THE HERO

It’s always hard to make a movie,’ says director Mary Harron. ‘It’s just having to be enormously persistent.’ In her case, it has paid off – with an eclectic CV boasting indie classics I Shot Andy Warhol, American Psycho and The Notorious Bettie Page. Now back with Dalíland, starring Ben Kingsley as the surrealist painter, Harron is ready to unpack her career in broad strokes…

What led you to casting Ben Kingsley as Salvador Dalí?

I remember when his agent suggested that, I said, ‘But he’s so powerful!’ I was thinking of Sexy Beast and Gandhi. And Dalí was a tremendous coward! Like a child in a lot of ways and a hypochondriac. Also, we were watching Iron Man 3, where he’s the scary character [the Mandarin] and then he’s playing this cowardly British actor, Trevor, and he’s so funny. The other thing about Ben, he’s fearless. He said, ‘I’m terrified of playing Salvador Dalí.’ But he really will go there and take on an icon, which a lot of people don’t want to do.

You’ve focused on 20thcentury icons before, like Andy Warhol and Bettie Page. What interests you about taking such figures to the screen?

It’s funny because one of my first jobs in TV… I was a researcher on The South Bank Show for four years. I learned an awful lot. And I was the researcher on the big Warhol documentary they did; I didn’t do Dalí but did do Warhol. And those were proper biographical films, but when I came to do I Shot Andy Warhol, I thought, ‘What if you take the perspective of the least important person in the room?’ And there’s something good about that; it makes the story come to life more. You’re not so paralysed by celebrity or somebody’s fame and reputation.

How do you feel about the growing reputation of American Psycho?

I was actually having coffee with Christian [Bale] yesterday. And somebody came up to him and said, ‘I just want to say something. I just love American Psycho.’ Which was really funny. He said, ‘Well, she made it!’ And we were talking about how our kids are always showing us things of American Psycho. Because there’s all these memes. And for some reason that film is very meme-able. And I’m very pleased: you never can tell in the films you’ve made what’s gonna hit the zeitgeist.

‘BEN WILL REALLY GO THERE AND TAKE ON AN ICON, WHICH ALOT OF PEOPLE DON’T WANT TO DO’

MARY HARRON

THE CANADIAN DIRECTOR LANDS ANOTHER CULTURAL ICON…

What’s your favourite meme?

I mean, I think there’s one with kittens. And a Dutch jeans company did a commercial for denim. They did a hipster version of the business-card scene. They’re talking about coffee and denim. And they’ve all got beards and tattoos. And it’s just brilliant.

You are clearly good at tapping into the zeitgeist. You made your Charles Manson story Charlie Says ahead of Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood…

Yes. And it’s funny because my film cost under $4 million. And we had to recreate the Manson ranch. Some thought I’d used the same set. No, we had to do our own set! So he had 100 million, we had four!

Of all the TV you’ve done, what’s been your favourite?

I was very lucky with Alias Grace, which Sarah Polley wrote, based on [the novel by] Margaret Atwood… Great scripts… I felt like, ‘Oh, I got a chance to do a six-hour movie.’

You also made teenage tale The Moth Diaries in the wake of the success of Twilight. Was that the one that got away?

That was a very difficult production experience. And we ended up shooting 70% of the script… It just had production problems. There are still things I really love about it. When the film came out, everybody was like, ‘This is a terrible horror movie. This is a terrible Twilight! Why doesn’t it have all those things that you’re supposed to have, like teen romance or scary vampire stuff?’ Now I’m pleased it’s got its own cult following.

DALÍLAND IS STREAMING ON THE ICON FILM CHANNEL, AND IS ON DIGITAL AND DVD THIS MONTH.