‘I’m always interested in how the form of cinema itself is evolving’
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AT the age of 14, Sally Potter began making amateur films with an 8mm camera given to her by an uncle. She dropped out of school at the age of 16 to pursue filmmaking. She worked as a kitchen worker and a picture researcher for BBC in order to support herself and her work from 1968 to 1970. This was the type of path she tread on to become a film director and screenwriter, and eventually her hard work made her become one of the world’s best female film directors.
Potter’s background is in choreography, music, performance art and experimental film. She is known for innovative form and risk-taking subject matter, and has worked with many of the most notable cinema actors: Tilda Swinton in “Orlando;” Johnny Depp, Cate Blanchett and John Turturro in “The Man Who Cried;” and Elle Fanning and Alice Englert in “Ginger & Rosa.” Potter’s films have won over forty international awards and received two Academy Award nominations.
She is best known for her production of “Orlando.” Potter received greater appreciation for her writing and direction. The film was based on Virginia Woolf’s “Orlando: A Biography” and adapted for the screen by Potter. In addition to two Academy Award nominations, Orlando won more than 25 international awards.
The novel had previously been considered impossible to adapt for the screen because it took place over 400 years and followed a character that changed from a man to a woman. Funding for the film was difficult. Filming and editing took 20 weeks. Preparation for the film including adapting the novel, funding the film, scouting locations and other preparations took four years. In total, Orlando took seven years to complete.
“I spent seven years on the adaptation,” said Potter. “Seven years of writing, so it was a crazy project to take on because first of all, it was a classic novel, and secondly, it was covering so much time and space, so there were huge production problems, but also most importantly, it’s not a realistic story. It’s a literal conceit, so how to make that idea feel real, credible that you can follow the story that you’re not pushed away by this abstraction, so it was a big challenge.”
The way she chooses to make a film may be “nontraditional” to some audiences, such as “Rage,” which is about a young blogger at a New York fashion house who shoots behind-the-scenes interviews on his cell phone.
“I try to find the form that is necessary to tell these stories,” said Potter, “I’m always interested in how the form of cinema itself is evolving, and to be embracing and welcoming and working with new technology.”
The creation of “Rage” led to a new genre in filmmaking called “naked cinema,” which is about how to work with actors.
“For their work to really come alive on screen, they have to become naked, not with clothes, but with themselves,” said Potter. “They have to remove all the obstacles and the pretense. The best cinema actors have that quality of pure being, not pretending, but being on the screen.”
According to Potter, she does not always select the best well-known actors and actresses. “Sometimes I know exactly who I want, but sometimes who you think you want is not necessarily the best person,” said Potter. “A lot of casting is done for the wrong reasons because the person is well-known. That’s why I say the first thought is not always the best. Sometimes the first thought is the cliched thought, so when do more research, you suddenly find these other extraordinary people who are out there.”
Potter said “Ginger & Rosa” received 2,000 auditions including auditions on Facebook.
“I thought, ‘to find teenaged girls, why not use Facebook’?” said Potter. “So I put out a short fragment of a scene with an invitation and people could go into a closed site, film themselves in the scene and then send it, and then the second round we took down the number from 2,000 to may be 200. We gave them a longer scene, and then I brought 30 of them to London and did proper auditions, and then I choose two completely different people anyway, but it was a very interesting process.”
Despite her successful career, she said filmmaking is a very difficult process.
“It’s hard to make a good film,” said Potter. “Once you’ve made a film, that’s one thing, but trying to make a good film is extraordinary difficult and I think one becomes aware gradually. There are many films, but there are few really outstanding films, so the pursuit of excellence requires absolute dedication and devotion, and that’s what makes the difference.”
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