Отправлено: 02.03.08 00:39. Заголовок: Пресса о Колине #10

Предыдущая пресса закончилась здесь.
Продолжаем...

 Отправлено: 14.03.09 14:37. Заголовок: гор, спасибо! :sm47:..

гор, спасибо!

цитата:

Пригласивший Колина Ферта сниматься в своем фильме австралийский режиссер не может понять, в чем особая привлекательность этого британского актера.

Если бы не понимал, то и не пригласил бы!

 Отправлено: 14.03.09 18:00. Заголовок: Лора пишет: Если бы..

Лора пишет:

цитата:

Если бы не понимал, то и не пригласил бы!

Хто же их, режиссеров. знает... Да и не он приглашал, может быть, а продюсеры... Вот что он о Колине говорит в этой статейке:

Stephan was also happy to reveal some behind-the-scenes information about Colin Firth, known for his roles in Pride and Prejudice and Bridget Jones's Diary.
“Everything you think Colin Firth is, he is,” Stephan said. “Off-camera, he's quite a bit goofier ... but fun goofy, delightful goofy.
“When girls realise there's this much more approachable side to him, they just melt. It's very difficult. Of all of them, you can't walk the street with Colin.”

Англичанки наши, переведите грамотно, please!

 Отправлено: 14.03.09 22:37. Заголовок: Romi пишет: перевед..

Romi пишет:

цитата:

переведите грамотно, please!

Воистину любопытный он товарисч, Стивен этот Эллиот. Не могу удержаться:
(Но где дядя повторяется, я посокращала малость)

Эффектное возвращение

6:00a.m. 14th March 2009
| By Blythe Seinor

Каждый журналист мечтает взять интервью у такого режиссера, как австралиец Стивен Эллиот, потому что он не уклоняется от острых вопросов, более того, наслаждается ими. И к тому же охотно и откровенно скажет вам, что именно он думает о знаменитых актерах, которых знает, а таких немало.
«Поверьте, у меня после парочки таких интервью уже серьезные неприятности», говорит он. «Один-другой из тех, с кем я вроде бы прекрасно поладил на съемках, больше со мной не разговаривают. Я все пытаюсь исправить дело, но пока никак».
«Если ты хочешь раздавать интервью, и чтоб всем это было по шерстке, не говори правды».

За последние годы он имел дело с 4-мя кинозвездами – это неотразимец (черт, как перевести на русский heart-throb, a?) наш Колин Ферт, Джессика Бил, Бен Барнс и Кристин Скотт Томас – в новом его фильме Easy Virtue...

И Стивен признает, что напряженность на экране не совсем полностью наигранная.
«Великолепная Кристин например, вплывает на съемочную площадку, а тут я беру и напяливаю на нее седой парик, неуклюжий кардиган - и вот она выглядит гораздо хуже и старше, чем ей бы этого хотелось», поясняет он.
«И в этот момент со ступенек своего трейлера спускается Джессика, словно кинозвезда 30-х годов – это вовсе не радует Кристин, и это тоже вносит некоторое напряжение.
Между обеими дамами установились сердечные, но вовсе не приятельские за пределами киносъемок отношения. Они вполне осознанно держались подальше друг от друга.
И очень часто, оказавшись лицом к лицу, обе в самом деле испытывали некоторое недоуменное чувство друг к другу – и это просто клад для режиссера.
И так продолжалось до конца съемок – знаете, словно две кошки, что ходят кругами одна вокруг другой».

Не с меньшим удовольствием Стивен делится закулисными деталями о Колине Ферте, который прославился в ГиП и ДБД.
«Все, что воображают о Колине Ферте, правда. Только вне экрана он немного более неуклюж, неловок... но замечательно, очаровательно неловок.
Когда девушки обнаруживают, что есть эта более доступная в нем сторона, они просто тают. Это все здорово усложняет. Из-за них просто невозможно пройтись с ним по улице.

Два последних фильма Стивена просто провалились в прокате и он не собирался больше снимать. Тем более, когда он в 2004-м почти насмерть разбился в горах, переломав себе спину, ноги и таз. Так что казалось вопрос, как повторить успех фильма Priscilla, отошел на второй план, но на деле наоборот.
«Что случилось в 2004-м, привело обратно на съемки. До этого я хотел сменить профессию и что только не пробовал – даже посуду мыть.
Но перед лицом реальной гибели и драмы я очнулся и подумал – ты считал, что режиссер – тяжелая профессия, но по сравнению с тем, через что ты только что прошел – это совсем не так.
Это дало силы и решимость встряхнуться и сделать вторую попытку.


