You know those actors who say: “I can’t bear to watch myself. I notice all my mistakes”? Since the summer of 2019, I’ve had an inkling of what they mean.
The previous September, American academic publisher McFarland brought out my book George Orwell on Screen, which the few people who’ve read it seem to like very much.
Six months after that, American cineastes the Criterion Collection interviewed me in London for a DVD/Blu-ray of Nineteen Eighty-Four (the John Hurt/Richard Burton movie, from 1984).
In the space of a year, then, I’d achieved two of my life’s ambitions. As well as being an author, I was a DVD extra, which is arguably more thrilling.
Midway through July, Criterion sent me complimentary discs of 1984 (and let’s be honest, the numerical title is snappier). They were region-coded for the US and Canada, but after a little jiggery-pokery, I discovered a way to view them.
My first instinct was to check out the 21 minutes and 41 seconds devoted to me. That’s a whole TV show, more or less, with a professional sheen you’re not going to find on the average YouTube video.
I had to steel myself to watch it, mainly because DVD Beaver had published a review with screen grabs and I didn’t much like the photograph of myself.
Sure, I’ve peered into a camcorder before, many times. I know what I look and sound like. But this was an edited interview, with the camera to one side and inadvertent facial expressions included. I’d be seeing myself as others see me, pretty much.
After about 30 seconds, I relaxed and settled back to enjoy the featurette. Then, as soon as it finished, I watched it all over again.
I can tell they’ve chopped up my sentences and rearranged them, but it’s so seamless and clever, even I can barely see (or hear) the join. In any event, my face doesn’t appear that much: the vast majority of the time, I’m a voiceover for film clips and still photos.
Doubleplusgood
I watched the movie again, for the umpteenth time – it’s a favourite of mine – only with Dominic Muldowney’s original soundtrack, rather than the Eurythmics’ controversial replacement (both are included on the disc).
This is the definitive transfer, as it happens, approved by the director Michael Radford and his now legendary cinematographer, Roger Deakins.
To appreciate just how drained of colour the picture is – how it’s been pushed halfway towards a black-and-white look, on purpose – you ought to watch the trailer as well, which is garishly realistic. The difference is genuinely startling.
Radford and Deakins are interviewed separately and seem much more relaxed in front of a camera than I am.
The director is ebullient, talking ten to the dozen and chuckling a lot; while the equally affable, Oscar-winning director of photography talks fondly of what was an early opportunity for him – a young man breaking into movies, in awe of Burton (who ended up thanking the crew for invigorating him).
Though I’m a little self-conscious about my stumbles, slip-ups, pauses for thought and strange pronunciation of the word ‘moustache’, I guess I shouldn’t be so hard on myself.
I gave my sister a DVD and she watched it on her computer, which didn’t object to it being Region 1.
“You were very impressive,” she told me the next time she saw me. “Like you really knew what you were talking about.”
This is a updated draft of a blogpost published on my old site, Ryanflair.org, on 29 July 2019. The old version perished in a tragic website migration accident.
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