{"id":249033,"date":"2021-05-13T22:00:50","date_gmt":"2021-05-13T19:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/profile-director-interview-timur-bekmambetov-film\/"},"modified":"2021-05-13T22:00:50","modified_gmt":"2021-05-13T19:00:50","slug":"profile-director-interview-timur-bekmambetov-film","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/profile-director-interview-timur-bekmambetov-film\/","title":{"rendered":"#Profile Director Interview: Timur Bekmambetov \u2013 \/Film"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Profile Director Interview: Timur Bekmambetov \u2013 \/Film<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n

\"profile<\/p>\n

It\u2019s fitting interviewing director\u00a0Timur Bekmambetov\u00a0<\/strong>over Zoom. Towards the end of the conversation, when the pleasantries and goodbyes were over, something about my reaction to finishing the call made him say \u201cYou see!\u201d I didn\u2019t see. Maybe he saw how exhausted I actually was the morning of the interview after I hit pause on the recording and was exiting the digital room. I imagined he got a kick out of seeing something surprising over Zoom, something he wouldn\u2019t have gotten over a phone call \u2013 my true face of the day following a jovial conversation.<\/p>\n

Maybe I\u2019m projecting, but\u00a0something<\/em>\u00a0had the director of Night Watch\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0Wanted\u00a0<\/em>exclaiming in excitement. \u201cYou see!\u201d<\/p>\n

I could see his true joy for the screenlife format at that moment. I got to hear all about his passion for it during the interview, but seeing it, especially over Zoom, made the filmmaker\u2019s love for the modern technique all the more tangible. The director\u2019s belief in this format, which tells stories entirely through computer and phone screens, is strong.
\nHe\u2019s already produced several movies<\/a> using screenlife, including\u00a0Unfriended\u00a0<\/em>and one of the most original thrillers of the past few years,\u00a0Searching<\/em>. Now, Bekmambetov has directed his very own thriller using screenlife:\u00a0Profile<\/strong><\/em>. It\u2019s based on a true story about a journalist (played by\u00a0Valene Kane<\/strong>) trying to infiltrate ISIS, to see how they recruit young women. Naturally, things go wrong.<\/p>\n

Bekmambetov wants to push the boundaries of screenlife \u2013 and he thinks it is the future of moviemaking.<\/p>\n

More than ever with Profile\u00a0<\/em>you\u00a0test the boundaries of what you can do with this format, especially given the subject matter. Did you know from the beginning this story was right for screenlife?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes. Over the last seven years, I\u2019ve been looking for stories you can\u2019t tell otherwise than using screenlife. This is a story clearly for screenlife. They never met each other. I read the book and thought it was perfect material for a screenlife movie. It all happ<\/a>ened online. It was challenging because the book is not just genre; it\u2019s also a little drama. Dramatically, it\u2019s dense. There is an arc.
\nI thought it\u2019d be best to do it myself because it was very promising and challenging. I was trying to develop the language. I\u2019ve been doing it with other filmmakers, too, but for me, this was an interesting experiment. I thought, can I make a very emotional, nuanced story with screenlife?<\/p>\n

And with a potentially unreliable protagonist you start to question.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes, yes. The movie has a lot of layers. First of all, it\u2019s an interesting cinematic experiment. Second, politically, it\u2019s very edgy. It\u2019s not about ISIS at all, it\u2019s about us and how we live. With this guy, he\u2019s just a boy from London. They were once neighbors. They probably ate the same ice cream and sang the same songs. It was a real story, too, that was important to me. I had a chance to talk to her before I made the movie. She even presented me with her real laptop with her real screengrabs. It is so scary and real. Then, I had a light tower, knowing where to go.<\/p>\n

Due to the pandemic, life-changing conversations and relationships have developed over Zoom. How do you think the last year will have influenced how people look at screenlife movies?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think we were a little bit ahead of the time with screenlife. COVID really changed the world. Now, no one has the question, do we need screenlife? It is a way to talk about us, our civilization, our lives, our wishes, everything, that traditionally can\u2019t always capture. I mean, right now, you see a guy holding a phone. Now, you look in the phone, you see a guy robbing a bank or saying goodbye to his wife. There\u2019s a lot of drama. If you see the actual screen, you\u2019ll understand what\u2019s happening in their lives.
\nDirectors almost always used to say how boring it is to film characters talk on phones or typing on computers.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes. Without screenlife, it is boring. It\u2019s not cinematic. Nothing is happening. When you see the screen, you are really with the character. What\u2019s interesting is, the screenlife can show the inner life of the character. From what you see on the screen, you can get a sense of a character. Like, if somebody is looking up how to buy a cheap dog, you can assume he\u2019s probably lonely. It takes 10 seconds to show he\u2019s lonely rather than minutes in traditional filmmaking.<\/p>\n