Пикантный несколько вопрос касательно того, как он выразился о Колине - это смотря по тому что он имел в виду под термином
goofy - в словаре есть такие определения, что можно и обидеться -
общ. отупевший; чокнутый; "поехавший"; дурацкий; дурной
разг. глупый; тупой; бестолковый
сленг влюблённый до безумия; бесхитростный; сходящий с ума
Я выбрала самое безобидное - ???

 Отправлено: 14.03.09 22:41. Заголовок: гор пишет: Я выбрал..

гор пишет:

цитата:

Я выбрала самое безобидное

Ну еще бы! Спасибо, солнце!

гор пишет:

цитата:

как перевести на русский heart-throb, a?)

Мультитран дает предмет обожания, предмет любви.

 Отправлено: 14.03.09 22:52. Заголовок: Лингва дает - сердце..

Лингва дает - сердцеед. Смысл и набор букв понятен, но просто мне эти слова не нравятся.
Хочется ему, неотразимому, придумать какой-нибудь потрясный эпитет.

 Отправлено: 14.03.09 23:03. Заголовок: гор пишет: Хочется ..

гор пишет:

цитата:

Хочется ему, неотразимому, придумать какой-нибудь потрясный эпитет.

Сердцеед — мужчина, пользующийся большим успехом у женщин; покоритель женских сердец.
Синонимы — бабник, женолюб, женолюбец, женоугодник, юбочник.

 Отправлено: 18.03.09 21:29. Заголовок: Статья на "Итали..

Статья на информационном портале "Италия по-русски" Колин Ферт обожает Италию, но ненавидит итальянское ТВ

 Отправлено: 18.03.09 21:36. Заголовок: ЭРА Спасибо! его су..

ЭРА
Спасибо!

цитата:

его супруга - итальянская актриса

Ну? Откуда?! Умиляюсь непрофессионализму...

 Отправлено: 18.03.09 21:43. Заголовок: «Я стараюсь не задум..

цитата:

«Я стараюсь не задумываться о том, каков я в кино, так как считаю, что делаю это плохо. Более того, должен признаться, что когда я вижу мое изображение на экране, то ненавижу себя. Я себя спрашиваю: кто это? Он напоминает мою мать»,- такие слова произнес Колин Ферт в ходе эксклюзивного интервью итальянскому информационному агентству ANSA.

Такая странная фраза, как будто он ненавидит своё изображение потому что оно напоминает ему его мать
Мне тоже всегда казалось, что Колин похож на маму

 Отправлено: 18.03.09 21:54. Заголовок: ЭРА пишет: Такая ст..

ЭРА пишет:

цитата:

Такая странная фраза

Да, прелести небось перевода. Тут явное не то.
И небось давно испорченного телефона в придачу. Мне так все кажется - это уже было сто раз и с теми же ошибками, типа Фицуильям Дарси тоже для простоты в Марка превращен, и уже давно.
Наверняка есть какие-то у них базы статей-данных, типа так, вот они и перекатывают оттуда.

Кстати, офф о плагиате.
Один из педагого-ученых в дебатах о списывании с интернета сказал - да, списывают школьники все свои сочинения и работы из инета, ну и что? Это ж не значит, что надо поотменять эти задания-сочинения.
Вот, например, диссертации тоже списывают, но ведь нельзя сказать, что от них никакой пользы.
Убийственный аргумент. А какая польза - прибавка к зарплате? Тогда школьникам - точно что никакой.

 Отправлено: 20.03.09 15:06. Заголовок: Здесь о том, как Кол..

Здесь о том, как Колин узнал о смерти Наташи.

http://www.suntimes.com/entertainment/zwecker/1486516,CST-FTR-zp20.article


Colin Firth, a good friend and former co-star of Richardson's, received the terrible news of her death via cell phone at the Goodman Theatre Wednesday evening. The actor, along with his son Will, attended a preview of Regina Taylor's ''Magnolia,'' then caught a late dinner afterward at Petterino's. The popular Englishman graciously signed autographs and said he was particularly interested in the Southern accents in ''Magnolia,'' as he will need one for an upcoming film.

