DOKU.ARTS
Zeughauskino Berlin
09.09.–27.09.2015

Nicolas Roeg: It’s About Time

Nicolas Roeg enjoys an exceptional place in the annals of modern British film-making, first as a cinematographer (Far From the Madding Crowd, Lawrence of Arabia, Dr Zhivago) subsequently as the director or co-director of memorably idiosyncratic movies such as Performance (1970), Walkabout (1971), Don’t Look Now (1973), The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976) and Bad Timing (1980).

Roeg has always had a fine touch with actors, eliciting memorably sexy performances from (among other modern icons) Mick Jagger, David Bowie and Julie Christie. His carefully crafted movies experiment in intriguing ways with the conventions of narrative cinema, for, among other skills, Roeg has always been a superb editor, lending his films – or the best of them – a brilliant mosaic-like quality.

This sense of mosaic (whether speeding up time, or putting it into reverse) has been captured in David Thompson’s new essay on Roeg commissioned by the BBC to celebrate the director’s 87th birthday. Thompson’s documentary ranges across Roeg’s career with a fine freedom, showing extended extracts from the films, and pausing to interview professional colleagues such as Danny Boyle and Mike Figgis who speak of him with admiration and discernment. At the centre of the film is Roeg himself, modest and articulate, still in his old age talking about a lifetime’s commitment to cinema with rare conviction and enthusiasm.