'The English Patient', Cinematographer, John Seale

0:05Jawad MirHow are you doing this, lovely Friday morning in, Sydney or Melbourne?

0:10John SealeIn Sydney, and it's a beautiful winter's morning. It's warm. It's 21, 22 degrees.

0:17Jawad MirYeah.

0:18John SealeAnd n… there's no… there's a very faint... It's beautiful, not a cloud in the sky.

0:24Jawad MirLovely. I love Sydney. I spent, four, five days there just before COVID.

0:30John SealeOh, did you that recently? Yeah, great.

0:32Jawad MirYeah.

0:32John SealeYeah.

0:32Jawad MirIt's a beautiful city. And Australia…

0:34John SealeYeah

0:34Jawad Mir... Is very similar to Canada. I mean, it falls under the Queen as well, but, in terms of…

0:39John SealeYeah

0:40Jawad Mir... Building and structure, it's similar to Canada.

0:42John SealeYes, yeah. Very. Very. I've done a couple of films there, East Coast, West Coast, and always enjoyed it. Great crews. And…

0:52Jawad MirYeah. Where in East Coast did you film?

0:56John SealeWe were in Toronto, we were in New Brunswick, for Children of a Lesser God, up in New Brunswick.

1:05Jawad MirYeah.

1:06John SealeAnd, we did some second unit down in Toronto. And on the West Coast I've done, the Larry Kasdan film up in, oh, middle of a, middle of a pine forest somewhere in the middle of winter.

1:22Jawad MirYeah.

1:24John SealeIt wasn't funny.

1:27Jawad MirWell, a lot of films nowadays especially, they get... When they film, are filmed in Canada, mostly in Alberta or British Columbia, which is on the West Coast, right? So, I think Christopher Nolan's, Interstellar, the farm sequence, that was all near Calgary. And, Jurassic World, the open… the opening part where they're living in the snow in the middle of nowhere, I think that was also Alberta.

1:52John SealeOh, okay. Yeah. Yeah.

1:55Jawad MirWell, great to have you. Thank you so much for agreeing to do this. I can't tell you how much I love your work, especially in English Patient. I mean, it's absolutely magical and mesmerizing. I just saw it again a couple of days ago. It's been a long time. And, I mean, it just sent the vibes of Lawrence of Arabia and Out of Africa. So thank you for cr… creating such a visual masterpiece.

2:20John SealeOh, thank you. Thank you for your kind comments. Lovely.

2:23Jawad MirHow did you get started in the world of cinematography, John?

2:28John SealeIt was a long time ago, and, I left school. I wasn't academically inclined. And I left school. I found out I had a, an uncle that I'd never met, who had a sheep station up in Central Queensland in Australia. And…

2:51John Seale... I'd never met him, and I thought, "I better go and meet him."

2:55Jawad MirRight.

2:56John SealeSo I went up and met him, and it just so happened they needed what they call a jackaroo, which is like a trainee cowboy… ... On the place, and said, "Would you like to do it?" And I thought, "Why not? I'm kicking around Sydney. I don't know what I'm doing." But I had been using, little eight-millimeter cameras. With mates we were making little movies and things. But it was never, the thought that would be a career. It was just we were, we were having fun. And but I took that camera with me. But by the end of the two years, that little camera had taken over, and I decided that the working in the backblocks of Australia wasn't for me. But this little camera, maybe I could become a National Geographic, cameraman. Go to places that people wouldn't go to, couldn't go to, or scared to go to. Maybe I could do that. And so I came back to Sydney, and, with that completely now my track. I, that was it.

4:09John SealeAnd I joined the ABC, Australian ABC…

4:12Jawad MirRight

4:12John Seale... Which is a government station.

4:13Jawad MirYep.

4:14John SealeI spent seven years there working with some pretty garrulous old ex combat cameramen from the Korean War, Second World War. And they were hard teachers, but they were the best. And, then one d… I did a lot of documentaries there. And then one day they sent us out to the back… backblocks with a big camera and actors, and we put actors in front of the outback. And the outback I loved, and the cameras I loved working with. Now we had a big 35 mil camera, and we had actors, and we had performance and drama. And I thought, "This is it. This is gonna be life." So here I am.

5:03Jawad MirFantastic. And how did you break into Hollywood?

5:09John SealeI worked my way up in Australia. I loved camera operating. I just thought being a camera operator was the best job that you could ever get.

5:21Jawad MirRight.

5:21John SealeSo where my peers and colleagues plunged up into, directors of photography, I tended to stay back, and I ended up working for them a lot. Which was great because every film I learnt something new, I learnt something more. And, then I started lighting. Somebody offered me a job and I said, "Well, who's lighting it?" And they said, "Well, we were hoping for an extra cup of tea a day you'd do it." And I thought, "Maybe it's time." So I did that, and got a bit of a shock. And I went back and I operated a couple of films for the great Russell Boyd. And then I started, films again in that… I met Peter Weir. I was camera operating for, Peter Weir. And years later he said, "You know, can you, can you come to America and do, " firstly The Mosquito Coast.

6:21John SealeWe set up for that in Belize, and that crashed and burned. So they sent us back to Australia, and I think it was only about two months later Peter rang and said, "I've got another film to do in America. It's going to happen very quickly, and it's got Harrison Ford in it." Well, that was like, Harrison Ford.

6:42Jawad MirYeah.

6:42John SealeAnd that was Witness. So I went... We went back over and we did Witness, and that opened the door.

