It's difficult working with very rich actors, because inevitably they become a little spoilt, and the managers and agents tend to control things more than is healthy.
Mike Figgis
I play piano and trumpet. I studied classical guitar.
There's a sadness to the human condition that I think music is good for. It gives a counterpoint to the visual beauty, and adds depth to pictures that they wouldn't have if the music wasn't there.
In a way, the history of jazz's development is a small mirror of classical music's development through the centuries. Now jazz is a living form of original music, while classical music has gotten to the end of its cycle in terms of exploring its form.
In discussing the process with the actors, I made it clear to them that they could improvise but that the sum total of their improvisation needed to impart certain plot points, and schematic material.
I like to work my camera as if it were a musical instrument.
You can do really slow movements with it, like zooming in for a minute and a half. The audience isn't aware that the camera has moved, but there's subconscious tension there.
Obviously, I try to make the films work for an audience. That's the main point of making a film, and in retrospect, one can see that certain films, let's say Leaving Las Vegas, demonstrated its own success.
I would certainly say that films like Time Code and the Loss of Sexual Innocence were far more rewarding to me in terms of being able to move forward as a filmmaker.
But I don't have such a strong desire to need to get away from filmmaking.
I am intrigued enough to want to continue, and also to try and work with companies like Sony on modifying the cameras and making them more user-friendly and efficient.
One of the things I love about cinema is the range.
I'm a huge fan of world cinema, because each country uses cinema in a very individual way.
Films take up so much time, and with theatre, you do have to plan a period of time that you can be free.
There's nothing I've done which I'm ashamed of or I thought was actually bad.
Each film is different. Time Code was very quick - a matter of months. Miss Julie has been on my shelf as a script for some seven or eight years. But then the shooting process was very quick - 16 days.
I had no plans to be a director.
Then I became interested in drama, and almost by accident, I drifted into film.
I started using film as part of live theatre performance - what used to be called performance art - and I became intrigued by film.
When I do the music, I make the musicians listen to what's happening in the film. That way they treat the dialogue as if it was a singer.
I've held onto little musical sketches that I thought could be useful, and the more time that I spend doing them for each film, then the more I have to draw on.
I might have a guitar or a piano on set to play something for the actors.
The power of sound to put an audience in a certain psychological state is vastly undervalued. And the more you know about music and harmony, the more you can do with that.
The world is an infinitely fascinating, tragic and humorous place.
I've spent my life hearing people trying to apologize for music.
I want the score to have a really big voice.
You make sure that there's a structure that's interesting for them to play on top of, then do temp versions and try it on the film. By the time the players come to the recording session, I've found what works. So I'm not wasting their time.
