not. The pressures on me are enormous. Get more setups. Finish more scenes. Pick up the pace.

But the pace never picks up.

Geoff says, “I wish we could see one of your films.”

Finally the print comes, and we run it for the crew on Friday night after work. Most of the crew attends.

On Monday morning, I come to work, ready to fight my usual uphill battle. I come onto the set, picking my way among the cables and light stands. One of the electricians smiles at me.

“Morning, guv,” he says.

What happened was that the crew decided
Coma
was a pretty good movie, and I must know what I am doing after all. Thanks to Geoff, from then on the atmosphere is entirely different, and our progress much better.

The crew stretches a white bed sheet in the middle of a field so the helicopter will know where to land. A crowd of local people line the fences around the field. They stare at the sheet, waiting for something to happen. Their attention turns the sheet into a work of art, a Christo.
Wrapped Irish Farm Field, 1978
. I would find it funny if we weren’t behind schedule.

It is eight in the morning and bitterly cold. We are in a provincial train station outside Mullingar, Ireland, about to start a week of filming on top
of a speeding train. Sean Connery has agreed to do his own stunts on top of the train. The little 1863 locomotive is hissing steam in front of the station, with our specially constructed coaches trailing behind. It’s time to start filming, but the camera helicopter has not arrived yet from England. I suggest a test ride on the train. We climb up a ladder onto the roof of the cars, and set off.

Within minutes Connery is grinning like a kid on a carnival ride. He’s a superb athlete who could have been a professional footballer. Now he hops lightly from car to car, thoroughly enjoying himself. We approach a bridge, and must lie flat on the deck. The bridge whips over us, inches from our faces. Connery laughs uproariously. “Bloody fantastic!”

We return to the station and begin shooting. The exhilaration fades, and the work becomes work. Constant vigilance is required. The Irish Railways have permitted us to use twenty miles of track in the most beautiful part of the country, but since this is Ireland, the twenty bridges that span the rails are all of different heights. Some are very low. We have previously mapped and measured each bridge, but no one is willing to trust a map. Before each shot, we creep slowly beneath the bridge, to check our clearance.

Even more dangerous are the telephone and electrical wires that sometimes span the track; these are unmarked and difficult to see until the last moment.

Then, too, our authentic period locomotive spews a stream of glowing cinders and ash back at us. We literally set the countryside on fire wherever we go. Each night, when we return home, I take a shower and wash my hair. The water hits the tub inky black.

Connery throws himself into his work with abandon. He is one of the most remarkable people I have ever met, lighthearted and serious at the same moment. I have learned a great deal from being around him. He is at ease with himself, and is direct and frank. “I like to eat with my fingers,” he says, eating with his fingers in a fancy restaurant, not giving a damn. You cannot embarrass him with trivialities. Eating is what’s important. People come over for an autograph and he glowers at them. “I’m
eating
,” he says sternly. “Come back later.” They come back later, and he politely signs their menus. He doesn’t hold grudges unless he intends to. “I spent a lot of my life being miserable,” he says. “Then one day I thought, I’m here for the day, I can enjoy the day or not. I decided I might as well enjoy it.” There is that quality about him, that sense of choice and control over himself and his moods. It makes him integrated, self-assured. The most common remark about him is “That’s a
real man
.”

Once, on an airplane, a woman sighs, “Oh, you’re so
masculine
.”
Connery laughs. “But I’m very feminine,” he insists. And he means it; he delights in that side of himself. A gifted mimic, he likes to rehearse alone, playing all the parts himself. He does startlingly accurate imitations of everyone in the cast, including Donald and Lesley-Anne, his leading lady. He always seems to enjoy himself. He takes pleasure in all his aspects, all his appetites.

I am not equally open, and he teases me. Once, after a shot, I feel his hand gestures were a little effeminate. I call for a retake, but I’m not sure how to tell Sean what needs to be changed. How do you tell 007 that he’s effeminate?

“Sean, on that last shot, you had a hand gesture.…”

“Yes, what about it? I thought it was good.”

