Colin Firth brings a touch of Hollywood to Ipswich. Photo:
Lucy Nicholson
Dan Nancarrow, The Age, reports
It's the question every international celebrity confronts when
facing the media in Australia: "What do you think of it here?"
At a press conference on the Gold Coast today Colin Firth, the
Academy Award winning actor in town to shoot the film adaption of novel The Railway Man, handled
that most perfunctory of queries with the same modest charm he exudes on
camera.
He gleefully spoke about the beauty of Queensland's glitter strip
- "It's a little hard to get yourself in the mindset of a tortured person
when you are surrounded by paradise ... it's been bliss" - before giving
an honest assessment of his time in Ipswich, west of Brisbane, where he shot
scenes recently.
"My only experience in Ipswich was a rail yard in which I was
trying to cross a courtyard, thrown into a cell and kicked about," he
said.
"I'm sure it's lovely but that experience has probably not
given me the full picture."
The Railway Man began shooting in southeast
Queensland earlier this month after initial filming took place in Scotland and
Thailand.
The film tells the true story of Eric Lomax, a British prisoner of
war who was forced to work on the Thai/Burma railway during World War II, who
returns to the Bridge on the River Kwai to confront his Japanese tormentor,
Nagase, played by Hiroyuki Sanada.
The great challenge of the film for Firth was to get into the
mindset of a man who had experienced torture and tell a story that Mr Lomax
himself still struggles to be completely open about.
For Sanada though, the challenge is speaking about an issue -
Japanese treatment of prisoners of war in World War II - that is largely
unspoken of in his homeland.
"I think we have an education problem in Japan," he said.
"Nobody knows what happened. That's why I thought this was a
good chance to re-examine what happened in the past and think about now and the
future for me and the younger generation [to make] a better future together.
"We should reexamine that, go to the next step, to make
peace."
The UK and Australia co-production is backed by Screen Australia,
with Screen Queensland and Creative Scotland also lending support.
Andy Paterson, British producer and co-screenwriter of the film,
said southeast Queensland was used in the film for its visual similarities to
Singapore.
Ipswich in particular was selected for the North Ipswich rail
yards
While the POW camp scenes will be filmed on the Gold Coast.
Firth said it was fitting part of The Railway Man was filmed in Australia
"This isn't just a business arrangement between the UK and
Australia it is also historically, culturally and in a personal way a story
which represents the narrative of both countries and their people," he
said.
"Hellfire Pass, which is one of the sites heavily featured in
the film, is now an Australian war memorial and I think a lot of people from
both countries will connect with the story we are telling."
Australian screen star Nicole Kidman plays Firth's wife in the
film.
Firth said it was much less of a stretch to play Kidman's husband
than to play a tortured man.
"Some things are just easy," he said.
"I mean in an awful amount of this one just had to imagine
how this is possible that I did not have to imagine.
"She did the most beautiful job."
Firth finished shooting his scenes yesterday, but the filming
continues in Queensland for the next three weeks.
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