Ask Hollywood filmmakers to name the greatest directors ever, and one name will consistently appear – David Lean – the man who made Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago, The Bridge on the River Kwai, and many more classics.
“He’s on everyone’s list and for many he’s at the top,” said Barnaby Thompson, director of Maverick: The Epic Adventures of David Lean, which just premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. “I think for a lot of people he represents really that sort of leap cinema made into what we think of as being the grand sprawling epic that became his trademark.”
David Lean
Alamy
The documentary, which premiered in the official Cannes Classics section, explores Lean’s unlikely ascent to filmmaking brilliance. He was dyslexic and didn’t excel in school, leading his father to conclude his son was a dunce. That wasn’t the only obstacle in Lean’s path.
“He grew up in a rather dreary suburb of London. He was born into a family that were strict Quakers. So, they didn’t approve of theater, and they certainly didn’t approve of the cinema,” Thompson said as he stopped by the Deadline Studio in Cannes. “He did very badly at school. His father really kind of gave up on him and never really believed in him I think at any point in his career. So, he had a lot to overcome.”
Thompson added, “I think his secret was he discovered photography and he found that he was very good at photography. And I think that’s what ultimately gave him the confidence to get into the film business.”
Without David Lean, Alec Guinness might never have become a film star.
“Kay Walsh, who he was then married to, was an actress and she twisted David Lean’s arm to go and see a little theater production, which was an adaptation of Great Expectations that had been done by Alec Guinness,” Thompson explained. “And Alec Guinness played a number of the parts in this adaptation. Lean had never read the [Dickens] book and I think he was amazed by what he saw, what Guinness had done. And so he decided to make a film of the book, and I think in return he gave Guinness his first stab. And then Alec Guinness worked with Lean more than any other actor.”
Director David Lean on location for ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ (1962)
Alamy/Columbia Pictures
Lean put beautiful love stories on screen – Doctor Zhivago and Ryan’s Daughter among them. Yet, as the documentary reveals, lasting love eluded him. He was married six times.
“He was a man that was in pursuit of perfection,” Thompson observed. “I think he was a man that was always searching and I get the sense that whenever a romance had kind of blossomed as far as it felt it could go, he started looking over her shoulder. It’s extraordinary in a way that this man who made just such the most romantic films of all time couldn’t find happiness himself.”
Watch the full conversation in the video above.
The Deadline Studio at Cannes is sponsored by SCAD.
Title: Maverick: The Epic Adventures of David Lean
Section: Cannes Classics
Director: Barnaby Thompson
Sales agent: Embankment Films
Logline: The life of British filmmaker David Lean, from his strict upbringing to becoming a master of epic cinema. Features rare archival footage and insights from contemporary directors.
Panelist: Barnaby Thompson (director)