Clive+Owen

Clive Owen plays the main character Theo Faron in the film. Here are a few comments that he made to Rebecca Murray at [|About.com] when discussing //Children of Men.// The italicising is mine.

 

**His thoughts on the P.D. James book and the Relevance of //Children of Men//:** “I didn’t know the book and I read it afterwards. It’s obviously like whenever you do an adaptation of a book, that was the starting [point] and the huge inspiration for the movie. But then Alfonso had a lot of other things he wanted to discuss. Alfonso, I think, with this movie has been very clever. //He’s actually using a film set 30 years in the future as an excuse to talk about present worries, concerns, and fears that we all have. It’s an incredibly relevant vision of the future because he’s really looking ahead and saying, ‘If we’re not careful, this is where things could be going//.’ I don’t think the film is that futuristic. If you look at the opening scene, my character walks into a café, walks outside, and a bomb goes off. The beginning of the movie, that’s the world we’re in. //That’s not futuristic, you know? That’s incredibly relevant.// I think it’s not that far fetched. There are endless images in this movie that we’ve seen that we are sort of already familiar with. He’s obviously taken it further than the real thing but I just don’t think it’s a fantasy.”

**The Single Take Process of //Children of Men//:** Owen’s recently been a part of a couple of films involving special technical processes, and the actor says he’s always aware of what’s going on behind the camera while he’s performing. “It’s one of the elements of making movies that I actually really enjoy. I love the collaboration of doing shots like those in //Children of Men// because there’s something about film-making that, you know, if it was just about putting great directors, great scripts, and great actors together and you’re guaranteed a great film, that’s one thing, but that isn’t the case. There aren’t any rules. //There’s something sort of elusive that’s out of any individual’s control that makes a film work or not work, and when you’re doing one of those hugely ambitious long sequences of one shot, it’s a genuine collaboration.// It’s everybody pulling together to try and make something happen. The responsibility is a collective one. The strongest memory from the movie was how much, how closely I had to work with the [camera] operator on those sequences. //We would rehearse for a very, very long time and it was very painstaking and specific. But then when we come to shoot it, it has to feel like we’re catching it on the run.// //You’ve got to feel like you’re in the thick of it and it’s all about pacing. If you hold a beat a bit too long, it will suddenly feel a bit manipulative.// Like, ‘He’s held there so we see the tank just over his right shoulder.’ We work very, very specifically about what we want to see and what we want to catch. Then when we go for it, we’ve got to shape that up and keep an energy that is much looser than that. They’re very adrenalised, those sequences, because there’s huge resets. It’s like some of those big ones are four, five-hour resets to try and go again for a take like that. So everybody is very adrenalised, gearing up to go in for one of those takes, and there’s something just a bit magical. I think that technically some of this film is pretty staggering. The operator…most of the film is //hand-held// and the operator did a really incredible job, I think.”

**What Goes on Behind the Scenes During the Long Takes?** Owen says Cuaron just lets it flow after they’ve rehearsed and choreographed everything down to the smallest detail. “Somebody’s there to abort if something early on goes wrong. There’s no point in going on and carrying on and blowing up the side of that building if very early on there’s something that is obviously amiss. //No, it was really about rehearsing very, very thoroughly//. Then it was very cool of Alfonso because he then – sort of the pacing and everything – he then hands the trust over to George [the camera operator] and I that we’re going to do that thing. // One of the takes of the big sequence at the end going through the thing, there was a unanimous sense at the end of that one that that was the one. Alfonso was then very worried because the blood spattered on the camera and Emmanuel Lubezki said, ‘But that’s brilliant. That’s brilliant!’ But collectively at the end of that take, there was a sense – George, I, everybody – like that was it. We nailed that one. And Alfonso decided in the end we’re going with it because it worked. That was the best take.” //

