Andrew Haigh’s 2011 feature film Weekend announced the arrival of a filmmaker who could convey the lives of gay men with a sense of nuance in the ordinary that bled into the sublime. Haigh followed that film up with Looking, an HBO television series which ran for two seasons from 2014-15. That series was sniffed at for its lack of melodrama, its plain depiction of a small group of gay men looking for love and connection in the Bay Area. But for those who loved Looking, it felt like watching something new: a show where the gay sidekicks got promoted to be the leads. Their flawed decisions and imperfect behavior are the building blocks of a character’s interior life instead of pop culture references and Fudgy McPacker quips.

Haigh’s new film 45 Years is and is not a departure from his previous work. Here he applies an even greater degree of attention and scrutiny to the psyches of his characters. Like Michael Haneke’s Amour (2012) before it, the quiet storm at the center of the story is a long-term marriage, and a heterosexual one at that. Also like Amour, most of the accolades have gone to the female lead, Charlotte Rampling, who, at 69, received her first Academy Award nomination for the role. But in both cases — Jean-Louis Trintignant in Haneke’s film and Tom Courtenay in Haigh’s — the men’s performances were overlooked. In town for a screening, Haigh answered questions about Courtenay, Rampling and the Looking movie that will air on HBO later this year.

Some of the emotion that drives the film is the rage and frustration about aging, exemplified by Geoff, the character played by Tom Courtenay.

The film was always about two people looking back at their lives. So it makes sense that that character would be filled with anger and disappointment that he's not the person necessarily that he thought he'd be. That's why it's Geoff's issue all along and not so much this beautiful woman that he was madly in love with. It's about what he was when he was younger and what he is now in the present. That's what fuels his anger in the film. Our conversations with Tom were about all the choices that we've made in our lives, all the things we regret and how we have firm political beliefs.

Just by the nature of Courtenay’s being 78, his body has changed and everything has changed and he can't do things like he used to so I think it was so inherent in him as a person that it didn't really need much discussion. Both he and Charlotte knew that I was going for a naturalistic approach to aging and to that kind of characterization.


Courtenay is largely unknown to American audiences. What was your experience of his work?

It's strange to me that he's relatively unknown. He was nominated for The Dresser (1983) and Dr. Zhivago (1965). Two Oscar nominations and he won a Golden Globe. He's done all these things but he's never really been part of the Hollywood system. He's not been in any of those big films and that's been a conscious choice on his behalf. I was a big fan — but not at the time because I wasn't even born — but The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962) is the film that made his name in England. It's such an incredible film to me in that period of British New Wave. As a British filmmaker you can't help but be inspired and improved by those films. And I hadn't actually seen The Dresser until a few years ago but it's a fantastic film. But those actors of that generation, he and Albert Finney, they are part of the British cinematic world, of what I want to do.

The casting of Charlotte Rampling in this part is, if not against type, then the most vulnerable performance we’ve seen from her. In many of her previous roles, she projects a fiercely independent froideur.

I feel like that's very true and it was so important to me that whoever was cast as Kate had a strength. I didn't want a woman from the outset who would look weak. I wanted it to be a strong woman. In many ways that crumbling of her identity becomes so much more powerful because she does have a strong center. And I always thought that Charlotte, even when she's playing those characters that are almost incredibly icy almost, there's always still a vulnerability in them and that's what I love about her. There's something unknowing, mysterious, and I think that is an insecurity and a vulnerability. And so it made complete sense to me that that would work for this.

There is pain and turmoil going on behind her face and her physicality. A lot of people look out of the window and it doesn't mean anything; she looks out of a window and you look at her face and it's like, "Okay, there's something going on there." For film where basically she starts talking halfway through, it becomes a silent performance. I needed someone who would portray those moments in a powerful way.


Did you watch the Francois Ozon films that he crafted for her?