6:51Jawad MirYeah. No, Witness was a remarkable movie. I honestly don't remember Mosquito Coast. I've seen it, but the one Peter Weir's film that stood out for me growing up, because I was going into film as well, and just the poetry behind it, right? Dead Poets Society.

7:09John SealeOh.

7:09Jawad MirI mean, what an incredible, inc… probably Robin Williams, I mean, he has done such amazing stuff…

7:16John SealeYeah

7:16Jawad Mir... But that was his most amazing dramatic performance. It's... It was a phenomenal film. And I…

7:25John SealeAnd…

7:25Jawad MirSo glad to s… you know, I didn't even know that you did that when I was doing some research. That's when I discovered that you did that as well, so, which was fantastic.

7:32John SealeOh, and Robert Williams's such an enjoyable man to work with. You could see, in all honesty, a little bit of pain in there. He loved making people laugh. If he couldn't…

7:46Jawad MirYeah

7:46John Seale... Do that, he seemed to be very s… sad in a way. But gosh, he put in a beautiful performance, I thought.

7:57Jawad MirI mean, he could do anything, you know, Mrs. Doubtfire to…

8:00John SealeYeah

8:01Jawad Mir... You know, Dead Poets Society, Good Will Hunting, and…

8:05John SealeYeah

8:05Jawad Mir... Good Morning Vietnam, like Aladdin, like all these amazing films. The list never ends. And it was such a…

8:11John SealeYeah

8:11Jawad Mir... Sad thing that we lost him. I mean, he was a remarkable human being from what I've heard as well.

8:17John SealeIncredibly sad. And we got on well. He asked me to do a couple of films, after that, and, unfortunately I was scheduled out. So I never got back to work with him, which was a big shame. There's... That happens a lot in the industry, as you probably know…

8:36Jawad MirYeah

8:36John Seale... That, you know, your schedule is such a tight thing at times, and you get offered a film and you sign on and then another one comes along later and you think, "Oh gosh, I'm, I'm sad to have missed that." but you have to. I feel you've got to honor the first signature.

8:57Jawad MirOf course.

8:57John SealeSo…

8:58Jawad MirYeah

8:58John Seale... There you go.

9:00Jawad MirYeah. And English Patient, right? Like you worked with Walt… I mean, you didn't work with Walter Murch, but obviously, you know, he edited the film, and then you have Anthony Minghella, the late Anthony Minghella directing it. What... Do you remember how that started? How that got you involved? Like do you remember, was it like a straight on sign the picture or you read the script or... Tell us that. Tell me that story.

9:27John SealeIt was interesting. It was one of the most interesting, introductions to a director, in that mostly, you know, you... We got flown in to have a lunch, with the director, and so you'd suss each other out, I suppose.

9:46Jawad MirYeah.

9:46John SealeAnd then a decision would be made by the director, and then you might, get the film, and away you go. With Anthony, he was in Rome and, doing, pre-production on it, pre… pre-production really. And I just got a phone call straight away to say, "Anthony would love you to do the film. Can you get over here?" Which was so unusual, but there was a lovely Australian friend, Steve Andrews, who was the first AD director, so, and producer, executive producer I think. And we'd worked together on numerous films in Australia, and I know he was a great support. And whether or not he put a little word into Anthony's ear…... I don't, I don't know. But, it was very strange that phone call, "Pack your bags, get over here.

10:48John SealeWe're gonna make this movie, your honor." And so when I arrived in Rome, that's the first time I clapped eyes on Anthony and luckily we got on well. It's a funny thing sometimes the way that works. In very few days he said to me, he said, he said, "How do you see that opening shot of the airplane?"

11:15John SealeAnd I said, "Well, it might be a bit weird, but I always thought that maybe craning up from the sand hills going by, and craning up through the root of the main wing of an airplane to reveal the people in the cockpit of an open, type airplane." He said, "That's exactly what I had in mind," and I had the movie. So we kind of started off well, so that was good. And I think the end result, I watched it again yesterday just to prime…

11:53Jawad MirYeah

11:53John Seale... All the little thoughts, and, I think Anthony did an amazing job of...

12:01Jawad MirHe did.

12:02John SealeHe…

12:02Jawad MirI mean the pr… Sorry, go on.

12:04John SealeWell, he's one, he's one of those beautifully… made directors who are extremely collo… collaborative. And he seemed to always say, "My success is due to the fact that I surround myself with people who know what they're doing."

12:22Jawad MirYeah.

12:22John SealeAnd, you know, he's... He was such a lovely man for that. And, even though many times there was a almost a vagueness to what he needed, what he wanted to do, how he was going to handle a scene, it was a vagueness of approach that we could have, that we could say, "Well, that last scene in the edit, if it gets that go, it'll roll through. What if we blah, did this or that or whatever?" And it was little, wedges of ideas that would then instigate his, quite frankly, brilliant mind as far as writing emotion of actors and integration of that between them. He was a genius at that and I was privileged to see actors literally sitting at his feet listening to every word. Be… you know, because even the writing of that, the screenplay out of that beautiful book by Michael Ondaatje, boy, I had so many people say to me in the, in the...

13:34John SealeOnce we got it going, "Who's written the screenplay of that?" And I'd say, "Well, Anthony's done it." And they'd say, "Boy, I can't wait to see the film." To see what the writer of a screenplay for a film would get out of that beautiful book of Ondaatje. It's like poetry that book all the way through, but so convoluted, so complex, and Anthony broke it down.

