James Davies meeting Sir Sean Connery

They say you should never meet your heroes, but I did when I met James Bond. Well one of the six actors to play Ian Flemings “00” agent.

Ever since I saw the film, ‘Dr No’, at the tender age of six, and heard Sir Sean Connery utter the words “Bond, James Bond” during that famous casino scene, the Hollywood legend has always been someone I have greatly admired, and someone I have always wanted to meet.

I’m not small, standing at six foot, but the Edinburgh born actor was huge. Not only was he tall but he was incredibly well built.

After telling the star he was my favourite actor he gave me a nice broad smile, shook my hand and said in his famous Scottish tone, “Thank you”.

Sir Sean, 77, who was dapperly dressed in a red sweater, navy blue jacket and smart grey trousers, oozed all the sophistication and charm he showed during the 60’s while playing the elegantly dressed, Martini drinking, British agent.

Sir Sean, who is a patron, along with Tilda Swinton, of the Edinburgh Film Festival, gave a lot of time to his fans, particularly the young ones, stopping to talk to anyone who had the confidence to approach the likeable actor.

Although our meeting was brief, it is something I will never forget. Thanks Sir Sean, you made my day. What a gentleman.




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James Davies interviews Ira Sachs

 James with Ira 

Like most young men, I like action films in the form of James Bond, Indiana Jones and Batman. So I was unsure what my reaction would be after seeing Ira Sachs latest film ‘Married Life’, starring Oscar winning actor Chris Cooper, one time Bond, Pierce Brosnan, Saturn award winning, Patricia Clarkson, and the beautiful Rachel McAdams .

However I was pleasantly surprised, that I could add this film to a long list, of those, I had thoroughly enjoyed this year. Ira Sachs, who directs the film, won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, for his film ‘Forty Shades of Blue’.

Since that “life changing” experience, three years ago, the Memphis born director has gone from strength to strength. “In order to be successful, you have to believe in yourself. I think, for me, that has a lot to with my family. Some people become very successful with bad families but I had a loving family who made me believe I could do something with my life.”

Ira, who has lived in New York City since 1988, had been working hard a decade before he attained the recognition he deserved.

He explained his greatest influences and inspirations came while he lived in Europe: “In 1986 I lived in Paris while I was in college and spent most days in the movie theatres. I saw 195 films in a three month period.”

But things weren’t always easy for the ambitious teenager: “I took myself seriously from a very young age. I was fighting with Fassbinder in my head when I was 16.”

Ira, along with Oren Moverman, co-wrote the screenplay for ‘Married Life’, adapting John Binghams novel. Ira said: “People often say that you can make a movie out of a pulp fiction better than a movie out of a classic because there's something more you can play with. I think in a way that's the tension in the film, because it is a genre film on some level and yet it's told in a naturalistic fashion.”

‘Married Life’, is a film that follows the life of a married man who falls in love with a young war widow. He believes that it would be kinder to kill his wife than to leave her. Pierce Brosnan plays his best friend, who finds himself learning secrets from all three of the other characters. It is a story set in 1949 Seattle, and is the first film the award winning director has set in another period.

Ira interestingly explained: “Every time you make a film, you create a world. You make decisions about sets and costumes and you create a universe connected to reality but not reality itself. The year 1949 was a choice that we made and we were authentic to that choice. But as William Faulkner said, “The past isn't dead; it isn't even past.” Our parents, our grandparents, are like ourselves; they were full-blooded full-bodied people who had sex and fights and relationships and were not different from us. So even though it is set in another time, it is about us.”

Throughout the film there are some magnificent performances, particularly from Pierce Brosnan, who is still trying to shed his James Bond persona. This, however, wasn’t something Ira was particularly worried about as he admitted: “I have never seen him as James Bond.”

Despite his admission, Ira described Pierce as: “delicious”, adding: “I think he’s amazing. He is a great actor and a real gentleman."

Ira, who was last in Edinburgh at the age of 13, decided to cast Pierce after he had seen him in the ‘Matador’: “I was very taken with the humour in his performance in that. It was a really rich role for him in terms of humour. He’s a great physical comedian as well as an actor. He brings a lot of emotionality and vulnerability in his performance, which was important for a lot of reasons but especially because of his voiceover.”

Ira, 43, mentioned that Pierce Brosnan’s part would have been perfect for Cary Grant had the film been made in the forties: “Yes that’s true. I think Cary Grant and Pierce have a lot in common. They both have a physical charm. I also think that Chris Cooper has a certain quality you could associate with John Garfield or Edward G. Robinson. He’s vulnerable, easy to identify with and he has drive.”

By the end of the film I was slightly confused as to whether it had a happy ending. Ira gave me his thoughts saying: “I do think it is a happy ending because the characters understand themselves better. It is not insignificant to me that Cooper’s character knows very little about the three people he is intimate with at the beginning of the movie, but at the end he knows the most. At the end he says “L'chaim”, which means “To life!.” There is almost redemption here. It’s not scott free from the problems of human life but there is a better chance at an intimate relationship with the person you are with.”

Although it is a reasonably small production, its cast and director pack a strong punch, and hopes for success are high. Ira said: “It is about adults for adults. People used to go to movies to see their own lives played out on screen; now they go to TV for identification and movies for escape. This is a combination. It has glamour, movie stars, clothes, and fun; that brings people in. Underneath is something people can hold onto and that will resonate.”

