BUSTER PRODUCTION.
PRIME TIME The preferred camera for filming Buster was the Panavision Panaflex, incorporating AGFA XT320 film and prime lenses
Green worked with DOP Michael Garfath on his first and previous film, Car Trouble (1986), starring Julie Walters – who also plays Buster’s wife June in the film – and was impressed with his work. However, for Buster he wanted ‘a more dyed-in-the-wool movies guy’. Green’s producer, Norma Heyman, recommended cinematographer, Tony Imi BSC, who she’d worked with on the film Empire State . “It was a low-budget film and he shot it brilliantly,” Green explains. “Imi loved the Buster script and my vision – then he shared his own ideas.” CHOOSING THE RIGHT KIT Imi and Green were adamant they wanted to shoot the film on location in the UK and Mexico, with a Panavision Panaflex and AGFA XT320. “Imi said he always shot with it because it allowed him to shoot without a filter, low-key, high-key with high or low contrast for interiors and exteriors,” Green says. “We used standard prime lenses for the Panaflex camera at the time. We felt strongly about using primes and not zooms because we thought zooms would diminish the quality of the filmmaking. We both had a traditional and bloody-minded belief in prime lenses.”
and Diana, saw their invitation to the premiere on 15 September revoked jointly by Messrs Green and Collins so that they weren’t associated with what many detractors, including politicians, described as ‘glorified violence’. Buster grossed £66k in its opening weekend, and after going nationwide in its fifth week of release, reached number one at the UK box office. The film went on to gross £3.9m in the UK, making it the highest-grossing independent film of 1988. Now, 35 years since its release, director David Green, a veteran of over 100 feature films, TV dramas and documentaries, explains how he brought one of the most infamous crimes to the big screen.
“Buster grossed £66k in its opening weekend; after going nationwide in its fifth week of release, it reached number one”
IN MEMORY Director David Green visits the commemorative plaque for Jack Mills and David Whitby at Crewe Station
67. MAY 2023
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