In the first part of our interview with THE SILENT STORM writer/director Corinna McFarlane, the filmmaker discussed feminism and the challenges of being a woman in film. In our second and concluding part of this exclusive interview, she tells us just how she managed to get Damian Lewis and Andrea Riseborough involved her film and the moment she realised she had found a star in newcomer Ross Anderson.
An upsetting and stressful time in McFarlane’s life sparked her need to reconnect with her Scottish roots. When her father became sick, she says: ‘I had this overwhelming feeling of my destiny and having to discover Scotland.’
At that time, McFarlane had made the documentary THREE MILES NORTH OF MOLKOM, which had been well received. However, nobody was knocking down her door, she says, so it was ‘now or never’. With her dad on the road to recovery, McFarlane sold what she could of her belongings and headed north. ‘I wanted to be free to move and discover,’ she says.
Months later, once the film had been written, it was then a question of actually getting it made. With help from Nicky Bentham and Barbara Broccoli, who both signed on as producers, the wheels were set in motion.
McFarlane says that Damian Lewis was her first choice for the role of the minister and she couldn’t stop singing Andrea Riseborough’s praises, so impressed was she by her previous work. She insists that, to her, Riseborough is ‘one of the best actresses alive’. Of course, wanting the actors is only a small part of the battle. Even if they did want to be involved, both Lewis and Riseborough were working to extremely tight schedules on other projects and finding a window that would suit all involved was going to be difficult.
Somehow, however, it all managed to come together.
With these two big names on board to play the minister and his wife, the next challenge was to find someone to play the third pivotal role in this fascinating trio, the younger man who is sent to the minister for penance. McFarlane explains that this role is arguably the most important as ‘he represents the future’ and is a ‘genuinely good, kind soul’.
‘We scoured the country,’ she explains, ‘and it was difficult to find someone who had a quality that you would believe that he could fight for himself in the docks . . . but also had a tenderness.’ McFarlane also notes that ‘he had to be a survivor . . . but also have this poetic dimension.’
Newcomer Ross Anderson clearly made a big impression on McFarlane who confesses that his audition brought her to tears. After that impressive reaction, he was thrown ‘in the ring with Damian’ and the rest was history. ‘It was fortunate [that it all worked out] because he’s just wonderful,’ McFarlane says – and she clearly isn’t the only one thinks so. Angelina Jolie has since cast Anderson in her next directorial project, UNBROKEN.
The cast and crew discuss The Silent Storm at the LFF premiere
McFarlane knew she was asking a lot of her stars, who would need to film in a remote location, far away from civilisation. ‘They were going to have to really dive in to this independent, roll-up-your-sleeves type of filmmaking,’ she explains. Though it seems they all relished the challenge.
According to McFarlane, Lewis and Riseborough were already very keen to work together and were familiar with the other’s work so went into the project with a respect for each other already there. That respect was quickly extended to Anderson. ‘[Anderson] was a really grounding influence on set and they loved working with him,’ McFarlane explains.
Despite the importance of Anderson’s role, it is Andrea Riseborough’s central performance as the minister’s wife which brings the story together. McFarlane explains: ‘women tend to be judged very heavily for what their past is, so I wanted to create a character that had no past . . . This community put a past on her and when she isn’t that, they judge her anyway.’
With the film not yet picked up by a distributor, McFarlane can only hope that audiences will get to see this impressive performance as she intended it, on the big screen.
Some audiences have, of course, already had the pleasure of seeing THE SILENT STORM when it premiered at the London Film Festival last month, which McFarlane says was ‘a real honour’. The film seems to be very important, not just to McFarlane, but to all involved and many of the cast and crew were there for the premiere. ‘For Damian and Andrea to come was really touching for me,’ McFarlane says. ‘For them to make the journey….’
And what a journey it’s been – though McFarlane says the journey is not yet over, explaining that ‘we’re still on it’. A newcomer herself to the world of feature films, McFarlane seems incredibly grounded when it comes to the reaction from audiences. ‘As long as it gets under your skin then I’ve done the job of making a piece of work that people are talking about . . . that moves them.’
‘I was very lucky,’ she says and she isn’t wrong. By the look of things, she got some incredible producers to work alongside her, she got her first choice for the cast, found a great new actor for the younger role and has clearly made something of which she is incredibly proud.
We can only hope more people get to see it soon enough!
