Celebrated British actor Joseph Fiennes is here to present his new Holocaust-themed film at the Haifa Film Festival - and to see the sights.
By HANNAH BROWNjoseph fiennes 224.88(photo credit: Gustavo Hochman)
'We know all the horrors that surround these stories, and sometimes you can get to the truth more through fiction than through fact," says Joseph Fiennes, the celebrated British actor best known for his starring role in Shakespeare in Love, who is attending the 24th Haifa International Film Festival to present his latest film, Spring 1941.
The movie, which was made by Israeli director Uri Barabash (Beyond the Walls), is based on an Ida Fink story and tells the story of Artur, a Jewish doctor in Poland (played by Fiennes) who goes into hiding with his wife and family during World War II. They are taken in by a Polish peasant woman and Fiennes's character becomes involved in a complex romantic relationship with his host.
The question of whether he truly loves the woman or is playing along with her so that she will keep them hidden is left unanswered.
For Fiennes, this ambiguity was one element that drew him to this character: "This is a domestic drama. Like in a lot of Ida Fink stories, the ghosts of the Shoah are there, but the stories deal with very simple and economic moments. She describes it as 'a scrap of time,' and here we have a series of conflicts that you and I couldn't possibly imagine with that level of intensity. I guess what it does is it just takes you by the hand and takes you to a crack in the window and you get to glimpse that scrap of time," says the actor, who speaks with a quiet intensity and clear diction that makes whatever he says sound like a Shakespeare soliloquy.
BECAUSE OF his own "intellectual curiosity," Fiennes did visit concentration camps and read historical accounts of the period, but he focused on the small details of the character in order to prepare for the role.
"Artur was a man who was fully integrated into Polish society - he was a doctor, a husband, a father. I looked for the keys to the character in the practical details of how he adjusted to his new life," says Fiennes.
When in hiding, Artur begins helping on the Polish woman's farm, and bonds with her as she teaches him basic tasks around her property, such as chopping wood, which at first are very difficult for him.
"Here he is, a brilliant surgeon, but he can't chop wood. But learning to do it, he's living life, he's experiencing life, in the face of pressure that is so intense... Maybe getting in touch with milking a cow, and the practicality and the life-affirming quality of something so banal and simple might give you a burst of life in the face of impending doom," Fiennes says.
"That's what I love about the title. It's 'spring,' which is about birth and new life, and '1941,' which is synonymous with the horrors we're familiar with."
Filming in Poland and getting to know Israeli, Polish and British cast and crew members was an intense experience for Fiennes, as was learning the history in greater depth. "The subject of the Poles at this time is difficult and complex. In the Polish community, some housed Jews and some turned them in. Unlike when you see a Nazi uniform, when you see a Polish character, you don't know which way things are going to go," he says.
ALTHOUGH FIENNES is world famous as a film actor, "film is a byproduct of my theater work," he points out.
He was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company and has appeared in many West End productions of both classical and contemporary plays. He supported himself as he studied acting, working as a dresser in the theater, "which means washing people's underpants. Back then, I never dreamt about film."
Although he loves working in film, he feels that, "Theater is an actor's medium and film is a director's medium."
He combined his love of classical theater and film not long ago when he played Bassiano in Michael Radford's Merchant of Venice, starring Al Pacino. In order to make the movie work for contemporary audiences, the text was trimmed down, but Fiennes is not a purist in that respect. "Whatever you do, the genius will always come through. You can set it on the moon and have everyone in crazy costumes, or you cut three-quarters of the text, but genius will always win."
His next project, he hopes, will bring him back to the world of film, but as a director. He wants to make a script he is writing called Street Riders, about black cowboys in tough Philadelphia neighborhoods, which is based on a magazine article he became fascinated with.
This is the actor's first visit to Israel. He plans to visit Jerusalem and to see as much of the country as he can. "It's wonderful to come here with the calling card of this film," says Fiennes.
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