14:04Jawad MirYeah. And I think it's also, right, the direction obviously had a strong part in, you know, captain of the ship needs to steer the ship in the right direction with the crew and the cast. Also cinematography but also editing, right? It was just one of those, you know, rare I thi… I could be wrong, this is my personal opinion. It rarely happens nowadays. I don't think the la… I think the last time that happened, was with American Beauty and maybe Everything Everywhere All at Once where…

14:36John SealeRight

14:36Jawad Mir... Everything clicked. English Patient was one of them, Schindler's List, Forrest Gump. And between American Beauty and this list year, I mean, I haven't seen anything that comes close to a film as a whole where everything clicked and, you know, they got nominated…

14:55John SealeRight

14:55Jawad Mir... And everything. And what I loved about English Patient, I mean, cinematography obviously is, you know, amazing. But one thing I loved about it and I appreciate it a lot, which I have come to appreciate in the last 10 years more than ever before, is making sure that you have a wider or a medium frame where you can see the surroundings of the character that they're in. And, you know, there was very rarely like over the shoulder shots here and there for some important scenes. How... Was that something that was collaborative between you and Anthony or was... Did he just give you the, you know, the ship and, you know, figure out what the frame we should do? What was that like?

15:38John SealeNo. It... Anthony hadn't done too many films. I think, two. Two films, and this was his third. Third one.

15:47Jawad MirRight.

15:48John SealeThey'd always been in one eight five format because that 19,.. In the early '90s, late '80s, we were transitioning onto anamorphic.

16:01Jawad MirYeah.

16:01John SealeAnd there was a we… Often there was a lot of discussion about should we go anamorphic, should we stay one eight five? Anamorphic's got these qualities and these problems, you know, et cetera, et cetera. So, it was a big decision. I think in hindsight, in all honesty, I think Anthony was a little scared of anamorphic. I loved it. We had used it in Australia on Gallipoli, with Peter Weir and other films, that needed to utilize the background to…

16:41Jawad MirYeah

16:41John Seale... To put the actor into. But I could sense in a way that Anthony was a little bit reticent to go the anamorphic and I put it down years later to, an unfamiliarity with that format. But it was very interesting because much as I thought English Patient should have an anamorphic frame because of Anthony's wonderful script, and listening to him talk about the performances that he will ask the actors to get, the realization came to us both I think that this was a film about people in the desert, not about the desert with people in it.

17:35John SealeAnd anamorphic gives you the desert with the people in it, but one eight five we felt would give us the people first, the story, the essence of the whole, exercise, and the desert would be in the background. With that in mind, we then agreed that the camera would never start on the desert and pan to the story.

18:01Jawad MirRight.

18:03John SealeWe would always have the ability in the edit to cut to the story that was in the desert. And we held that. And a couple of times Anthony would say, "Can we start on the thing?" I'd say, "No, Anthony, remember we agreed we wouldn't do that. We would never pan onto or tilt down or crane up or crane down to the story. We would always cut to the story and the background would be wherever they were." And he'd say, "Yeah, I know. We did too." So we had those lovely little, tete-a-tetes during the making of the film. I don't think to this day it was detrimental. I think those little philosophies we garnered, that it's a story about people, and the 1.85 format gave us a little more of a pleasant close-up, compositionally than having to spread the story across a frame.

19:06John SealeIt was a story about the people, the romance, the drama, the d… you know. And the desert was always there, and it would be seen.

19:16Jawad MirYeah.

19:16John SealeIt didn't have to become a, such a prominent article.

19:22Jawad MirYou know, it's interesting you mention anamorphic. So I have a 32-inch anamorphic monitor and, I, you know, I mostly watch stuff on TV, but I, when I was gonna watch English Patient I'm like, "Okay, this has to be anamorphic." Like, literally I don't remember if it was or wasn't, so when I played it I'm like, "Oh my God, this is not anamorphic." But now that you mention it, now that you mention it makes…... So much sense. It makes perfect sense. 'Cause then the gimmick comes into place, right? Like, technicalities and all that, and story gets lost and confused and I think that's something that a lot of films suffer nowadays, is that technology and, you know, all that stuff…

20:03John SealeYeah

20:03Jawad Mir... Comes in first over story, but story's always the key, the heart of the film period.

20:09John SealeAnd we also thought that for Walter the editing would be…

20:15Jawad MirYeah

20:15John Seale... Very much more fluid. I think what's interesting is finding that a lot of directors, and George Miller included…

20:26Jawad MirYeah

20:26John Seale... Are centralizing the subject matter within that anamorphic frame. I'll go anamorphic, but I'll centralize all of the action. I mean, Fury Road was basically centrally, composed, throughout the entire film. So that, y… you know, one might even say is that a waste then to have all of that information on either side? Which George didn't worry about. And our, as operators, and I was operating one of the cameras, our instinct is that because we have that big wide frame I could include that action with the close-up, and George would say, "No. Centralize. Center up. Center up." And he didn't care about what happened there. And I found that very interesting because it meant that the frame was being used for the actors, the actors' story, not necessarily what was always going on around them.

21:32Jawad MirYeah.

21:32John SealeAnd that went then back to The English Patient where we made the decision not to shoot anamorphic. We didn't talk of centralizing. We still composed off center so that we had information in the background, like the airplane in a close-up of Ralph was nicely framed in the background. Whereas with George's system now you'd centralize, the airplane could be cut in half. But the airplane's still there, it's just not nicely framed.

22:02Jawad MirYeah.