Firth was scheduled to again work with Richardson on the London stage -- also joined by the actress' Oscar-winning mother, Vanessa Redgrave.

 Отправлено: 20.03.09 17:27. Заголовок: Первая фраза понятна..

Первая фраза понятна -

Колин Ферт, хороший друг и в прошлом партнер по фильмам Наташи Ричардсон узнал ужасную новость по сотовому в Goodman Theatre в среду вечером. Актер присутствовал там вместе с сыном Уиллом на пред-просмотре пьесы ''Magnolia.''

Позже был на ужине в Petterino. Известный англичанин любезно раздавал автографы и сказал, что ему особенно был интересен южный акцент в пьесе, потому что он ему понадобится в будущем фильме.
(Regina Taylor’s Magnolia, an adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard - это пьеса по мотивам Чеховского "Вишневого сада", об угрожающем состоянии поместья на юге США, в Атланте).

Вторая по моей версии звучит так:
Ферт был включен в состав с Ричардсон на Лондонской сцене - приглашен оскароносной матерью актрисы, Ванессой Редгрейв.
Но что-то я не очень уверена - впервые слышим о будущей работе на сцене?

Прямо об этом никто не говорил, и он тоже. (90% "намерений" в их актерской карьере остаются на уровне слов и предположений. Впрочем, как и в любом бизнесе, ИМХО.)

Значит, он и впрямь в Чикаго, и будет сниматься в "Главной улице".
Но не заезжим будет англичанином, а пришлым на Север южанином. Однако....

 Отправлено: 20.03.09 19:08. Заголовок: гор пишет: впервые ..

гор пишет:

цитата:

впервые слышим о будущей работе на сцене?

Угу, я подумала, что ошиблась с переводом. А было бы здорово...

 Отправлено: 21.03.09 15:59. Заголовок: The Perfect Man Бол..

