One of my favorite shots in the movie is the recurring one where Churchill looks out his car window to the people on the streets of London. I tried to ask Joe Wright his inspiration for it and he couldn’t actually articulate it. Can you speak to it?
I think it was, in fact, it was in the script. I think the idea was to show how disconnected Churchill was from the working class Englishmen. So, he’s living in a fish tank and the car is a fish tank as well, so that’s why there was this idea of the slow motion as well, which I’m not a big fan of, you know. I don’t really like slow motion usually speaking, but on this specific case it made kind of sense. Just to have this guy staring at the people he has no way, no clue how they are living. Again, the government was lying to those people. They were saying that England was winning the war when they were obviously losing it. So I think there is a double thing in Joe’s mind, which was how disconnected as a person he was from the crowd and the second thing was, “I have to talk to those people and tell the truth as a politician” so it was kind of duality like that which I thought was interesting. Yeah, I think it kind of worked?
I know this film was shot on digital do you have a preference between the two?
I don’t want to compare them, I mean, I’m not nostalgic about film. I love film. I think “Big Eyes” with Tim Burton was my first movie on digital. I thought before [then] digital was not good enough. Now, digital is very good. It’s as if you were comparing watercolor with oil painting, you see. You don’t do exactly the same thing. Digital is a very interesting image and I have to learn how to use it. I don’t know yet, exactly.
Well, I would say based on this movie it looks like you know what you’re doing, because it’s pretty gorgeous.
Yeah, but is it gorgeous has nothing to do with the medium, you see. There’s always something to learn with digital which is the color is slightly different than film so the contrast are different. It’s a new technology even if it’s twenty years old now, but it’s still kind of new compared to film which is 100 years old. So, we have to kind of learn it a bit.
Was there any scene or sequence in the film that, maybe not to the audience but for you, was more difficult to pull off than it might have seemed?
To tell you the truth, I don’t remember, really. Yeah. I just don’t remember, sorry, because it was a year ago and I just finished the next Coen Brothers’ movie and my head is still with the Coens. So I don’t remember how difficult it was on “Darkest Hour.”
Were you working on The Coen Brothers’ new mini-series or is there a new movie too?
There is a Netflix thing they just did.
Can you just sort of say what was it like to work with them?
Oh it was great! It was the second time I worked with them and so I love them and I love working with them.
Can you say at all, like where you guys are shooting or anything?
No, I can’t really. It’s not really a top secret thing, it’s called “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs” and it’s Netflix, it’s a western and that’s it. That’s all I can say. But everything I just told you was in The Hollywood Reporter six month ago.
Exactly! Oh wait, can you tell me this: did you shoot on film or digitally?
No, I can’t tell you.
You can’t tell me? That’s hilarious!
The purpose of this interview is “Darkest Hour.” (Laughs.)
O.K., My last question. Is there one particular shot, again, or sequence, that when you watch “Darkest Hour” now that you are most proud of?
I think I kind of like the last Churchill speech in The House of Commons and I like the first meeting with the King in Buckingham palace. There are a couple of shots I like which are kind of separate shot when Halifax is listening to the radio to Churchill’s speech. It is a way I never would have lit it and I saw something, which I thought was nice and I said, “Oh, I love that” but it was not exactly what I expected. But I love that shot. It’s the Halifax scene, obviously he is listening at to Churchill.
“Darkest Hour” is still playing nationwide.
