“Michael and Gerry didn’t gel as directors, or even realise what exactly they should be doing,” Parker observed. The original intention had been to include The Wall concert footage, but the attempts to shoot five concerts at Earl’s Court all proved disastrous. “For Roger it was never a case of writing a script,” said Parker, “it was about delving into his psyche to find personal truths I was more interested in the cinematic fiction.” Three faced inwards to a communal chatting, drinking area Roger’s caravan faced outwards with his entrance away from everybody else.”Īfter filming Shoot The Moon, Parker returned to London and began working with Waters and Scarfe at Scarfe’s home in Cheyne Walk on the Thames, developing the scant screenplay Waters had written. When he is asked for an example of Waters’s controlling influence, Parker recounts one telling observation: “Backstage during the concerts they had four caravans in a square, one for each of the Floyd.
#Pink floyd the trial movie#
Parker recognised that the powerful combination of the live music, the animation projected on the large triptych screens and the construction of the vast wall across the stage “created a theatrical sensation that would be hard to improve on in the confines of a regular movie theatre screen”.īackstage after the show, another thing that struck Parker was how “everything was dominated by Roger’s autocratic, almost demonic control over the entire proceedings”.
In particular he was struck by Scarfe’s disquieting animation and the impact the memorable sequence involving the copulating flowers had on the audience. Likening it to a colossal puppet show maybe not quite how Roger Waters saw his tortured semi-autobiographical story of alienation, but Parker was clearly wowed. The concert was rock theatre on a mammoth scale, probably more grandiose and ambitious than that genre had ever achieved before a giant, raging Punch And Judy show.” As Parker recalled: “It was impossible not to be impressed by the immensity of the proceedings. To get an idea of the task ahead, Seresin and Parker flew to Germany to see Pink Floyd performing The Wall live.
“The idea appealed to me because it meant that I could be vicariously involved with a project I had great hopes for, without having to sweat the blood that directing requires.” It was while in San Francisco that Parker got a call from Waters proposing the two of them produce the movie, and have Michael Seresin (Parker’s long-time cameraman) and Gerald Scarfe team up as directors. The original live shows that inspired the movie. Dave Gilmour once referred to Midnight Express as my Dark Side Of The Moon, which was very flattering.” When asked why he thought Waters wanted him to direct, Parker is uncertain: “No idea. These were raw and angry – Roger’s primal scream, which to this day remains at the heart of the piece.”Īt this stage, with his thoughts focused on his next project, Parker had no intention of directing the film even though “Roger was very persuasive”. Parker: “On first meeting it was obvious that Roger wasn’t the typical zonked-out rock star, as we sat in his kitchen talking over the history of the piece and he demonstrated the evolution of the work with snippets of original demo tapes he’d made alone locked behind the wall of his previous house in the country. He was about to start filming Shoot The Moon in San Francisco with Diane Keaton and Albert Finney when a casual conversation with EMI executive Bob Mercer led to a meeting with Waters. The 37-year-old English director was by then a hot Hollywood property thanks to an already impressive list of credits that included Bugsy Malone, Midnight Express and Fame. For Parker, a self-professed “Floyd devotee since A Saucerful Of Secrets”, the opportunity to work with the group was an appealing one.
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