The Perfect Man

Большущее интервью. click here




Скрытый текст

The Perfect Man Interview: IT ALL SEEMS so normal. A long car journey through a winter landscape acquires an element of fun as an American mother encourages her daughters in a guessing game at which the younger child is very good, or so it seems. The triumphant little girl becomes dangerously excited and in a split second the joy turns into tragedy. Their father, an Englishman, is left to make sense of his own grief as well as the respective resentment and guilt dividing his two daughters. The chance of teaching in Italy presents the family with a year away from the US and the legacy of an accident that should never have happened. Genova is British director Mike Winterbottom’s first movie in five years. It marks a brilliant return to film and, drawing on his various strengths, including documentary film-making, it is his finest work to date. Either way, it is a remarkable piece, intense, believable, beautifully shot and sufficiently shocking to have a viewer gagging with terror. There are elements of the surreal as a benign presence becomes sinister. It is as much a thriller as it is a faltering romance. And yet again it demonstrates the subtle, persuasive gifts of the most sympathetic, and understated of actors, Colin Firth. Playing the bereaved father Joe, Firth is caught between the contrasting needs of 10-year-old Mary, tormented by nightmares and bedwetting, and the more complex tensions introduced by Kelly, her 16-year-old sister, bored by adolescence. It is a movie of unexpected power. Firth seems genuinely pleased and admits to being very taken with it. “I keep looking at it and I have to say I’m quite besotted by it. It’s beautiful and it’s real. It’s also quite different, Mike uses a small camera. It’s really opened my eyes to the wonders of working in natural light.” He refers to the contrasts: “The sharp, blinding sunlight and those long, dark alleys.” There is also the contrast between the snow and ice of the opening sequence and the subsequent summer haze of Genoa where most of the film is set. Firth looks me straight in the eye, and speaks about the new movie with all the enthusiasm of someone who sat in the audience instead of being the star. “It’s about grief and the way people deal with it. It’s also looking at a particular family and how love is tested.” Any parent watching it will experience several pangs of recognition. A father of a grown son and more recently two younger boys by his Italian wife, Firth is very good with children and his scenes with the little girl who plays his daughter in Genova are convincingly affectionate. Also moving is his growing helplessness in dealing with his angry older daughter played by the assured Willa Holland. One magnificently well shot sequence in which the younger girl attempts to cross a busy street is terrifying. Having seen Firth in so many movies it is a bit odd to be meeting him in person in a Dublin hotel. There is no affectation, no pretence, no theory; he says acting is about “suspending disbelief”. He is handsome without being sexually intimidating and often smiles that sweet quick little smile that some of his characters use to great effect. Mention him to anyone, male or female, and the response is invariably the same; people like Colin Firth. Some, myself included, went to see Mamma Mia! only because he was in it. The child actors who worked with him on Emma Thompson’s Nanny McPhee consistently remind their own parents of how nice he is, while his performance as Mr Darcy did more for Jane Austen than an army of admiring literary critics. On a Friday afternoon, he looks more like an off-duty vet or doctor than an actor; in fact he speaks like a lively academic and is decidedly unactorly. This observation makes him laugh. Interested in books, he has always read a lot and likes history, the subject his father studied at Cambridge. “My grandfather went to Oxford, he read theology.” Firth does not belong to that precocious Oxbridge set of British actors. He didn’t go to university and still seems more surprised than regretful about missing out on the experience. “I didn’t do that well at school, I don’t know, I wasn’t focused at the time . . . I don’t really know what happened.” He still seems a bit mystified, but not at all defensive about it, as if he is merely trying to figure out what happened. His reading has filled many of the gaps and he researches his roles well, often continuing the reading after the shoot is over, such as when he was in Conspiracy (for which he got an Emmy nomination) and became interested in Albert Speer. No, even if the famous Victorian actor/manager Henry Irving is a distant relative by marriage, Firth is not a typical actor, much less a movie star. He laughs on hearing this, and says of acting: “Well, it’s kept me amused”. It has also kept him in work; Firth is in demand and has never been short of a role. His range is impressive from the obsessed Arsenal supporter in Fever Pitch to the world-weary Roman soldier in The Lost Legion, to a detached Vermeer in Girl with a Pearl Earring, in which he showed how ruthless an artist can be. Few actors can convey the uptight Englishman as well as Firth does; he can look heartbroken as he did in Love, Actually – but is also a good comic actor and is the only saving grace in The Accidental Husband. He has been in two of the most successful British films ever made, The English Patient and Shakespeare in Love. “I don’t think many people