22:02John SealeSo I find all of that as... 'Cause I loved camera operating, I find all of that, soup in a way, that the visual soup that different directors want to obtain and want to present is such a fascinating thing, and it's one that I love working at, to help them make it succeed, to see how it works, and to see how the end result of the film can benefit by it. It's a fascinating business, it really is.

22:39Jawad MirRight. No, it is. I, again, I was talking to, I don't know if you know John Schwartzman, he's a DP, cinematographer for…

22:47John SealeOh, yeah

22:47Jawad Mir... The Rock, Armageddon, and we're talking about the same thing, is that the story, the visual that, the story that a visual tells in a wider screen, like in a medium frame or wide frame, wide shot, is so much more. It shows so much about the chemistry between, especially between two characters.

23:07John SealeYeah.

23:08Jawad MirYou know, if they have a friendship or if they are enemies or if they're, you know, husband and wife or whatever that is. It just... And when you cut it just takes you away from that chemistry or that distance between the two characters and,.. I mean, sometimes I understand, like, you know, you have to cut just to get a, get a tighter shot if there's an emotional scene, but I really, you know, I can't say enough, like, just watching English Patient a couple of days ago it just made me realize how amazing cinema used to be. And there are still some filmmakers that are trying to do that, but I think it's, it's tough now. It's tough to... Because people attention spans are so short and…

23:50John SealeRight

23:50Jawad Mir... The only films that come to movie theaters that do well are, like, you know, films like Top Gun, Super Mario, or superhero Ma… movies. But it really reignited, my love for wider shot. I mean, it was there, but it just really pushed it another level. And you know, talking about English Patient, what was the biggest challenge that you guys faced, whether it was… With the weather or whether it was something else, any kind of challenges on shoot days? Because it was a long film, I mean, you probably had, like, over 100 days of shoot easily, right?

24:26John SealeYeah. Yeah, it was. It was. There were quite a few... Once again, I think because Anthony, was on only his third film, there was a lot of learning, I think, that he was trying to…

24:42Jawad MirYeah

24:42John Seale... Trying to… to get into his system, into his i… his thoughts of how to cover it. And he was leaping well ahead into the final film. And one of the big problems that really, I think worried him a lot was that he knew he was going to intercut between the past in the desert…

25:11John Seale... Where the, where the romance story was…

25:15Jawad MirRight

25:15John Seale... To the present, where he's dying and he's burnt in Italy. And, he was really worried about would the audience understand on a straight cut, straight cut, would they understand they just left the desert and they're now in, modern time in Italy? It worried him a lot, and he talked of, building the hospital, the, room, the s… the sick room where he was…

25:50Jawad MirYeah

25:51John Seale... Building it in the desert with sheer walls that you could see through that were painted so that when you pa… when you left him you could go up and you could see the airplane or whatever through the wall.

26:07John SealeAnd I think both the production designer, Stuart Craig, and I bo… both gulped thinking do we have to match the, I have to match the perfect lighting. And we shot the desert first, so you'd be doing the, shooting the desert first and then going to Italy then to the room, and we didn't know what the room was. And all of these things all come barreling in on you. And Stuart Craig I think thought, "Oh my God, I've gotta build translucent walls of the room, and we'll have to find the room in Italy so I know what size, shape, what the walls are." And all of that became... And we're looking at each other in a way going, "Oh no, there must be some other way." And so there was... We went through a lot. But Anthony did not want to do subtitles of, "Meanwhile, back in the desert," or, "Meanwhile, back in Italy," to tell the audience they had now transitioned. It was wonderful that what happened was such a lovely film thing.

27:14John SealeWalter Murch found the long slow dissolve. I think they were 96 frames or something like that. So once you started to dissolve you very slowly, segued across into the other era.

27:31Jawad MirYeah.

27:32John SealeAnd then I found that in the timing of the film, in the color grading, that by keeping the desert slightly yellower and warmer, therefore prevailing a sort of a sense of heat, and then by keeping Italy cooler and bluer and therefore a little colder climatically, the transitions are perfect. I think they work. I don't think anybody's had a complaint about not having a subtitle and say, "Well, where are we now?" Because that color shift and Walter's, magic, dissolves just found a new way of, doing it without having to be so explanatory with the piece of subtitling. That was one of the big problems. I mean, the others were normal movie problems of…

28:30Jawad MirYeah. Right

28:31John Seale... You know, keeping cameras protected in desert situations with wind storms, sand. We were shooting obviously film negative, and scratches and things were paramount, but everybody's brains were geared to it, all the equipment that went in was geared to it. So that was all sort of standard

28:53Jawad MirYeah

28:53John Seale... Standard procedures. But the biggest one was I think I feel was Anthony's, transitional themes. Stuart Craig, amazing production designer, w… was relentless in finding locations, and he had a lovely, I felt a lovely way of presenting them, was like, "Well, this is the first one. You know, they could come down there into there. There's the cave entrance and there's that and that." And Anthony might g… might g… "Yeah, it's not... Yeah, not quite, not quite what I want maybe. But, close, yes." "Well, I've got a second one," and the second one was better. But if there was any question he'd say, "Now I have a third," and the third one was always perfect. Always everything just went whack, straight in, and it was lovely. So working with Stuart was an absolute de… delight.