I think Under the Sand (2000) is one of her most beautiful performances. I love that and Swimming Pool (2003) as well. They're beautiful films and he knew how to use her properly. I love to see Charlotte when she's in every shot of the film. Those films were about her. She's had some great performances in smaller supporting roles, but I want to see her in almost every frame. In 45 Years, I don't think that there's a frame she's not in.

Rampling often plays the mysterious, unknowable other. In this film, you’ve switched that dynamic: It’s the man who is unknowable.

The original story is actually told from the male perspective weirdly, and I knew the minute I read the story, as I was trying to tap into it, I wanted it to be from her perspective. I wanted her to be the center, everything is from her point of view. He is a mystery and she's trying to pull out elements from the past to try to understand what's been happening, but he's hidden.

I do think in the Ozon films she's so wonderful, and he is a great director. Straight people are often scared of challenging women and gay men aren't as scared of challenging women. We look at her in a different way than perhaps some straight male directors do. I want that character to feel challenging, I want to work with an actress who is challenging.

Michael Haneke's Amour is a recent film with a similar theme about aging together as a couple, but your director’s consciousness is much more agnostic or realistic than his.

I do feel like I'm an atheist. I don't believe in God but I do feel like all of my films aren't even looking. They're about, for me when I'm writing, there are people living in a world where there isn't a God for them and they don't necessarily believe in him. They're trying to understand what their life means in the universe, basically, and finding that place within it, working out how they can give meaning to their own life. And I do feel like in 45 Years it's two characters looking back to see if their life has had meaning and if the relationship that they've forged together has had meaning. For some of those other filmmakers, God becomes that meaning or has forged a meaning and for me that doesn't exist in the world of my stories. While it's not an obvious thing, I do think because I don't believe in God I'm always looking to create my own meaning in an existential way.


The fade to black is such a fitting end to the film. Did you have a "This is exactly right." moment when you shot the scene?

That final shot, which was a very long shot of them coming off the dance floor, dancing and zooming into her, I wanted that. That was the first image that came into my head when I was starting to write the script. I knew I wanted that to be the end. For me the film is leading from one point to that final point. It's not even undulating. I felt like it's either a straight line to it or it's spiraling into it or something like that, that's how I saw the film. I knew that was going to be the final moment, I knew that I wanted it to cut to black and I knew that it would just be on her face.

But then in terms of what that would be on the day, Charlotte and I talked about it, obviously, and it was in the script, this notion of what the emotion is. But then you just make that decision and I wanted it to be jarring, just hit you but also be slightly confrontational at the same time. I wanted it to be a bit of a shock to the system like, "Oh my God, fuck!" Yeah, I think Charlotte's amazing in there and I want you to like be thrown into the darkness to be like, "Oh, okay. Now what?"

As an artist, your works veers away from closure. Why decide to work on a final film for Looking after the series was canceled?

When they decided they weren't going to have another season of it, there was talk about the movie. I was unsure to start with, but then very quickly I pushed to do the movie. I don't usually like closure in my work but for some reason I wanted closure with this. Especially if I look at Patrick's journey throughout the seasons. Season 2 he's all over the place and making stupid fucked up decisions which some people can be angry about or not angry about. To me that was important: he needs to make wrong decisions before he can make right decisions.

I wanted to end his story, that was what was fundamental to me. And it's not about it all having it with a neat bow. But I wanted to see him, for me, in a lightened, good position. I wanted to end that story for him. I feel enormously for him. I think the show for me was just about nice people trying to find their way in the world and trying to find their version of family and trying to find somebody that they can be with. It's very simple to me really what the show was and it wasn't about anything other than that really.

I'm happy that I've got to finish it, and the shoot finished three days ago. I'm honored and it was so lovely for me to be able finish it with everybody. So many of the crew is San Francisco-based, they've all been there from the very beginning of the pilot. I've never worked with so many gay people which has been amazing in a professional environment. And just to be with all the actors again, it was a really emotional thing for us all. We've all really loved doing it and it's sad for us to bring it to an end.

45 Years opens in San Francisco at the Embarcadero Center Cinema Friday, Jan. 30.