**Putting Into Words What Sets Alfonso Cuaron Apart as a Filmmaker:**

“I was, and now am an even bigger, huge fan of Alfonso’s. He’s very, very high on my ‘directors I’d love to work with’ list,” confessed Clive Owen. “Even some of his films that were maybe not as commercially successful, I think are very special. He’s a highly original, talented [filmmaker]. Huge talent. When he first sent me the script, I wasn’t sure about the part. I didn’t quite know why he wanted me to do it. It’s a highly unusual lead part. //If you look at that character he’s in every scene, but it’s very unusual traits that he’s got.// It’s not the kind of part where you can sort of do your thing as an actor, in a way. //It’s about sacrificing yourself to Alfonso’s vision and not getting in the way of it, which seems to me more important than doing any acting.// But I went and I met him and I talked to him, and I found him hugely exciting. He told me his whole vision of the film and his take on the movie. Then I came on board and the first thing he said is, ‘This is now the bit I love. I love working with actors. I love the collaboration of that. We’re going to do this movie together.’ And he was very true to his word. I signed on well in advance of the movie. I was shooting other stuff, but we kept in constant contact. I then, as soon as I got a break, went and spent a few weeks with him in New York, just holed up in a hotel room talking about the movie, talking about Theo. The collaboration continued throughout. It was a genuine, really brilliant collaboration through the whole movie. He kept me completely in the loop in all the post-production. He sent me various cuts and edits. There were endless conversations and still now as we’re taking the film out there and sort of putting it out there, it still feels like that. //It’s been a very, very special collaboration.// I do genuinely think he’s a very rare and unique talent. //The thing about his movies is they are whole visions.// He doesn’t do that thing of pandering to what he thinks the commercial market wants. He makes his movies. He has a very //singular vision// and he goes out there and does that. I think he’s very special.”


 * Running Around Without Shoes:**

Sometimes Owen’s character has sandals, other times he’s having to race around barefoot. “People sort of crack jokes about the flip flops and things, but it’s actually a real stroke of genius. There’s a point in the movie later on where suddenly Theo is becoming active. He’s become engaged again and he’s running around trying to save this girl which in turn could save the world. //Alfonso, who has a huge aversion to sentimentality, to stop any notion of we’ve seen this cliché where our guy’s going to become active and do it, he put me in flip flops.// //That’s never going to become the cliché action guy. It’s not going to happen. So that was a very deliberate thing on his part.// Then the thing just developed… (Laughing) The foot fetish developed throughout the movie.”


 * This Isn’t Your Ordinary Action Guy Role:**

//“It’s a highly unusual lead character for a movie of this size really, because the first half of the movie the guy doesn’t even want to be there.// //The guy’s dragged into the movie. He’s very reluctant. It’s very unusual to play a lead character that is apathetic, cynical, depressed, drunk, sad, really. Overwhelming sadness was the thing. Now they are unusual traits. That’s not usually the sort of lead character of a movie. Eventually he does become engaged.// // Theo sort of embodies the loss of hope. There’s a hopelessness about him. He’s given up. He’s given up. There is no point to anything. But through the movie he does become engaged again.” //

**Clive Owen Admits to Having a Few Concerns About //Children of Men//:**

Owen said there was a time when he asked himself if the movie was going to work. “With what I was doing, yes, because as I said before, //he’s not a dynamic lead character// and you’re holding a film. I’m in every single scene in the movie. When you’re holding a film of this sort of scale and size, and you are playing sort of sad and apathetic and the way you pitch that, you worry if it’s holding. You worry. I//t’s not like I can be proactive and take the character in the film and take people through the movie. That isn’t the kind of character.// My instinct from the very, very beginning was that thing I said is that I didn’t want to get in the way of his vision. It wasn’t about doing good acting in this movie. He thinks very wide, Alfonso. //He’s about environment. He puts characters in environments//. //If you notice, there are very few close-ups in the movie.// There are very few times where he goes in on something, and there’s a reason when he does. //But most of the film is done wide. There’s an awful lot of just following me and you worry that as an actor that it’s holding. You can’t do the strong things because that’s not what’s required. It’s something else.// I felt I just wanted to serve his vision and not get in the way of it and bring something to it, but you don’t know where that’s pitching. You don’t know if you’re playing somebody who’s reluctantly dragged through the first part of the movie. You don’t know if the audience is going to go, ‘Why should we even be going with this guy because he doesn’t want to go on the journey?’ So there were times certainly where I was involved, but he… You know, for me, the opportunities I’ve been getting in the last few years are hugely appreciated and the opportunity to work with him was a really great one. //I think the film is one of those that later on in my career when I look back it will be one that I am very particularly proud of, I think.”//