29:54John SealeAs I said, he spent a lot of time out there w… in cars driving around looking everywhere and finding everything that we needed. The cave unfortunately was a long way from a road, so everything had to be schlepped in by hand. It meant we couldn't run a cable from the generator so we had to use the exterior of the cave. We had to use available light and little lanterns and things, and some reflectors and bits of polystyrene bounce cards. But that's okay. I'm, I'm... I was, at that stage, very happy with that challenge. The interior of the cave, of course, was on a sound stage, completely built, for us, and we're able to light that. Very sadly, I'd love to re-light all that. I think it… I over-lit it a bit.

30:56John SealeSort of go nuts when you get in the cave. You, "Oh, put a light there, put a light there. We got a light for every..." I'd love to take all the lights out except one. Which you can do now on digital cameras, but…

31:08Jawad MirYeah

31:08John Seale... We couldn't, we couldn't do on film. So it had all of those sort of problems. But really and truly a fantastic crew that just took it all in their stride. From the deserts to Italy, there wasn't anything really that, wasn't out of the door. Except maybe the, transitional things, but we solved that.

31:36Jawad MirI mean, filming, on a beach itself, let alone desert, is difficult in a sense that if, you know, a single speck of sand, you know, goes into the lens or to the camera, or anything else, it's, it's a pain. Like you... But being in the desert and dealing with, you know, film cameras and all of the other equipment, it... Was it something that you were used to by that time, or was that your first desert kind of environment film?

32:08John SealeNo., we had been working in Australia in the outback.

32:15Jawad MirRight

32:16John Seale... Not quite as sandy desert as we had, on English Patient. But certainly Gallipoli was out there in the, in the back country, and it was, it was desert country. So all of that protection was developed there. Every film, I've found that I was involved with, you know, under those situ… circumstances, situations, we were able to develop new ideas when new people, new camera crews came in. I found that we were quite, capable. Somebody'd say, "Oh, look, on a film we did this and this and this," so we'd incorporate that. So you build up a whole repertoire of, defense against sand and dust and s… storms…

33:03Jawad MirRight

33:04John Seale... Wind, all of those sort of problems. Rain included, if it's necessary.

33:11Jawad MirYeah.

33:11John SealeSo really we were quite prepared when we went in. Some of... I did feel, first time working with Italian crews, I found that interesting because, partly in that they were more au fait with the American system, which was big gear, lots of it.

33:38John SealeBig cars and trucks and everything is mechanized, motorized, mobilized, whatever. Whereas in Australia, we had tended to be a lot less, and we used a lot less, partly because we could not afford anything else a… and we didn't have it. It was pretty lean material. Panavision came to Australia, which was fantastic, and that they supplied the best of lenses and cameras. But the rest of the equipment was really put together by the grips and the electrics.

34:14Jawad MirWow.

34:14John SealeAnd it was minimal gear, and we tended to like with that minimal gear. And so it wasn't, it wasn't a challenge to not have everything you needed in a truck parked beside a location in the desert. Like the cave entrance, we had to carry everything in. And the lights, the we walked in on the survey and Moe Flam, our wonderful New York gaffer, we're walking along, striding along, and he's being very quiet and, finally we got to a point and he said, "John," he said, "We just finished the cable here." And I said, "You're joking, Moe. You mean we've, we've run out of cable?" And he said…

35:04Jawad MirOh

35:04John Seale... "Yeah, we've, we've still got 200 meters to go." I said, "Oops, okay, pull out the polystyrene and the reflectors and all the old-fashioned gear. We're off." And we were, and we did. And, we used a little bit of little bounce cards and things and you can still make movies like that. But, always nice to have a bit of, bit of electricity up your sleeve if you can do it.

35:30Jawad MirYeah.

35:30John SealeBut, it wa… it wasn't, a decision-making thing against that location. In other words, it was like, you know, more of a challenge to…

35:42Jawad MirYeah

35:42John Seale... To shoot it without the gear rather than lose the lovely location that Anthony loved and Stuart loved. So there was no question about that.

35:52Jawad MirWell, that's the thing, right? When you're limited with resources, most of the time, if not all the time, the best stuff happens, right?

35:59John SealeAbsolutely.

35:59Jawad MirBecause then your creati… your creativity kicks in. You are forced to think, to improvise, to come up…

36:05John SealeYeah

36:06Jawad Mir... With a solution. And when everything is sort of, you know, in front of you, then your creativity is kind of just, you know, sitting in the back burner waiting for something to happen. And I think that was probably a good thing for English Patient. I'm not saying in any way that the direction, the cinematography, the editing and production design... Screenplay didn't have anything to do with it, but I think sometimes limitations push us further to do, make better decisions.

36:35John SealeTotally agree. Totally agree. And the simplicity of shooting, I think, I hope I think I'm right, helped the actors because there was less junk around them…

36:47Jawad MirYeah

36:47John Seale... Less lights and less people and less equipment, surrounding them, in a ma… in a make believe environment. And I've, I've always from very early in the piece in Australia tried to make the space for the actors as comfortable as possible within the bounds of the script. In other words, keeping everything, possible to a minimum that this is a movie set, that trying to keep the actors in, i… in their place in that script by com… keeping a simple location set or even interior set as simple as possible for them and for everybody. And I think it helps. Nobody's ever said so, but I think possibly a, that little thin end of a wedge, may help to satisfy their feelings that we're actually in the movie while we're making it, which I think's so important.

37:54Jawad MirI think that's probably why independent cinema is so much more effective than mainstream. I mean, among many other factors, it could also be because of low budget, limited number of crew, and you know, the actors, even though they're actors, they still get nervous, you know…

38:10John SealeYeah

38:10Jawad Mir... Performing in front of 200 or 300 people versus 20 people.

38:15John SealeYeah.

