Interview by
Benjamin Poole
Director Marc Isaacs' latest feature is set in the quintessentially charming village of Thaxted in Essex,
which is steeped in history. A playful tale of love, loss and betrayal,
This Blessed Plot seamlessly mixes fact and fiction in this
otherworldly film which features remarkable performances from an ensemble
cast of non-professional actors.
We spoke to Isaacs about his genre-blurring new film.
As you are a filmmaker who is celebrated for documentary films, I was
hoping that I could start by asking you about this type of filmmaking.
What do you feel is the purpose of the documentary as a mode of
cinema? What responsibilities do you believe that the documentarian
has, if any? And how does This Blessed Plot fit in with these
ideologies?
To be perfectly frank, I don't believe in the term documentary (although
I use it myself for convenience) because all forms of moving image work
are unavoidably shaped by the creator's subjectivity.
So, in this sense, the question of purpose extends to all forms of
filmmaking and, for me, I am only interested in using the medium to
express my feelings, confusions, curiosities about the world I'm living
in. I feel compelled to ask questions rather than provide answers; to
explore the intimacies of people's lives and how they choose to live,
especially as they navigate the often confusing worlds in which they
exist. I have a responsibility in my films, to not look away from
uncomfortable truths. I must respect and be honest with my contributors
even if I ask them to reveal difficult aspects of their lives. Above and
beyond this, I have a responsibility to take risks and challenge
established ways of making work - even more so now as the form becomes
ever more corporatised. And this is where
The Filmmaker's House (2020) and now
This Blessed Plot fit in. Two films made with the energy
and defiance against what I see as the conservative nature of the film
industry, especially here in the UK.
Without wishing to spoil the film, what impressed me most about
This Blessed Plot was the blend of suggested authenticity and
deliberate artifice, which somehow made the characters and the
sentiments within the film all the more sincere and touching. I wonder
if you wouldn't mind discussing this approach in more detail: how the
film balances the "real" with an almost magical realism...
Every film I have made has emerged from the struggle to transcend "the
real," to not be hostage to reality, to be free to invent. In
This Blessed Plot, this of course is taken to extremes in some way. I'm glad you find it
sincere and touching because this was my hope....that by moving further
away from reality and into strange stylised performative modes and, as
you say, deliberate artifice, I could add layers of complexity to the
whole endeavour by provoking us to consider questions of authenticity,
performance and myth making, both on an individual and national level.
Films asks us to suspend our disbelief, and I am playing that game too
but I am also asking the audience to think about what this suspension of
disbelief means to them - especially when the protagonists are
non-professionals and seem to be (in most cases) performing themselves.
The breaking of the fourth wall is all over the film not just contained
in specific moments.
Notions of national identity seem important to
This Blessed Plot. What sort of questions does the film propose
concerning what "being English" and the idea of "England" may mean?
I don't really know about that except to say that whatever it once meant
is now of course unravelling at such a great speed that some people are
thrown into confusion and uncertainty. This is when new myths are
created/needed for better or worse (often worse sadly).
I think that the (character ?!) of Lori is absolutely crucial to the
narrative success of the film. I liked her wry and warm objectivity. I
note that she is played by an in real life documentarian, Lori Yingge
Yang, which is very congruous with her persona in
This Blessed Plot. How did Lori (the person) become involved
with your film?
Lori studied film on a course I teach on at UCL and this is how we met.
She was wonderful. I had no idea if she could play this role but she
took to it incredibly well. She was very involved in shaping the film,
rejecting some of Adam, the writer's ideas and offering up better
solutions and also totally open to pushing her character in directions
she wouldn't relate to naturally.
In This Blessed Plot, filmmaker Lori goes on a journey, but
I'm interested in the likewise expedition which
This Blessed Plot has completed. What pre-production and
production challenges did this idiosyncratic independent film
overcome?
Well, firstly, gathering the £30k that the film needed. This money came
from different places but no film fund money. Some of it was from a
previous film sale of mine, a little from my university research pot and
so on. We had to keep things small and simple but I like limitations so
it wasn't too difficult but an extra £10,000 would have helped.
Everything is expensive now but I had some great help especially from
Sarah Gonzales Centeno, who assisted with the editing and was/is
a technical wizard. Writer Adam Ganz was incredibly crucial to
the whole film and I worked with a young Producer, Lydia Kivenen,
who kept the whole thing ticking along.
If you could programme This Blessed Plot in a triple bill with
two other movies, what films would they be? Where would
This Blessed Plot fall in the line-up and why?
Great question: I'd start with one of the Straub Huillet films - maybe
Moses and Aaaron, then probably Jaguar by Jean Rouch and lastly
This Blessed Plot. Why? Because these filmmakers both took huge risks to produce novel
forms and I think the films would all talk to each other in an
interesting way.
Thanks so much Marc! All the best with This Blessed Plot!
This Blessed Plot is in UK
cinemas from January 26th. Read our review
here.