Many people dream of making a movie, but Col Spector has actually done it. What’s more, Someone Else, Col’s first full-length movie, which he wrote as well as directed, has a top-notch cast with the likes of Stephen Mangan, Susan Lynch and John Henshaw. It is almost entirely self-funded and set in all of Col’s favourite northwest London haunts, including his own flat.
Col is tickled pink. He has spent the year walking the walk on the red carpets of film festivals from Budapest to Palm Springs, picking up the coveted Variety Critics Choice at the Czech Republic’s Karlovy Vary Film Festival along the way. Now with its run finished in the UK, Someone Else is soon to be released internationally.
Likened to Woody Allen’s Manhattan, Someone Else is a 78-minutes comedy-drama about a thirty-something man coming of age at that particularly sensitive time in his life.
It has elements that make you cringe, reminding you of the times when you too got it so very wrong. The film is full of gems, like the time when Lisa (Susan Lynch) books a surprise trip to Venice for David (Stephen Mangan), whom she doesn’t yet know is thinking of dumping her. He hides his true feelings and ends up in the to-and-fro of lovers’ exchanges.
“You’re lovely,” states David.
“No, you’re lovely,” coos Susan.
“No, you’re lovelier”, reiterates David, to which Susan, heady with excitement, suggests, “Shall we go and look for guidebooks?!”
This is a typical Col Spector fist-in-jaw moment that he hopes will get a physical and emotional reaction from his audience.
”You have to be involved emotionally with the characters and go on a journey with them” says Col. “The film is about men and what makes them happy”.
So what makes Col happy? Making movies is the only conceivable response.
Col has always been a “film head”, but Someone Else is a far cry from his first film that he made on VHS for a multimedia project when he was 14 and still at school.
“It was about personal space and the nuances of behaviour” he reminisces with a smile. Col is still as fascinated with human behaviour, in particular how relationships work.
“If you come from a dysfunctional family, you are interested in how other peoples’ relationships work” explains Col. He admits he has a “quizzical outsiders look on the world” which he views with “cool objectivity”, stemming from his “unconventional upbringing”, as he puts it. Col’s honesty is mirrored in his film and with gritty, often embarrassing, realism. It may explain why in Col’s work, he manages the fine line between comedy and tragedy, which allows the audience to comfortably come face to face with the complexities of everyday life.
On leaving school Col went to Art College for a year before embarking on a three-year BA honours degree in Film and Television.
“It was like putting fighting dogs together,” he says. It gave him his first taste of the competitive world of television. However, it did allow him to make some short films.
“Making films was like going to nursery – you make lots of messy paintings at first until you create something half decent”.
Col has never left the film world but slowly yet surely edged closer to his desired goal – making feature films. After leaving film school Col spent three years looking for his first job. All this time was spent researching documentary ideas. That meant that when, by chance, he met someone who worked for the BBC, he had a whole host of exciting projects up his sleeve. They were so impressed that he was snapped up and so started his freelance career. He worked for the BBC and Channel 4, first as a researcher. He was soon directing his own documentaries. The rest, as they say, is history.
“It was at BBC Schools TV where I first learnt my craft” says Col of directing arts music documentaries. “I was given complete freedom and trust as a director”. Although Col had “an amazing time” he left, as he couldn’t see a future in quality arts programmes.
All in all, Col has directed all sorts: from the critically acclaimed documentary Just Enough Distance, the tragic story of a photographer murdered by her subject, to The Lost Supper, the story of how the Da Vinci masterpiece was destroyed by its restorers, to the BBC’s Firework Safety Films. He still directs commercials, which keeps him sharp and refines his skills in making quick artistic decisions.
Having spent years establishing himself as a documentary director, five years ago Col turned his back on it to concentrate on dramas.
“As a documentary maker, of the sort that I was, you are generally limited in terms of what you can show on film” he says of why he came to make the transition.
In contrast, feature films allow a whole new canvas of possibilities.
“You create something new that is open to interpretation”, enthuses Col.
Still with the dream of making a movie at the forefront of his mind, he decided to make his first short film, New Year’s Eve. Featuring the then unheard-of future starlet, Keira Knightly, it won Col the Best British Short at the International Kinofilm 2003. Initially intended as a sketch, New Year’s Eve was later developed into what we saw in Someone Else.
Despite his depth of film experience and recognition, Col is his most severe critic and he has to be satisfied with his own high standards.
“You have to prove you’ve got something to say”. Despite his modesty, it seems that he already has.
Someone Else and New Year’s Eve are released on DVD in January by Soda Pictures.