38:15Jawad MirAnd it just becomes like a family environment.

38:18John SealeYeah

38:18Jawad Mir... With Anthony, how many... Wha… what kind of a... Like what kind of number of takes he used to do on average? Was he s… like did he knew what he wa… like he was a safe number three, or was it more than that, or it varied?

38:33John SealeLittle, a little more than three. Not much though. He w… he fa… the actors were very economical because they were so good and they so wanted to make all that work. It was his writing, his words, they all loved it. And as I said earlier, they all loved his words and they just wanted... I remember Kristin Scott Thomas, gorgeous woman, say, "I just love coming to work. I just love coming to work to say his words." And I thought, wow, that's fantastic, because I've worked with actors who arrive and don't know the words…

39:15Jawad MirYeah

39:15John Seale... And start will try to learn them, you know, as soon as they arrive or when they're in makeup or something. And it's, it's, it's just that difference, but that was such a lovely compliment to Anthony, as the screenplay writer, that an actor wanted to get up and get dressed and come to work to say his words. So, vaguely I remember that three to five, maybe six takes at the most. But they were all so good, you know. It, see, we were economical compared to other films I've helped make.

39:56Jawad MirYeah.

39:56John SealeYeah.

39:58Jawad MirAnd, when working on The English Patient, like you said, there was, you know, storms and all that stuff. There's obviously a scene in the film like that. You know, not, obviously it wasn't a, you know, a real storm, but was there... Did you, was that something that you guys experienced very harshly, going through sandstorms and p… production being halted?

40:24John SealeThere were a lot of, logistical problems in, Tunisia at times. And, I know that with, the office and Steve Andrews, first assistant director having to change things, rapidly because of, not necessarily the weather. The weather wasn't too bad. Once you get into a desert, at a certain time, that weather stays r… reasonably stable for long lengths of time. Sandstorms we got more regularly obviously, but not rain, not in the desert. And Italy was in a way, so fragmented in its storyline and the flashbacks, if the weather was inclement for a scene, we could still shoot it because the flashbacks meant that we'd been away. When we come back climatically it's different, so it didn't worry us and we just kept shooting through everything.

41:25John SealeO… over the years I've found that budgets are very s… tight

41:32Jawad MirYeah

41:32John Seale... As to schedules. And I've always felt that it's, that the cameraman who can make it work even though it's, it's, it's not exactly suiting the situation for him or her, I really do feel that it's, that's what they're paid to do is to make it work, somehow. And I think that…

41:57Jawad MirYeah

41:57John Seale... In a way with English Patient, we were so lucky that the whole film is bouncing backwards and forwards so much that really you didn't have to worry about a total continuity of, weather or light.

42:13Jawad MirYeah

42:13John Seale... Ma… mainly in the desert, I think you might. If you cut to the desert and it was raining like lasers maybe, but it never did and, so we didn't have that problem. What we did find that we came out of their wet season luckily during pre-production… what we did find that was that the sand was very, t… hard…

42:38Jawad MirRight

42:39John Seale... And therefore it didn't, it wasn't soft and dusty, as I think we imagined, so the cars didn't leave a trail of dust to say that it's dust and hot in the desert. It was all hard-packed from rain. But of course the airplanes found it fantastic 'cause they had a hard ground to land on. There were times when it was almost slushy, even though the sun was out, the trucks, the cars had a bit of trouble getting through. But in a way that was part of the story as well, so all of it seemed to work in together. And I don't remember on that film really having any, major weather problems at all.

43:30Jawad MirThe true measure in my view of a film, among other things that we have chatted about, is how much effect it has on popular culture. So, you know, the film came out in 1996. The Oscars were March, I was looking at this, earlier today, March 24th, 1997. And on March 13, 1997, 11 days before, there was an episode on Seinfeld, I don't know if you've ever seen that, which was literally about English Patient.

44:02John SealeOh, yes.

44:02Jawad MirHave you, have you, do you remember that?

44:05John SealeI remember people telling me about it, but I was never able to find it.

44:10Jawad MirOh, you gotta, you gotta watch it. I mean, the... It's, season, I'll tell you right now, it's, season eight, episode 17. And I won't tell you since you haven't seen it, but one of the characters, Elaine Benes, her entire storyline is wrapped around English Patient. It g…

44:35John SealeRight

44:35Jawad Mir... You, I mean, the amount of... It was, the fact that it went to Seinfeld for such a serious movie, I mean, it just tells you how much effect that film had. Because I remember when it came out everybody used to talk about, you know, Ralph Fiennes, and Kristin Scott Thomas, and Juliette Binoche, and everybody. It was just like the thing that everybody chatted about at that time. And this is pre-social media, early days of internet, and yet still it was something that was discussed at water coolers at work and everything.

45:05John SealeRight. It did wind up. It's one of those…... Films that, released early, is sometimes very detrimental to the academies. But I think it, if I remember, it came out fairly late. It was released fairly late, and, it suddenly shook people. They suddenly caught up…

45:33Jawad MirNovember 22nd it came out, so it was around Thanksgiving weekend.

45:38John SealeYeah. Yes. Which meant that it hadn't been sitting around for a year, sort of like Fury Road did that. It sat around for a long time and nobody then took any notice of it until something went wrong or right, and it suddenly got nominated. But, it, being released a little later. I think people see all those films and then suddenly something like as beautifully made and written as English Patient was, and I think they just sit up straight and say, "Oh my gosh, that's, that's dotted the I as far as I'm, I'm concerned."

