- Director, Actor, Producer.
He directed films since the mid-80s, with a success both in Britian and HollyWood. Frears made his featured film debut in 1971 with Gumshoe, a memorial production, about a Liverpool bingo caller.
Frears achieved his career breakthrough the following year with My Beautiful Laundrette, a Channel Four production shot on 16mm for £600,000. Scripted by Hanif Kureishi, the film tackles racism, sexuality and Thatcherism in a provocative and entertaining fashion. Intended for television, My Beautiful Laundrette was given an international theatrical release, proving a critical and commercial success.
Now in demand, Frears reunited with Alan Bennett for Prick Up Your Ears (1987), a long-standing personal project. A biopic of playwright Joe Orton, the film features strong performances from Gary Oldman and Alfred Molina, and a candid depiction of Britain's gay subculture in the 1950s and '60s.
Dirty Pretty Things (2002), Frears's latest film, centres on a group of immigrants, some illegal, living in London. Frears had already dealt with the plight of political refugees in the television play Cold Harbour (Thames, 1978).
-Director
He emerge as a diector from the late 20th centry.
In 1994 Winterbottom formed Revolution Films with Andrew Eaton, his producer on Family; his first cinema feature, Butterfly Kiss, emerged the following year
Winterbottom entered the prestige literary adaptation field with Jude (1996). Typically, he picked one of the bleakest possible properties, Thomas Hardy's novel of dashed hopes and illicit love. Sombre and stark in every way, it remains a compelling and underrated film, with a mesmerising performance from Kate Winslet as stonecutter Jude's vivacious cousin, made wan by the kicks of fate.
I Want You (1998), a seaside drama of obsessive love with Rachel Weisz, filmed in Hastings; the Belfast-set With or Without You; and, most individual of all, Wonderland (1999), a sad family jigsaw puzzle built up from what at first seem scattered scenes about the lives of three sisters.
Through all the variations in mood and technique, he seeks to combine social realism with stylistic experiments, bold photography, and expressive use of the widescreen shape. Though the artistic achievements have varied, and no film has enjoyed wide commercial success, in his determination to make idiosyncratic and innovative British films Winterbottom has established an enviable international reputation.
No comments:
Post a Comment