Profile of Michael Winterbottom on Famous Like Me

Michael Winterbottom (born March 29, 1961 in Blackburn, Lancashire) is a prolific British filmmaker, who has directed thirteen films in the past ten years, six of them written by the acclaimed screenwriter Frank Cottrell Boyce, including Welcome to Sarajevo and 24 Hour Party People. He has two children with his ex-wife, author Sabrina Broadbent.

Educated at Oxford, Winterbottom then went to film school at Bristol University. He began his career working in British television before moving into features. Three of his movies, Welcome to Sarajevo, Wonderland and 24 Hour Party People have been nominated for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.

Career

Winterbottom's television career included such diverse projects as the mystery series Cracker, the Inspector Alleyn Mysteries, two documentaries about Ingmar Bergman, numerous television movies and an episode of the series "Cinema Europe: The Other Hollywood," focusing on Scandinavian silent cinema. He also directed the celebrated mini-series "Family," written by Roddy Doyle, with each of four episodes focusing on one member of a working-class Belfast family. It was this series that first brought Winterbottom to the attention of moviegoers, when it was edited down into a feature.

His first theatrical feature, 1995's "Butterfly Kiss," firmly established his intense visual sense, naturalistic style and compelling use of pop songs to reinforce narrative. The story of a mentally unbalanced lesbian serial killer and her submissive lover/accomplice falling in love as they slaughter their way across the motorways of northern England, it found only a limited release.

That same year, he reteamed with Jimmy McGovern, writer of Cracker, for the powerful BBC television film "Go Now", the story of a young man who falls ill with Multiple Sclerosis just as he has met the love of his life. Focusing on the turmoil this causes the couple, the film was given a theatrical release in many countries, including the US.

In 1996 he adapted his favorite novel, Thomas Hardy's bleak classic Jude the Obscure, the tale of forbidden love between two cousins which so scandalized British society on its release in 1895 that Hardy gave up writing. It was not Winterbottom's first time approaching the work, he had already filmed the pig slaughter sequence once at film school. Starring a luminous, pre-stardom Kate Winslet, Jude brought Winterbottom wider recognition, his first screening at Cannes and numerous Hollywood offers, all of which he eventually turned down.

Welcome to Sarajevo was filmed on location in that city, mere months after the fighting there had ended, adding greatly to its authenticity and allowing frequent intercutting of actual news footage from the siege. The film is based on the true story of a British reporter, Michael Nicholson, who spirited a young orphan girl out of the hellish warzone to safety in Britain.

His next two films both had distribution difficulties and were not widely seen. "I Want You" is a neo-noir sex thriller, shot in bold primary colors by the noted Polish cinematographer Slawomir Idziak and set in a decaying seaside resort. Starring Rachel Weisz and Alessandro Nivola, it focuses more on mood than plot and was inspired by the Elvis Costello song of the same name. "With or Without You", starring Christopher Eccleston, is a light Belfast-set sex comedy, about a couple who are trying desperately to conceive, only to each have past loves re-enter their lives.

1999's Wonderland marked a decided shift in style for Winterbottom, with its loose, handheld photography and naturalistic, often improvised dialogue drawing comparisons to Robert Altman. The story of three sisters and their extended family over the Guy Fawkes Day weekend in London, the disparate elements are tied toegther by a sweeping orchestral score by minimalist composer Michael Nyman who would become a frequent Winterbottom collaborator.

Winterbottom followed that project up with his biggest budgeted film, The Claim, an adaptation of Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge set in 1860's California. Shot in the wilds of Canada for over $20 Million, it was not a financial success and proved an ordeal to make, with Winterbottom himself getting frostbite. The production had previously been ready to shoot in Spain, with sets already built, when financing fell through. Attempts were made to cast Madonna, in a role eventually played by Milla Jovovich and many of the production details and difficulties were explained to the public on an unusually frank official website.

24 Hour Party People documents the anarchic, drug and sex-fuelled rise and fall of the influential label Factory Records and the music scene in Manchester from the late 1970s to the mid-1990s. As much an ode to the city of Manchester as the story of the contemporary musical world, the film stars Steve Coogan as broadcaster cum music-mogul Tony Wilson.

His 2002 film In This World depicts the harrowing journey of two Afghan refugees from Pakistan, across the Middle East and Europe as they try to enter Britain with the help of people smugglers. Shot on digital video with non-professional actors who virtually lived out the events of the film, its compelling sense of reality brought Winterbotom numerous awards including a Golden Bear and a BAFTA for best film not in the English language.

The futuristic romantic mystery Code 46 is a retelling of the Oedipus myth, in a world where cloning has created people so interrelated they must have a test before coupling to be sure they are not genetically related. Essentially a film noir, it follows a private eye played by Tim Robbins as he investigates a femme fatale played by Samantha Morton. The film's highly stylized settings were created on a limited budget by taking the tiny crew around the world, shooting in places which already looked like one hundred years in the future. Much of the film was shot in Shanghai, while Dubai and Rajasthan in India were also variously mixed to create a multi-ethnic melting-pot culture.

9 Songs, released in 2004, gained attention as the most sexually explicit film ever to receive a certificate for general release in the UK. It charts a year-long relationship between two lovers, almost exclusively through their sexual interaction. Alternating with the sex scenes are various rock concerts the couple attend at London's Brixton Academy and other venues, the songs played at which give the film its title. The film became notorious in the U.K. for its candid scenes of unsimulated sex between the leads, (Kieran O'Brien and Margo Stilley.

Winterbottom's most recent film, Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story, is an adaptation of the famously unfilmable The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, one of the earliest novels. Designed as a film about the making of a film of "Tristram Shandy," it stars Steve Coogan as himself and as Shandy and Jeremy Northam as a director based on Winterbottom. The film screened to great success and enthusiastic reviews at the Toronto Film Festival and opens in the US this fall.

He is currently at work on his next film, The Road to Guantánamo, a television docu-drama about the "Tipton Three," three British Muslims captured by US forces in Afghanistan who spent two years as prisoners at Guantánamo Bay as "enemy combatants".

In 2004, his ex-wife, Sabrina Broadbent, published her first novel, "Descent," a thinly veiled account of their marriage. Ms. Broadbent was previously the winner of the WH Smith Raw Talent Award and the novel received positive reviews. She lives in North London with their children.

Filmography

• Butterfly Kiss (1995)
• Go Now (1995)
• Jude (1996)
• Welcome to Sarajevo (1997)
• I Want You (1998/I)
• With or Without You (1999)
• Wonderland (1999)
• The Claim (2000)
• 24 Hour Party People (2002)
• In This World (2002)
• Code 46 (2003)
• 9 Songs (2004)
• Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story (2005)
• The Road to Guantánamo (2005)

External Links

• IMDB profile
• Senses of Cinema: critical essay by Deborah Allison

This content from Wikipedia is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Michael Winterbottom