noticed that I was in Shakespeare in Love; there I was, the only one of all my colleagues not winning awards or being nominated and in a film celebrating poetry and language and love and beauty, and I was this miserable fellow with no imagination, no romance in me. I’m rather fond of my Wessex.” His character, Lord Wessex, is the bankrupt aristocrat intent on marrying Gwyneth Paltrow’s Lady Violet De Lesseps, who is secretly in love with Shakespeare. Wessex, says Firth, “can’t even tell her what he admires about her – is it her eyes or her lips? – he is utterly indifferent, and just wants to solve his problem”, which amounts to the funding of his ships heading to the New World. Being in the film was exciting, and Firth became interested in Elizabethan politics and read widely on the subject. He seems to have the sort of mind that, once it gets drawn to a subject, quickly becomes immersed. “I’ve always liked reading, and when I was approached about The English Patient I was very pleased with myself because I had already discovered Ondaatje and had read Coming Through Slaughter and Running in the Family.” How about In the Skin of the Lion? “Oh yes,” he smiles, “I’d read that. Did you know that some of the characters from that were in The English Patient?” Like a child playing snap, I say: “Caravaggio”. Firth smiles and describes how the late Anthony Minghella had read the novel “and just put it away, left it for a while, and then wrote his version of it, as an impression instead of an adaptation”. In the film, Firth played the doting husband of Katharine who, though only a minor character in the novel, becomes central to the film as the lover of the English patient. “Her character was the one that most struck Anthony. Interesting?” he asks, as much as states. Interviews promoting new movies are part of an actor’s job, but Firth manages to turn an interview into a conversation. Yet with the clock ticking and the publicist waiting in an alcove off the room, it is a race against time. Asked about one of his earliest roles, that of a young shell-shocked soldier in Pat O’Connor’s crafted A Month in the Country, he says: “I did like that; it is the one film I would like to see again.” Based on JL Carr’s novel, it tells the story of Tom Birkin, who arrives at a Yorkshire village in the summer of 1920. Hired to uncover a medieval mural known to be painted above the nave in the local church, Birkin is troubled. The war has left him with various twitches and a stammer. Another new arrival is Moon, another war veteran, played by Kenneth Branagh. His job is to locate the burial place of a wealthy woman’s ancestor. While Birkin is falling in love with the vicar’s wife, Moon is greatly taken with the moody, rather beautiful Birkin. Firth gives an inspired performance which also revealed what have become two of his great strengths as an actor: his ability to let his expressive face and eyes convey volumes, and his flair for playing well off his colleagues. Watching that movie now not only makes one conscious of how young they both were, but how good they were at such an early stage of their careers. “I think good acting makes good acting. I’ve never understood why actors choose to act in solitude, or why they are so competitive. It is more of a team thing. I enjoy having someone to work with rather than against.” In Another Country (1984) Firth featured as Judd, the independent idealist at a boarding school apparently based on Eton. His classmate is the openly homosexual Guy, no doubt intended to be Burgess, played by Rupert Everett. The two have a natural rapport and brought this dynamic to a lively film version of The Importance of Being Earnest in 2002. They also appeared in a subversive remake of the British comic classic, St Trinian’s, with Everett playing the headmistress to Firth’s Education Minister with a mission to clean up the bankrupt and anarchic St Trinian’s – his mission was compromised by the minister’s having had a previous relationship with the headmistress. Most recently, Firth played a distressed, confused son to Jim Broadbent’s overbearing Dad in And When Did You Last See Your Father? based on poet Blake Morrison’s memoir of a complex, ambivalent father/son relationship. Handsome, intelligent, witty, approachable, sincere, manly, soothing voice, looks good on a horse – what more could one possibly ask for? Speaking with Firth is enjoyable, even if the conversation is racing between topics because of the time restraint. Ironically, it had started rather badly. When the hotel receptionist had failed to locate Firth I was given a swipe card and directions to the suite. A strange conversation in the lift with a guest who looked like a spy was interrupted when a tall, slim man and a small woman entered the lift. The man was Firth. He and the woman were having an animated conversation. When the lift stopped, they got out, and so did I. Their conversation continued; Firth, with his slightly awkward elegance, was gesturing, telling a funny story, and the woman was laughing. Close on their heels, I followed, too awkward to say anything. It is unlikely that the hotel corridor was about a mile long although it seemed so as I lurched along behind them. The woman looked around and asked, “Are you following us?”