today I want to share an amazing interview about a documentary, that is still waiting to be released on DVD. As for me, I wasn't lucky enough to see this gem. I am dependent only on the trailer and various mentions that keep me in devotional patience.
๐น⭐๐น๐๐๐๐๐๐๐: ๐๐๐.๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ซ๐จ๐๐ค๐ฎ๐ฆ๐๐ง๐ญ๐๐ซ๐ฒ ๐๐๐๐๐น⭐๐น
In July 2017, a student Celia Lam, who studied at the University of Nottingham in Ningbo, China, interviewed the film's director Charlie Targett-Adams for a university magazine. We already know that Charlie has been a popular director for the band since 2008, among other things he made the first documentary Coming Up For Air for Placebo.
I want to share with you the most interesting moments of this conversation and I hope that you will enjoy the atmosphere of creation of this still carefully hidden treasure.
And if anyone here has been lucky enough to attend the screening of this amazing rockumentary, share your memories and feelings with us.
I wish you all a wonderful evening.
๐ฐ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ช๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ป๐๐๐๐๐๐-๐จ๐ ๐๐๐:
๐ป๐๐ ๐จ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ต๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐ท๐ณ๐จ๐ช๐ฌ๐ฉ๐ถ: ๐จ๐ณ๐ป.๐น๐ผ๐บ๐บ๐ฐ๐จ
๐ธ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐ช๐๐๐๐ ๐ณ๐๐
๐ Please tell me about the concept behind PLACEBO: ALT.RUSSIA. How did you establish a connection with the band and what inspired you to tell this story?
/.../ In April 2014, Alex emailed me about coming in to talk about making a documentary about the Russian tour. They were playing 10 Russian cities, eight of which they had not played before, and travelling on the Trans-Siberian express. It was a different tour for them, and a
great opportunity to make something unique. At the time Russia was all over the news with Crimea so I thought we should not concentrate on the politics and instead reach out to the people and see a different side to Russia. I went away and wrote a treatment for the film setting out the approach: going out into the cities and meeting creatives on the way. I had the name from the start, PLACEBO:
ALT.RUSSIA, because I always see Placebo being labelled as an ‘Alternative Rock’ band and thought that would be a good hook to look into alternative culture in Russia; the culture we rarely hear about in the mainstream media.
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| Screenshot from the trailer |
/.../ Like always in the world of rock’n’roll,
money and time weren’t on our side, so we had two weeks for the pre-production to find out as much as we could about the places we were going and who we could meet up with. We spent every waking hour researching, emailing and picking up the phone trying to set things up before we left. We explored every angle we could and contacted everyone we came across including Placebo fans to help give us their ideas about their cities. In the end a great resource for us was The Calvert Journal based in London. On their website they feature articles about the creative arts in Russia and Eastern Europe and it opened up a lot of angles on who and what to look out for.
Once we had a list of people in each city we sent them over to Stefan Olsdal and Brian Molko from the band to ask who they were interested in meeting. From there we narrowed down the choices and then the tough task of getting in contact with them. /.../ Some people we never managed to contact, others we did and they didn’t show up at our meetings and others we met but we could not fit into the edit of the documentary. Thankfully, of the people we did meet, we were really blown away by what they did and each gave their own unique angle for the film. /.../
When I shoot a concert, I am always more interested in trying to capture what it felt like to be there than document what actually happened. Therefore, I normally make my way around the whole venue picking up moments from on or off stage, trying to capture people’s reactions and emotions. /.../ The tour lasted sixteen days and in total we covered just over 13,500 km. /.../
๐ Tell me a bit about the editing process. How did you find the narrative? Did the story of the band’s encounters with Russian artists emerge after the shoot, or before?
/.../We returned from the tour with thirty-five hours of footage.
/.../All of this is boiled down to the one hour and seven minutes running time.
/.../We knew the premise was to go out and talk to creatives to find out about living and working in Russia. We aimed to get a diverse mix of people into the film and not just the obvious type of creatives that people would associate with Russia. We wanted to get different opinions on similar topics from each of our contributors.
Jerry Chater was our editor. He had edited music documentaries about U2, Radiohead, Oasis and Joy Division and I knew he would bring so much to our film. /.../
This went on for about four months on and off before we had a first cut. Stefan from the band came into the edit on occasions and helped craft the narrative as we went. /.../
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Screenshot from the trailer |
๐ What inspired your stylistic choices for the film?
/.../ The previous feature documentary was all
led by a narration from Brian. Therefore, this time we chose to have Stefan lead it and instead of it being a film that looked inwards to the band we thought it should look outwards and be guided by Stefan. He really embraced the project and was very involved at every stage of the production. He was the best champion and driving force to make sure it would see the light of day.
It was a constant dialogue on the road with Stefan. /.../ From what I knew, he had never really done any work in front of the camera like this before, leading the conversation and giving personal insight into difficult subjects on camera. Usually people would be asking him questions instead of the other way around but I feel he managed to fall straight into the role and get his own naturally inquisitive and engaging character across on camera. Then when we came to do the voice over for the
film, Jerry had written a guide dialogue and Stefan managed to spin it around into his own words to give it a real personal and engaging touch. /.../
What we did consciously seek out were people who were away from the mainstream. Hopefully by doing this we showed an alternative narrative to the mainstream reported in Russia. The film has gone down really well in Russia. I feel there is a great appetite for it because it is an alternative take on how Russians see their own country. /.../
๐ How important are alternative narratives to the band?
One of my favourite quotes from Brian is “Placebo attracts the misshapes, the square pegs in the round holes.” From hearing several interviews they have given over the years I would say alternative narratives are important to them. I feel they are writing their own one in the history of modern Western music. They are currently in their 20th year as a band and when they started Brit Pop had emerged, lad culture and crude rivalries between bands such as Blur and Oasis.
Placebo decided to blur these false boundaries and were the antidote to that culture. Having come to fame in that way, I feel they are now put under that section of ‘alternative’ for people to easily categorize and digest their style in a single term. That is why I thought it would be good to play on that with the title of the documentary, PLACEBO: ALT.RUSSIA, and also the Alt on a computer keyboard that gives a nod to our internet age. /.../
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| Screenshot from the trailer |
The documentary has had a great response at several festivals and a theatrical release so far in Russia. We have won three film festival awards at present. To be recognised outside the world
of music with the IAFOR award was incredibly humbling for us all./.../
I feel all music documentaries grow better with time as they capture the culture of that time. We want to get
the film shown to as many people as possible all over the world through film festivals. We are going to show it in as many festivals that accept us this year and then there will be a general release at the end of the year or next year.
๐น⭐๐น
You can read the whole interview here:
https://bit.ly/2U3Yxyl
Post by Marti