So what’s next for the incredibly talented and friendly director: “I’m working on a film called ‘The Goodbye People’ based on the work of Gavin Lambert, a British screenwriter, who lived in L.A in the sixties. He wrote wonderful books about sex, drugs, cults, and movie stars.”

Before I left, Ira humbly said: “We’re all average Joes. Everyone came from somewhere to get where they are now. I started after becoming a theatre director throughout college."

He also offered a bit of advice for any wannabe film directors. “I would say to see everything you can see, particularly things that have been made in the past. I think it important to be passionate, and go out of your comfort zone.”

Married Life is released in U.K cinemas nationwide from 1st August 2008.

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James Davies interviews Keira Knightley and Sienna Miller at the Edinburgh International Film Festival 2008

 James with Kiera and Sienna 

Now in its 62nd year, The Edinburgh International Film Festival is the longest continuously running film festival in the world.

At this year’s opening, Edinburgh saw some of Hollywood’s biggest movie stars descend on the Scottish capital, stepping out onto the red carpet, at Fountainbridge, for the opening night of the this year’s festival.

They had all gathered together to attend the World premiere of ‘The Edge of Love’, a story about the famous Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas.

Keira Knightley and Sienna Miller joined Matthew Rhys, who plays Dylan, at the star-studded red-carpet opening, alongside Scotland’s most famous export and the festivals patron, Sir Sean Connery. The one time Bond actor was ‘achin’ but not stirred’, in a ‘shling’, if you’ll forgive the pun, after a golfing accident the week before.

Nevertheless, the Edinburgh born actor, who spent much of his early years living just down the road from the cinema, was in good spirits declaring: “It only hurts when I laugh. But it’s getting better.”

Sir Sean didn’t speak to the press, somewhat appropriately, reminding me of that that famous snippet of dialogue “Do you expect me to talk?”, that has attained an almost legendary status, in the Bond series, as 007 is on the verge of being emasculated by Goldfinger’s laser, in the 1964 epic.

Although ‘The Edge of Love’, opened the festival it was interestingly rejected for three possible categories at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, after it was called: ‘extremely disappointing’. This, however, was something that didn’t bother the film's director, John Maybury, as he is a big Edinburgh fan.

His film ‘Love is the Devil’, based on the life of the British artist Francis Bacon, won the festival’s major trophy, the Michael Powell Award, ten years ago. In fact, he called it: “one of the best festivals in the world… a real film festival about cinema, about film-making, not about commerce”.

He joked, to loud laughter, at the film’s press conference: “We are all chuffed to bits to be here. I'm really glad the French didn't take it for Cannes,” adding, “the French festival, for all its lustre, was partly a hideous trade fair.”

Most of the film was shot in Wales, Dylan Thomas’ home, and the country plays a key role in the film. Keira who plays Dylan’s lover, Vera, said: “We were in West Wales the whole time. It was idyllic and I’ve already been back for pleasure”, while Matthew Rhys explained enthusiastically: “It really was the dream job to go to Wales over the summer and play Dylan Thomas. Everything ticked the boxes, the script, the cast. It was great.”

Keira shot to fame at the tender age of 17, when she appeared in ‘Bend It Like Beckham’. Since then, it seems, she is always learning new skills for her films, whether it be playing football, or sword fighting. In this film she had to do all her singing.

She said: “I’d actually gone into a studio and recorded all the songs beforehand so I thought I’d be miming on set, but John Maybury, the director, came to me on the day and said no you are going to be singing it live in front of about two hundred people. I nearly died. But I was alright after someone kindly gave me a couple of shots of vodka.”

The film, which is by no means a bio-pic in the traditional vain, was written by Keira’s Mum, Sharman Macdonald. She said: “I’m absolutely delighted with it. It’s a gorgeous film. It was remarkably easy writing for my daughter. She just wouldn’t play the part I had written for her (laughs).”

After the films premiere, I headed to the Teviot Union, one of Edinburgh University’s older and more decorative structures in Bristo Square, after receiving an invite to the tightly guarded after party, where 40’s dress was a must. Given the media scrum that converged to catch Sienna and Keira on the red carpet, the heavy security was arguably quite a good thing.

Set out on three floors, the venue was fascinating. It was a labyrinthine maze full of staircases and rooms which had been tastefully converted to accommodate the 40s theme. Divided into ‘Dancehall’, for live acts , the ‘Loft Bar’, a place where people could go outside, the ‘Canteen’, where food was served, ‘the writing room’, for listening to the voice of Dylan Thomas, and the ‘Library Bar’, which was a beautifully old fashioned terrace bar on the ground floor with ornate fittings and, aptly, shelves of books around a balcony. There were also a number of ‘chill-out’ rooms where exhausted party goers could slump in elegant poses over an armchair or two.

The whole place was stuffed to the gills with dapperly attired men and glamorously draped women. Keira Knightley, Sienna Miller, and Matthew Rhys, all turned up at about ten o’clock, and watched Beth Rowley, who has been tipped, by ‘The Times’, as the next big thing, perform a beautiful set in the packed out Dancehall. The party went on long into the night, with an endless supply of food and drink, which made for a great atmosphere, setting the tone for what was still to come during the rest of the week.

 James at the opening of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (2008)