. Firth took off his glasses, peered like a schoolmaster and muttered, “You could have introduced yourself.” It was a Mr Darcy moment. My excuse about not wanting to interrupt them sounded feeble even to me. But the ground failed to open. I could hear my words spoken some months earlier announcing that there were only two actors I wanted to interview: Johnny Depp because he is so weird; and Colin Firth because he was so gorgeous . . . I mean, such a fine actor. “Both of my parents were born in India. I grew up all over England, well, mainly the south, the Home Counties.” His Englishness manages to avoid the stereotypes while also being used to great effect, such as in Genova. There is a terrific scene following his wife’s funeral when Firth the Englishman is having a half-hearted conversation with his American in-laws. The cultural distance seems to echo the sense of shock. Referring to the part he plays in Atom Egoyan’s dark, unsettling movie, Where the Truth Lies, Firth says, “You know in the book, my character was an Italian American, and I didn’t mind playing that — I can do an American. But Atom decided I should make use of my Englishness, that’s what happened there.” It is a dark, stylish piece, screened amid controversy at Cannes in 2005. Firth is one half of a nightclub act, the other half being Kevin Bacon. Again, the partnership was electric. “Kevin is such a fine actor, you have no choice but to perform well.” It was also a daring role for Firth: “My character was violent, sadistic, sexually deviant, and so on.” It is strange to be discussing Where The Truth Lies when so many people immediately think of Firth as the attractive, uptight lawyer in the Bridget Jones movies. Yet even those romps which made so much money had certain “Mr Darcy” in-jokes, as did St Trinian’s. Does he mind being asked about Pride and Prejudice? “No, not at all.” Is it not true that Firth is irritated by the way that role continues to stalk him? “No. I know that there is this perception that I’m sick of it, but I never said that, and I’m not. It is odd, though, because it was so successful, but for me it was a five-week shoot and then I went on to do other things. That’s the way it is, you move on from jobs to the next one before the other one is finished; the acting is over, but the other work is still going on.” Had he read Austen? Was he conscious of portraying a character who is so much part of his tradition? “I had never read Austen. I was conscious of her, that school I was in at Eastleigh, near Chichester cathedral, where she is buried. I’d never read her because I thought she was just for girls,” he laughs at himself, “but also, at that age, I was more interested in reading Sartre and Camus, I wanted to be brooding and existentialist. I never studied Shakespeare either, until I went to drama school. But when I read Pride and Prejudice, I loved it. I couldn’t believe what I had been missing out on and read all the novels.” How about Persuasion? He would be a good Wentworth. “No, I’m probably past it now.” How about playing Henchard in The Mayor of Casterbridge? “That’s my favourite novel; Henchard is a fascinating character because he has flaws and he has done this terrible thing and had had to live with it,” says Firth, who reckons humans are more interesting than heroes. In the forthcoming film of The Picture of Dorian Gray, Firth plays Lord Henry Wotton, while Dorian is the young English actor Ben Barnes, who played Firth’s son in Easy Virtue, based on the Noël Coward play. Released last year, it is a stylish period comedy, with Firth as a disillusioned ex-soldier. He was pleased with the movie, and says: “It has done very well in Italy, but got mixed reviews over here.” How does Firth feel about Mamma Mia!? “That was great fun, I was delighted to be asked to be in it, it wasn’t easy singing and all that . . . but I knew that it was going to be a big hit and fun, and it was great being part of it.” His nostalgic solo in the boat was very good. “Why, thank you,” he says. He seems a contented person, neither complacent nor smug. He mentions Tennessee Williams’ plays and is intrigued to hear that the short stories are even better. Mention of a German novel that would make a fine film causes him to praise Downfall and The Lives of Others. In between all the films, the jobs, the reading,Firth is involved in promoting fair trade for producers in Third World countries. Initially, when he was approached by Oxfam in 2003 he was wary of becoming a token celebrity. But he looked at it in a practical way. “I went to Ethiopia to see for myself. You know, we are all complicit in this exploitation, every time you buy something that has been produced for nothing by a person who has no say, no rights. Ethiopia is beautiful and the people are dignified, but the poverty . . . I thought it would really get to me, but in fact it was far worse when I came home and saw us all drinking our cappuccinos and not thinking about the real costs. The farmer you see doesn’t realise how much we pay for his coffee. He gets so little, he thinks we get it for free. My involvement started as symbolic, but it quickly became personal.” Through his involvement with Progreso, of which he is a director, he has made his celebrity work with a shop in Chiswick (Ecò Age Ltd), which sells a wide range of fair trade goods. Just one final question: did he do his own riding as Mr Darcy? “I did indeed,” he says proudly. “Recently I was in something else and my character had to ride a horse, and I thought, ‘Oh I’m getting on a bit, get someone else to do it’, but when I watched him, I didn’t think the double was doing that well. So I decided I’d do it myself – and I did.” This article appears in the print edition of the Irish Times

