At 37degrees South, Emile Sherman was interviewed by Sandy George. From the pinnacle of independent success, he reveals his particular mix of idealism and clear-eyed common sense.
“It opens a lot of doors, and you are taken more seriously, but if people don`t like the project they are not going to do it because of you.” Emile Sherman is reflecting bluntly on the wildest ride of his life, which gave him and Iain Canning the Oscar for Best Film.
Now he is back to pushing projects, knowing he is only as good as his last film. Since The King`s Speech he has brought his producer`s touch to Shame, The Top of the Lake, Dead Europe, and the current project, Tracks.
Sandy George, in the interrogator`s chair, asked him if the Oscar made him happy, or “did it ruin everything because there`s nowhere to go now?”
“It didn`t worry me too much,” he replied. “It`s going to be a long, slow descent to the grave, and as long as it is slow, I am happy.”
It is difficult for Sherman to reflect on why The King`s Speech was so successful, because he was steeped in it through the script, the shoot, the rushes and the myriad cuts. But he did say that “It is the emotion, really. It is always the emotion which takes a film beyond a small audience to a broader audience.”
He has kept that focus with Tracks, the story of Robyn Davidson`s epic interior and physical journey with four camels and a dog across Australia. “I know that if there isn`t that emotional moment at the end, if it doesn`t really let people in emotionally in the third act, it is going to be a beautifully shot travel movie.”
On Tracks, “it was relatively simple to work out the story beats, but we spent a lot of time working out what the story was actually about, and what story we are telling beyond the physical survival story.”
Oranges and Sunshine, about the forced removal of British orphans to Australia, was similar. “I just found it a very emotional script, and I thought, if I react like this to the script and the film turns out even half as well, it will find an audience because people do want to connect, to humanity really…”
What kind of films are he attracted to? They involve a journey into another world, and “they are always focused on some kind of meaning. We spend a lot of time, Ian and I where are asking what exactly is this film saying? We don`t want to just tell a story for the sake of the story, we want to work out what I it is actually saying. We feel we can grab on, finally, to what the film is about, to what the meaning is.
“By meaning, I am not trying to reduce it to a simplistic meaning. I think we are not looking for answers, but maybe questions. But at least what is it grappling with? That is what we have been drawn to across the list of films.”
His slate is loaded with adaptations, as a matter of convenience. The basis of them is already created, so it is easier to bring the elements of the production together. But he also argues that “really good writers don`t have the time to write original screenplays, it seems. You never get a great writer submitting an original screenplay – it is mediocre to submit. In fact really good writers are being commissioned and getting paid.”
He makes the selection process on projects sound fairly easy, with a checklist which makes sense to any producer with the luxury of combing through extremely good options. What is the essence of the story? What are we trying to say? Who are the creative people? What are the options around financing and budget? What sort of film in terms of marketplace? Does it need wide or niche release?
It seems that Emile has now sidestepped the passion for new voices and edgy next-gen players which propelled many of the landmark films of the last decade. Instead, he is building the creative talent of the team around the picture.
“We are quite focused on working with really top directors, because they are the driver for attracting cast, and to attract top directors you need really great material. It`s that chase,” he said.
He argues that the English industry retains its classy directors well enough to attract major actors to a British film, or a film which is ultimately English. Then, “it becomes a presellable movie at a certain budget level and the whole thing starts making sense.
He used the chicken-and-egg analogy several times. Credible projects need credible directors, but they have to be secured with something else that is credible.. and that means scripts. But there is a peculiarly Australian twist to that problem.
“A lot of really good Australian writers are now writing for English or American production companies and studios, because we can`t afford them. So, again, it becomes a question of development funding,” he said.
“And having the relationship with really top Australian writers so they trust you [to create a film] rather than going to the next job with an overseas company.”
The ducking and weaving to develop a package is revealed by the key creatives on Tracks,on which he has taken three years to “find something that is a big enough Australian story, that has a director who is going to be able to excite actors, and as a package will be able to excite the presale market.”
John Curran, the director, is American born, made the short, Down, Rusty Down, followed by his first feature, Praise, then We Don`t Live Here Anymore, made in the US with Naomi Watts taking a producer credit, and a version of Somerset Maugham`s The Painted Veil, which starred Naomi Watts because she had become bankable after Mulholland Drive, and she brought Curran with her… and so on [according to WikipediaM, which at least demonstrates the pattern].
Now, the picture has grown Mia Wasikowska. You can imagine the conversation with her agent. As Emile said, “Every day I am dealing with agents in the US and making them feel that we are a safe home for that actor, for that director. Take them off that other movie because this one is really going to happen.”
Sherman is optimistic about the Australian industry, and sees real potential in the quality indy space now vacated by the studios. But emphasises the need to “lift up the level of our films in terms of the cast and the directors we work with, and writers -of course – as well.”
This may seem like a relentless search up the totem pole of industry-endorsed talent, but Sherman insists that See-Saw Films is more diverse than that.
“We always want to find interesting directors,” he said, “and first time directors on smaller movies.” The point seems to be the project, and its central concerns, and whether they are fundamentally excited by them. That tends not to include genre; horror is not their thing, and the thrillers they have been involved with were too driven by their genre to interest them.
“The thing that is the hardest to do as a producer is to let go of projects,” he said.”There is this discussion all the time about producers need to be tenacious, to never say no, never let go no matter what anyone says – they may not know anything.
“And that is true, and there are occasional successes, but for every success there are probably 99.9 percent should have been let go for a reason, and that is they are not very good – and the producer knows it is not very good. So I think to be able to let the project go is the most courageous and the most freeing thing.
“It`s a bit like breaking up, isn`t it? You agonise over it and you think of every reason why actually all things considered they are a good partner, and you do it, and then you think wow, I should have done that ages ago.
Obviously you have to be tenacious, but you have to be more doubtful than tenacious, I think.”
David Tiley
Screen Hub 6 August 2012