Marianna & Daniel O’Reilly
UK filmmaker
—>
—>
Interview:10 questions
1. Tell me something about your life and the educational background
We met while studying for our Masters Degrees in London (Royal Academy Schools and Chelsea College of Art) in 2002, and then we got married because we were in love. After working independently, Marianna in painting and Daniel in philosophy, we combined our efforts into a singular output.
2. When, how and why started you filming?
In 2008 we produced a series of short studies and experiments with scene, circumstance, character and myth. This was initially spurred by a holiday in Rome in which the question arose: ‘How does one take a photograph in the most photographed of all cities?’ We then surreptitiously took footage of holidaymakers and city-dwellers (as only tourists can) and then combined this imagery with a letter which Daniel wrote to himself about Rome. Holiday sights, centres and people thereafter became significant in our output.
3. What kind of subjects have your films?
Our videos tend to correlate with the psychic situations encountered in our relationship and could almost be said to be involuntary or extremely necessary. We focus largely upon testing the limits of what may be called ‘Individuality’ and how relationships are both bound and severed by its definitions and demands.
4. How do you develop your films, do you follow certain principles, styles etc?
We would conceive an idea and start developing separate scenes, for instance our recent video shoot of ‘Longbridge’ was completely planned out on the Internet from our home in London and then shot in Copenhagen on our holiday, each scene set at a tourist landmark. We adopted the idea of using the ‘tourist’ identity as an incognito – a concept derived from Soren Kierkegaard – in order to develop a narrative fiction about the city and its inhabitants. The final video presents three characters whose actions intersect in a suspense plot being investigated by the fictional ‘Institute of Film and Video Studies’ in Copenhagen. We are now planning to post images and fictional characters from the video onto Google Earth to enhance the mythology and engage in the production of new realities.
5. Tell me something about the technical equipment you use.
We use consumer grade HDC-HS300 Panasonic camera, Acid Pro, Sound Forge and Premier Pro CS4.
6. What are the chances of new media for the genre film/video in general and you personally?
We are keen to continue using new developments in internet media and distribution for creating new narratives and settings for our work, and our future projects will take advantage of the instant accessibility of this media to a wide audience. Future projects involve shooting and streaming episodes of a video-diary ‘live’ via our YouTube channel, and an attempt at getting our camera stolen in Naples – because the tourist guidebook says that it is bound to happen.
7. How do you finance your films?
We have real jobs for financing our work.
8. Do you work individually as a video artist/film maker or do you work in a team? if you have experience in both, what is the difference, what do you prefer?
We work strictly as a couple.
9. Who or what has a lasting influence on your film/video making?
Probably mother.
10. What are your future plans or dreams as a film/video maker?
To make more films.
Can works of yours viewed online besides on VideoChannel? Where?
List some links & resources:
www.mariannaanddaniel.co.uk
www.streamingfestival.com
www.outcasting.org
www.ottica-tv.com