Is more control than traditional filmmaking a part of the appeal, too?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is, but it is one of the biggest challenges. You change the story 100% until the end of editing. You can change a lot. You can change too much. With traditional movies, you have the script, the shoot, and the edit. You can change, but you can\u2019t change too much. Until the last second with screenlife, you can alter or change the whole story. It is one of the biggest changes. At the same time, you\u2019re right. Screenlife is almost, like, writing. Every person can write a book. You just need a pen and paper. It\u2019s the same with screenlife. It\u2019s almost the same. You don\u2019t need a lot of resources. You don\u2019t need 100 people or a team.<\/p>\n

Having to work with a lot of people, especially all the cooks in the kitchen on a Hollywood production, did you get tired of that?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I did, I did. The whole thing happened for two reasons. Yes, when you\u2019re making a movie for over $100 million, there are a lot of scared people. It is normal and it\u2019s understandable, so you feel a responsibility. You don\u2019t have a lot of freedom. You can feel that in theaters today. You see 99% of movies made by a collective brain and made by formulas. You feel it. With screenlife, because it\u2019s not expensive, you can make your own choices. It is very important. That\u2019s one thing, but another thing is, how many movies really surprised you in the last five or ten years?
\nIt\u2019s a low number. Maybe a few a year?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Unfortunately, maybe I\u2019m wrong, but I\u2019m not surprised anymore. There are a lot of movies and a lot of good stories, but aesthetically, there\u2019s not much new in the last 10 or 15 years, like\u00a0The Matrix<\/em>. There\u2019s nothing new.<\/p>\n

What about\u00a0Mad Max: Fury Road<\/em>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes, it\u2019s good, but in general<\/a>, when I\u2019m in a theater, I feel I see something similar. You know,\u00a0Tony Scott\u00a0<\/strong>was someone experimenting with a new language, aesthetically. Then, over the last few years, that experimenting is gone. With screenlife, real experiments can happen.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s fitting you mention Tony Scott. He had his finger on the pulse, knowing how fast audiences can take in visual information. With screenlife, too, you seem to do the same for younger audiences.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes. Tony Scott or Baz Luhrmann, they were surprising. There was a moment, like the MTV era. It was like a big earthquake. Then, we got good stories and good movies, but not something surprising, aesthetically. It\u2019s why I believe screenlife is the future and revolutionary. It\u2019s not only a new way to tell stories but a new way to tell a story about the new world. Like, it\u2019s a new world with new rules, new characters, and even the dead living with us, like dead people still having accounts on the Internet. We will continue to try to understand our new lives in this new world.<\/p>\n

I see you are a fan of a Russian hockey player.<\/p>\n

[Note: Timur noticed a framed Alex Ovechkin jersey in the background]<\/p>\n

Greatest hockey player in the world. You a fan?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes, yes.<\/p>\n

This reminds me, I have to ask about\u00a0Night Watch\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0Day Watch<\/em>. Those were such groundbreaking Russian movies.<\/b><\/p>\n

Okay, so I have a question for you. Next time you watch\u00a0Night Watch\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0Day Watch<\/em>, look for two scenes in screenlife. I forgot about them, but a few weeks ago, I found them. In\u00a0Night Watch<\/em>, it\u2019s a big scene. In\u00a0Day Wach<\/em>, there\u2019s a total screenlife scene.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll look for that next time. Are you still interested in making the third film in that series?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Okay, it must be screenlife. It will be screenlife. Where do the dark ones and light ones live today? In a digital space. I think it will happen in screenlife.<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

Profile<\/em> arrives on May 14, 2021<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

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Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#Profile Director Interview: Timur Bekmambetov \u2013 \/Film” It\u2019s fitting interviewing director\u00a0Timur Bekmambetov\u00a0over Zoom. Towards the end of the conversation, when the pleasantries and goodbyes were over, something about my reaction to finishing the call made him say \u201cYou see!\u201d I didn\u2019t see. Maybe he saw how exhausted I actually was the morning of the interview…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":249034,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/d13ezvd6yrslxm.cloudfront.net\/wp\/wp-content\/images\/profile-1-e1617638397715.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[1568,75219,105357,1570,34096,23147,105358,100923,105703,12722,9739],"class_list":["post-249033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-social-mediaa","tag-featured-stories-sidebar","tag-alex-ovechkin","tag-day-watch","tag-features","tag-focus-features","tag-interview","tag-night-watch","tag-profile","tag-screenlife","tag-thriller","tag-timur-bekmambetov"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249033"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249033\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}