 * The Particulars of the Childbirth Scene:**

//“There were a number of sequences in this where Alfonso was hugely ambitious,//" explained Clive Owen. "You know, we’ve talked about the long one-shot deals. Now when you’re rehearsing and setting one of those up all day long, and the light goes and you haven’t turned the camera over and you’ve got to come back and carry on tomorrow, you can imagine the phone calls that fly around that evening with the studio going, ‘What is he doing? We haven’t turned over?’ And he had that sort of a tack on certain sequences and the child birth was one of those. We get there and he says, //‘I want to do it in one [take] - the whole sequence, from the minute we come into that room to the baby being born.’// //His objective about this movie is to keep trying to viscerally put you in the action. T////he best way of doing that is to keep it as much real time as possible, and to not cut away and not do this sort of manipulative, single, single, where you feel you know the sort of territory you’re in – the movie territory. He wanted to put you into the thick of it so that scene was about just trying to viscerally connect with the audience. That was the thing.// Now I was present at the birth of both of my two children so I had those things to draw on. I was in the thick of it both times, and I remember feeling a bit like Theo does in the movie. The strongest thing that I remember from that day was towards the end of the shoot, it was a very, very long day and we went well into the evening because it was only one take and we had to make sure we had it. And Alfonso goes, ‘We’ve got to just try one more.’ We would just keep going and keep going and we went, you know, the day turned into a night shoot as well.” The actual baby in the scene was an //animatronic stand-in//. //“Some CGI stuff was done afterwards,”// explained Owen. “But, again, it was… You’ve got all the camera work to consider; you’ve got the pacing of the scene. It’s very special when a director gives actors the responsibility of a scene of that length, because we have to pace it in some way. We are dictating the pace. We have to keep the scene alive, and it puts a lot of responsibility on the actors. But also, technically, it was very demanding for the operator. //The whole movement of the camera at the very end when the baby arrives, it’s incredibly specific where that camera has to settle and sit.// So, again, it was one of those genuine collaborations where everybody was coming together and trying to achieve something pretty extraordinary.”


 * Working with Michael Caine:**

“You know, he’s just a legend. He’s been at the top as long as I’ve been around and there’s a reason. He’s just a fantastic and very special talent. We had a very strong connection because we’ve both done a couple films with Mike Hodges. He did the original //Get Carter//, which was an important film in Michael’s career, and //Croupier// was a very important film in my career, so we had that strong connection." // The tone of the film changes whenever Owen and Caine share the screen. “The most important thing in those scenes was that that’s the one place where Theo relaxes," said Owen. "The rest of the time he’s a defeated, very sad person. But then there’s a light, there’s a warmth, there’s a humanity about their relationship, so we just had to look like we were really comfortable and he’s my best friend. That’s what we had to nail in just those few scenes we had. He was a delight to work with.” //

**Shooting the Opening Bombing Scene:** //That scene was filmed shortly after the bombings in London. “The bombing scene, the scene at the beginning of the movie where the bomb goes off, was the worst day’s filming,” acknowledged Owen. “It was really upsetting for everybody because it was close after the bombings. I was amazed we actually got permission because it was a big explosion, and we were right in the center of London. It was just incredibly eerie and awful. // //<span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> It’s very poignant. I think it’s a very incredibly poignant and profound opening to the movie, to have that happen and set the tone and say, ‘This is the world we live in. This is 30 years’ time and this is the world we live in.’ Because, you know, I’ve got two young girls and the fear and the trepidation about the future is that this feeling of fragility and fear of these things happening. You’re bringing kids into the world and this might just become part of their lives. That’s just what they deal with and that’s an awful and worrying idea, really.” // <span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">

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