After having been a frightfully wicked Sheriff of Nottingham, a determined Irish leader, a ghostly and exceptionally likable husband, and even a Rasputin, Alan Rickman has come to the Festival to present a new facet of his talent, his first full-length film as a director, The Winter Guest:  an interesting film of frozen landscapes, beautiful images, engaging characters and fine feelings, which has, moreover, carried off the "People's Choice" award at Brussels.

ETM:  More and more actors are wanting to get behind the camera.  Now it's your turn.  Could you describe your motivations?

AR:  There have always been actors who have become directors.  You only have to think of Orson Welles, Robert Redford, Dennis Hopper....I think that we simply want to "write."  Working as an actor in many films allows you to observe directors. It's like taking a film-school course.  You might not learn everything about focal lengths, but you learn enormously about the manner of working on location, on a set.  Moreover, an actor likes to be treated in a certain way, to work in a certain manner.  [Because the actor has] to put everything into place, to observe, to grasp...this work in progress that's hiding from him.  [And] this obviously depends on individual directors, their vision and their personality.

ETM:  You had already directed the theatrical version of The Winter Guest. Now you're directing the film.  Mainly because of the subject?

AR:  It isn't really the subject.  It's more the friendship between Lindsay Duncan (with whom he worked in Les Liaisons Dangereuses, for the Royal Shakespeare Company) and me, all the more so because the work is dedicated to her mother.  I introduced her to Sharman MacDonald (author/screenwriter).  I really didn't know what the work would be.  I didn't even try to guide it, but I was involved from the start in insuring the direction it would take.  I was present at its birth and I had a stake in seeing it succeed.  As time went on I realised that it was a work which fascinated me more and more because...directing [it?] was something that I ought to do....But the subject was also important.  The film doesn't just speak of a frozen seascape, but of all generations.  It's a bit of the life of all the characters, maybe also a bit of ours.  As we approach the year 2000, you don't always look ahead, but you turn equally to the past.  I think of that more and more.

ETM:  Who is the real "winter guest?"  Death, which is close to a number of the characters?  The grief of the main character Frances (played by Emma Thompson)?  Her solitude and that of her mother?  The renewal of life?  Or of love again?

AR:  For [Sharman] MacDonald, I know it's death.  For me, it's rather Frances, who spends so much time at the beach looking for something, or someone, across the mist.  Someone whom you imagine but can't really see. Certainly, in her case, there are the decisions not to go on grieving, to not go away, to accept her responsibilities there where she is, to take into consideration her relationship with her mother and accept it.  For me, the winter guest is a moment, sometimes several, in the life of everyone, where you come face to face with a difficult choice, where you have to grow up quickly.

ETM:  But all the same, the theme of death is important...