46:19Jawad MirYeah. And I think…

46:20John SealeThey've been very…

46:22Jawad Mir... It's also the audience is hungry for something fresh always, right? And if they're in that mindset of a movie like Jerry Maguire, for example, or Forrest Gump, or English Patient, or American Beauty, or Gladiator, I mean, those are very unique films, the ones that I just mentioned, right? There's nothing like them in any way, and I think if they're done properly the audience notices it and it, and then if the word of mouth spreads and... And with that film everything clicked, the supporting p… performances, the main performances, the photography, editing, direction, writing, and…

47:00John SealeYeah

47:00Jawad Mir... And the audience notices that.

47:02John SealeYeah. Yes, I agree. I think that, when all of tho… those, talents harmonize to the end, you have a film that, connects to a lot of people, which, I think, I think, I really think English Patient did. I'm, I'm very proud of it. I think, I think, we have the lovely Paul Zantz, Saul Zantz's nephew who was on the film, and he regularly, has organized, little gatherings of the crew from all over. Well, you know, we came from Australia, Italy, England, America to make that film, and it's so lovely when they all get together. And, Kristin Scott Thomas is there and Ralph will appear and get to kn… And we became a family, living in the desert, together basically, all together, was,..

48:06John SealeAnd a lot of us went on to do other films obviously with Anthony… ... And a lot of the same crew, and that family kind of stuck together, and Anthony treated us like that. He treated us like a family. And, we were basically. We ate together, laughed together, and made films together, and it was, an extraordinarily lovely way to make a film. One of the best actually, because most films at the end of a day it, everybody goes off in their general directions and…

48:42Jawad MirYeah

48:43John Seale... Separate until, you know, call time the next morning. But on that film, no, we tended to, "Where are you eating tonight?" oh, not that in Tunisia there were too many places to eat, so you always bumped into somebody. But it was always that lovely, "Where are you gonna eat? You know, can I join you?" And, "Yeah." And, you know, and that was cast and crew. It was a lovely combination of the mix and mingle of crew and cast, together as well, off camera, which is a lovely way of making movies. Lovely.

49:18Jawad MirAnd I think that's one, again, I can't stress this enough, that's probably one of the reason everything clicked, because when everybody clicks off filming, like, you know, you're having dinner or lunch from, with this person and that person the next day, there's that synergy that clicks in and you start…

49:35John SealeYeah

49:35Jawad Mir... Understanding. 'Cause, you know, it's all about, we all assume things about other people until we get to know them, and that's what literally life is about, and so is cinema. If you get to know the other person's, you know, whatever difficulties or fun times they're going through or connect with that, everything else clicks in.

49:57John SealeYeah. And they, and obviously that, little bit of discussion would be at the meal would be over the next day's shoot or the week's shoot.

50:08Jawad MirYeah.

50:08John SealeThere'd be always a little bit of talk of that at times, but it wasn't a heavy meeting situation. It just would come up.

50:16Jawad MirYeah.

50:16John SealeAn actor might say something and Anthony would, help solve it. Crew would be there listening or wardrobe might be part of that. It, so it became a lovely sort of, very low-key production meeting type meal. But only sprinkled through…

50:38Jawad MirYeah

50:38John Seale... The rest of a sort of a lovely camaraderie of sociability. It was lovely. It was a lovely way to shoot films actually.

50:46Jawad MirWell, the best things kind of happen over a meal when you're having lunch or dinner.

50:52John SealeA meal…

50:52Jawad MirEverybody's relaxed.

50:54John SealeThat's right. With some nice Italian wine too. It always helps.

51:00Jawad MirSure. And I was going through your IMDb, Jon, and I kind of noticed that y… I don't know if it was intentional or you take like three, four years off from films or is that just something that has become like that or is that something by choice?

51:14John SealeNo, it was something, that I picked up very early in my career once it went international, was that with a, with a beautiful wife and two gorgeous children, I could not spend my whole life traipsing around the world for filmmakers. And none of them were in Aus… in Australia. Once I went over to do Witness, got nominated and the door opened to be… bigger films overseas, my time in Australia was reduced considerably. So it was actually with Peter Weir. I was working with him on one of the international films and he said, "Oh, you've gotta take time off. You can't finish a film on Friday night and start another one Monday morning." not that I was doing that. There was always a time factor between them, but it never seemed enough.

52:16John SealeSo then I started to vow that, yes, I would do that. So I did. I would, I would finish a film and then if my wife and children were with me overseas, wherever that was, we might rent a motor home and we would go for three weeks, travel a… around that country camping, and they all enjoyed that. And then I would come back to Australia and have another month or two there, depending on when the next project was. And I made that a pact, and I missed a lot of good films because of it, but I'll never regret it for the time that I had with my wife and children and helping them through school and life.

53:03Jawad MirYeah.

53:03John SealeNever regret it. Never regret it. And, yeah, the other films were beautifully done and beautifully made by other people, so be it, but, I have no regrets about it.

53:14Jawad MirYeah.

53:14John SealeAnd I did stick with that, much to the chagrin sometimes of directors that I wanted to work with that, got caught up in that. But look, I, as I said, I don't regret it and I just feel…

53:30Jawad MirYeah

53:30John Seale... It was the right thing to do. I've now retired completely, so, I have all the time in the world. In fact, now, people say, "What the heck are you doing?" And I'll have to tell them in all honesty that if I wanna take a holiday and relax, I'll go back to work.