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Interview: Colin Firth Monday, March 23, 2009, 09:30 GOING from big budget musical Mamma Mia! to working on Michael Winterbottom's understated drama Genova would have been a demanding task for many actors, but seasoned British star Colin Firth took the transition in his stride. Whereas Mamma Mia! was filmed on a vibrant Greek island, amid a cast of hundreds, Genova was filmed with a minimal crew around the backstreets of the Italian city Genoa. Over-the-top song and dance numbers were traded for emotion-wrought scenes, as Colin adopted the role of a father who takes his two daughters to Italy after their mother dies. "The film set was a very intimate and spare environment, it was really just the four walls or the street. There were no lights, no cables, no paraphernalia," the 48-year-old actor says. "It also meant there was no waiting around for people to build trains or any of the preparations you normally have to wait for. It was just us, playing family." Since he made his name in 1995 as the dashing Mr Darcy in the BBC's iconic adaptation of Pride And Prejudice, Colin has carved a career playing both straight and comic roles, from The English Patient to St. Trinian's and of course Mamma Mia!. Colin says he was always keen to work with Winterbottom, the British director of A Mighty Heart and 24 Hour Party People, and jumped at the chance to make Genova, even though it meant commuting to Italy from Pinewood or Greece during breaks from Mamma Mia!. "There is an immediacy to Michael's films and they never take an obvious approach. They're never trying to hit the usual buttons and tick the usual boxes," he says. Winterbottom comes from a documentary-making background and is renowned for his low-key method of filmmaking. He doesn't rehearse his actors, he lets them improvise and he never says 'action'. Colin says the experience was a refreshing change from all the hanging about in trailers and endless takes that happen on normal film sets. "It's sort of a blurring of your life with what's going on in front of the camera and if you show up at nine o'clock to the flat where you're filming the scene, the chances are the camera will be pretty well rolling by the time you walk in and you just start. "He Winterbottom makes use of a script, but you're free to depart from it and if you want to leave the room and go out and get on a bus, the camera will follow you." The film is shot almost like a loving tribute to the Italian city, with its beautiful buildings, sandy beaches and maze of narrow sidestreets. Hampshire-born Colin has long had a fascination with Italy. He met his Italian documentary-maker wife Livia Giuggioli on the set of 1996 miniseries Nostromo and the couple now split their time between homes in Italy and England with their two bilingual sons Luca and Matteo. But he says watching the film re-ignites his passion for the country, and particularly Genoa. "It's very much a character in the film. I've seen it several times and I fall in love with the town, I'm addicted to it for that reason. I love the sound and I love the feeling of the place, it makes me want to go back." The plot follows the fortunes of Joe (Colin), an English academic in America, who heads to Europe with his daughters, 16-year-old Kelly (The O.C.'s Willa Holland) and 10-year-old Mary (Perla Haney-Jardine), six months after his wife dies in a car crash. When they arrive in Genoa, the family are helped to settle in by Barbara (Catherine Keener), an old friend of Joe's. While Kelly throws herself into her new life, mixing with Genoa's young people, Mary suffers from terrible nightmares and sees the ghost of her mother in the streets. Although Colin has two children of his own, he says he didn't need to draw on his experiences of fatherhood for the role. "If you're a storyteller, you can't use anything other than yourself, so it's all bound to be coming out in some way. "But the thing I'm more conscious of is that the inspiration is not so much my own life, but the actual girls that I had in front of me and the story that we were telling. I don't think I needed to have kids to believe this," he adds. "Willa and Perla were both very loveable people and if you hear one of them shrieking at night, and we filmed at night, the sense of the complete powerlessness of wanting to help a child who is suffering that much, I think you'd feel that whether you were a dad or not." Genova deals with the themes of death and grief in a sensitive, yet open way, which Colin found incredibly refreshing. "Death is probably the biggest taboo in our society. I remember when my great grandmother died when I was seven. I wanted to go to the funeral and I was kept away because they thought it would upset me and there was this big dirty secret somehow about it all. "Death is something we don't face very easily head-on, but we also don't know what the protocols are to deal with grieving people, it's not very social. We kind of want people to get over it to the point where they are fun again. "In the film, my character is hanging on to the everyday as if his life depends on it and if he stops and thinks about how much pain he's in, he can't be there for his daughters," Colin continues. "However much each of them is suffering, it's very difficult to help each other or connect, however much they love each other, it's very hard to take away each other's pain." While the small cast was given no time to rehearse their sometimes emotional scenes, the director made sure they bonded as a family by giving them various tasks. "He said 'here's some money, go and buy food and make lunch'. Nobody really wanted to, it's like when you're a kid and your mum says 'go and play with my friend's kid'," Colin laughs. "But by the end of two hours, you do know each other better and trust starts to build up." The film was made on such a meagre budget that real – sometimes scary - residents appear in background shots instead of extras. "There was this mad bald lady who came out, holding a wig stand and saying 'you cannot come here, you cannot bring children here, get out of here now!' "It's clearly not safe, but then you suddenly come out in this burnished, clean piazza in the blazing sun and it all feels safe again. The film reproduces that, we're lost in an alley and suddenly here we are." While it may not be a Hollywood blockbuster, Colin believes films like Genova may be the way forward in the current economic climate. "I wonder if these sort of low cost ventures are going to become more common, where you don't have vast sums of money that you have to go to a studio for. "You still have to finance it, but I wonder if there's going to be more emphasis on people's independence of thought rather than whatever calculations the market's demanding." Genova is released in cinemas on Friday March 27 KATE WHITING