Breakfast with The Nest

Interview with Jamie Jones, director of The Nest

 What motivated you to tackle London’s housing crisis and precarious conditions in this film?
Many different reasons to be honest. It’s constantly in the news. It’s something that people talk about a lot, but most importantly the idea came to me from conversations with my mother. I grew up in London during the 1980s and my parents were part of a squatting community so I spent a lot of time as a child moving houses and watching my mum deal with bailiffs. So I wanted to look at my past and see how it compares to the present. I took a lot of stories from my mum, updated them to make a contemporary story and then compressed them all to create one tragic morning.

 Can you tell us about the footage you use at the start and at the end, and the choice of soundtrack?
Even though these things happened to my family I was worried that people watching the film might think it’s all a bit over the top. They might not believe that these things really happen in such a ruthless way. So I spent a lot of time during the writing process reading stories and watching YouTube clips of evictions. It was pretty shocking to see how much stuff is online and actually there is a lot more brutal stuff than comes across in The Nest. So me and Shelley (my sister and producer of the film) decided during the edit that a really powerful way to remind people that this is really happening is to open and close the film with some actual footage of real events.

For the soundtrack I wanted to emulate some of the protest music of the 1960s. So I worked closely with my good friend and talented composer Javier Calequi and he created this amazing soundtrack.

 Can you tell us about the casting process?
We cast in a conventional way really. We had a casting agent who helped with the bigger roles, but because of the budget restraints we had to find the majority of the smaller parts ourselves. And then getting Vicky attached was obviously a big boost for us. We just sent her agent the script cold, she passed it on to Vicky and she said yes. It was great working with Vicky as it meant I had to up my game.

 What sparked your interest in filmmaking? Are you keen to focus on the short format or are you interested in developing features?
I’ve been into movies since I was very young. My dad is a massive Charlie Chaplin fan and I became obsessed with Chaplin through him. I was always very interested in Chaplin’s backstory so I guess it all came from there. I really love making shorts. What’s great about shorts is the fact that you can be experimental as you’re not expecting to make any money from them. The downside of making shorts is that you don’t make any money from them. I’ve never been lucky enough to secure any public funding for my shorts so in reality it’s just been a very expensive hobby of mine over the years. If I’m totally honest I’m starting to feel a bit guilty about asking my friends to keep working for nothing. In reality unless I can secure funding so I can pay people properly I doubt I will be doing anymore shorts. But I shot my first feature film in September and it went incredibly well so I am hoping to make a sustainable career out of that. We’ll see how that goes.

 Any cinematic coups de cœur in the past year you’d like to tell us about?
I just watched American Honey and was totally blown away by it. I think Andrea Arnold is a complete legend. There aren’t nearly enough women directing cinema and she is the strongest argument that needs to change. I’ve found that the more I’ve been involved in the making of films the less often I am swept away by the ones I watch. I guess it’s because I can see the matrix a lot more often, but when I watch Andrea Arnold’s films it’s like being a kid again. I can’t see the matrix. I can’t see the script. I’m just in the film, totally immersed from beginning to end. I think it’s because she has so much respect for acting and doesn’t try to control every little thing. Instead she just lets actors do their job, shoots the shit out of it and then finds the nuances in the edit. I know there are a couple of cheesy “Little Mermaid” moments in there, but I don’t care. Also Robbie Ryan is incredible and I could just watch his footage all day long.

 If you’ve already been to Clermont-Ferrand, could you share with us an anecdote or story from the festival? If not, what are your expectations for this year?
I haven’t been before, but I hope to drink some good French wine, watch loads of great films and enjoy a few days of escapism pretending to be a director and not a dad.

 Are any other releases scheduled?
So far we’ve been accepted into the following festivals. We are still waiting to hear from a bunch of others we’ve applied to:
Liverpool International Film Festival (won the Women In Film award)
London Short Film Festival (nominated for Best Cinematography)
Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival
Tampere Film Festival

 Are you taking part in other events during the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival? (Espressos, Conferences, other?)
I’m meeting with the British Film Council and that’s it so far.

The Nest is being shown in International Competition I12.