53:51Jawad MirIt's interesting you mentioned that about not having any regrets. I think I was watching... This was very recently, Michael Keaton came on, I think it was Hollywood Reporter or Variety, one of those roundtable discussion, and he said the same thing. He's like, you know, basically essence was that when your kids are growing up, take the time off. You know, yes, you will lose jobs, but believe me, you won't regret it afterwards. Like, you know, once they're grown up, because that time…

54:18John SealeOh

54:18Jawad Mir... You know, eventually they're gonna go to university. Eventually they're gonna have their own life. Until then, just sit tight and hang on and then you have the rest of your, you know, next 15, 20 years to do again whatever you wanted to do.

54:31John SealeExactly. Yeah.

54:32Jawad MirYeah.

54:33John SealeOh, that's lovely you said that. Yeah. I mean, it was pretty hard. As I said, I had to pass on…

54:38Jawad MirI know. Yeah

54:39John Seale... A lot of great films I would love to have done and But it's over here

54:46Jawad MirBut I think this is kind of going in a completely off-topic direction. I always talk about this to my, to tell this to myself whenever I'm making a decision, whether it's about film or family or whatever. The first thing that I think about, and this sounds, may sound morbid, but that's just how I make decisions, is that if, when I'm on my deathbed, whenever that is, and if I'm gonna look back and think about a moment that I wish I had changed and I didn't, I'm gonna regret it. So I might as well take that leap of faith and do it now, even if it sucks, if I fail, that's okay. I just don't wanna have any regrets down the road.

55:26John SealeOh, lovely. No, that's, that's good thought. And of course, what is lovely is that, the films that I have been part of, I'm really chuffed that a lot of them, have been so well-received. Even you saying that Dead Poets Society is, an extraordinary film. I mean, one of the greatest compliments of your life could be when our lo… our granddaughter, our eldest granddaughter was in high school, and I got this phone call on my mobile one day, and she's whispering, and she's saying, "Papa, do you know where I am now?" I said, "Sweetheart, I wouldn't have a clue." And she said, "We're in the movies watching your movie."

56:27John SealeI said, "Which one?" She said, she said, "Dead Poets Society." I said, "Oh, are you enjoying it?" She said, "I love it." And that to me is one of the greatest compliments you could, I could ever get, that film is being used by schools to, teach children about life and death and man's unrest. And to come from our granddaughter was such a lovely compliment to Peter, to the writer, to the film, everything about it. And I think those moments, are just ready to compensate for any other regrets that you might have…

57:11Jawad MirYeah

57:11John Seale... About missing, another movie.

57:15Jawad MirAnother movie, yeah.

57:16John SealeYeah.

57:16Jawad MirDead Poet, Dead Poets Society, I'll tell you. So Dead Poets Society came out which year? It was '89, I think. Yeah, '89.

57:27John SealeYep.

57:27Jawad MirSo I remember... So I got the film bug when Jurassic Park came out, but there was something…

57:33John SealeRight

57:33Jawad Mir... El… but there was something else lingering before that. I, in my... I had exact same teacher from my, grade 11 English and grade 12 English class, Mrs. Brownlee her name was, and she was very tough, very tough, and she was always hard on me. And we saw Dead Poets Society in the class at that time, and it had such an impact on me with Seize the Day, O Captain, My Captain, and just learning of... And then the funny thing was that's exactly how she was, you know…

58:07John Sealehuh

58:07Jawad Mir... The character that Robin Williams played. Like, it's not about, you know, getting a grade and all that stuff. It's just about experiencing poetry and reading and literature and all that. And it had a huge impact on my life before Jurassic Park. I didn't know at the time that I wanted to maybe be a filmmaker, but that was, it sets the seeds, you know, in my brain that this is the direction that I wanna go to, not knowingly.

58:34John SealeOh, fantastic. Yeah. And interestingly, too, that film, we ha… we shot that so fast with one camera. It was before I really started to use multiple cameras. And we had to shoot that very quickly. I think we averaged 21.5 setups a day with a single camera.

58:58Jawad MirOh, wow.

58:58John SealeAnd that was the av… average over the film. And Peter was very, tough with the actors that if they wanted another take, there had to be a good reason. Otherwise, we're moving on because, you know, w… he had so much material he wanted to get for the editor to be able to hone that film down to the, to the piece of work that it is. We had to shoot as much as we could to give the editor that material. And he was very hard on the actors, and the, but the boys were just so great. They rallied. They loved doing it. There wasn't one of them that didn't not wanna come to work, especially working with Peter, who once again is such a lovely, quiet, dedicated, talented man, and a family man, that treats everybody on equal, that's helping to make the film.

1:00:00John SealeSo they all enjoyed the process, I think, on set, but also enjoyed being the people. And of course, we've talked about Robin Williams, his approach to it, was just extraordinary. A lovely man.

1:00:15Jawad MirYeah. No, it was, it was purely a beautiful film, and I wish I could talk to you for more, but I would love to chat you again, you know, maybe in the next coming weeks and months about your other films because this has been amazing experience chatting with you, and I really appreciate your time.

1:00:31John SealeOh, Jawed, thank you very much. It's been very enjoyable. Actually, lovely questions. Lovely questions.

1:00:37Jawad MirGreat. Thank you so much, thank you so much, John. I'll be in touch for sure. I'll, I'll send you an email, probably next week, and we'll, we'll chat more for sure.

1:00:46John SealeDone. Thank you very much.

1:00:48Jawad MirThank you. Have a great day, sir.

1:00:50John SealeYou too. Take care. Bye.