“Well, uh, it was a little, uh, loose. Limp.”

His eyes narrow. “What are you trying to say?”

“Well, it could be a bit crisper. Stronger, you know.”

“Stronger …”

“Yes. Stronger.”

“You’re saying I look like a poof?” Now he’s grinning, amused at my discomfort.

“Yes. A little.”

“Well, just say so, ducky!” he roars. “Just say what you want! We haven’t got all day!” And he shoots the scene again, with a different gesture.

Later he takes me aside. “You know,” he says, “you don’t do any favors beating about the bush. Making us try and deduce what you mean. You think you’re being polite, but you’re actually just difficult. Say what you mean and get on with it.”

I promise to try. And I do better, but I never manage to be as direct as he is. He says, “You should always tell the truth, because if you tell the truth you make it the other person’s problem.”

He follows his own dictum; he always tells the truth. Sean seems to live in a kind of present moment, responding to events with an unaffected immediacy that disregards the past and future. He is always genuine. Sometimes he compliments people I know he doesn’t like. Sometimes he blows up angrily at his close friends. He always tells the truth as he sees it at the moment, and if somebody doesn’t like it, it’s their problem.

The days of shooting on the train continue. The crew is extremely careful; no one is hurt. By now we have shot the most hazardous sequences, the ones that require Sean to not see the bridges as they rush up behind him,
and to duck down at the last moment, his head missing the bridges by inches. Those shots were carefully arranged and timed, but we are all relieved they are behind us.

Finally we are shooting a long take where Sean comes running up the length of the train, jumping from car to car. Because we are shooting in all directions, the camera operator and I are hanging out on a side platform, and everyone else is inside the train. I am trying to watch the scene and also to remember to duck down at the right time so the camera lens can swing over my head.

Filming begins. Sean runs up the length of the train. I smell a harsh, acrid odor. I feel a sharp pain on top of my scalp. I realize that my hair has been set on fire by the cinders from the locomotive. I am frantically brushing at my hair, trying to put the fire out, because I don’t want smoke coming from my head when the camera swings over me.

While I am doing that, Sean jumps to the nearest car, stumbles, and falls. I think, Jeez, Sean, don’t overdo making it look dangerous. He is carrying a bundle of clothes, a story point. He drops the clothes as he falls and I realize Sean would never do that, that he must have really fallen. Meanwhile, I am still trying to put the fire out on my head. Sean scrambles to his feet, retrieves the clothes, and moves on, wincing in genuine pain. I get the cinders out of my head as the camera swings over. We make the shot.

Afterward we stop the train; everybody gets off. He has a bad cut on his shin that is being attended to.

“Are you all right, Sean?”

He looks at me. “Did you know,” he says, “that your hair was on fire? You ought to be more careful up there.”

And he laughs.

His fresh view allows him to reach some surprising conclusions. On the fourth day of filming, we put everybody inside the train except Sean, because we are filming with the helicopter, and the camera will see the entire length of the train. So I am inside, wearing a top hat, with a walkie-talkie in my lap. As the train starts, I hear the engineer call out the speed, “Twenty-five miles an hour … thirty … thirty-five miles an hour …”

We have previously arranged for this speed. The helicopter radios that it is in position. I call for action on the radio, and the shot begins. I sit there, listening to the thump of the helicopter as it moves overhead, trying to imagine the shot, trying to figure out by the sound how it is going.

The pilot announces the shot is good. We stop the train, and Sean comes down from the top. He is furious, stamping and complaining. “It’s bloody dangerous up there! This bloody train is not going bloody thirty-five miles an hour!”

“Sean,” I say, “it is.”

After so many days of shooting, the control of speed has been well worked out. This is essential, because in making a film you must travel at different speeds depending on which way the camera is pointing. If you are shooting sideways to the direction of travel, your apparent speed is faster, and so you must make the train go slower. If you are shooting in the direction of travel, you must go faster than usual. If you do not vary the speed in this way, in the final film the train will appear to go faster in some shots than in others.