MikeFiggis Tagged Articles at Cinematical

I'm not exactly sure how the word "pilot" came to mean "initial episode of a TV show," but it's definitely a part of the general lexicon by now. "Did you watch that new series called People on an Island?" is what I might ask you, and your response very well could be "Yeah, I watched the pilot but I couldn't get into it." So you understand the word "pilot" in this context, right? Good. Maybe you should get a job at Los Angeles International Airport.

It's funny because I'm kind of surprised it hasn't happened before: Director Mike Figgis was going through security at LAX when he was asked the reason for his visit. "I'm here to shoot a pilot," was his response. Obviously he meant "I'm here to shoot the first episode of a TV series that may or may not be picked up for broadcast distribution," but what the immigration official thought he meant was "I'm here to shoot an airplane pilot with a gun." Yikes! The director of Leaving Las Vegas, Timecode and Internal Affairs was then detained for about five hours until immigration officials could get online and figure out that, yep, "pilot" has more than one meaning.

Good thing the immigration officers didn't ask him about his body of work. Figgis' answer might have been "I recently made a huge bomb."

Mike Figgis, who we last encountered directing pornographic lingerie ads, has announced that he'll be continuing his trend of working with hot women when it comes to his next project. Newly-minted Bond girl Eva Green will star in Figgis' The Nazi Officer's Wife, based on a memoir by Edith Hahn Beer. The story is a fascinating one, about a young Jewish law student in Austria who was forced first to a ghetto and then to a labor camp by the Gestapo. Eventually, after leaving the labor camp, she went underground with a friend's identity papers and made her way to Munich (no idea why a Jew would flee to Germany during World War II - hopefully Figgis will make all of that clear). In Munich, she met a Nazi officer who fell in love with and married her despite her background and ethnicity, which he kept secret from his peers. Wow. That sounds exhausting just to watch.

Also appearing in the film will be Alexandra Maria Lara and Thomas Kretschmann; it begins shooting later this year.

For reasons that have not been even slightly explained, Mike Figgis made an eight minute film shilling for lingerie house Agent Provocateur. The bad news is that he's a total sellout. The good news - depending on what interests you - is that he's sold out to make lesbian porn. Seriously. Titled Tied Up at the Office, it's shot in grain black and white and features some women, lacy underwear, lots of touching, some panting, and a touch of bondage at work.

While I'm afraid I'm a little light on details (I couldn't tell any of the women apart - there were either like six or only two of them. And there either was a Mannequin-style transformation thing going on, or there wasn't. What do you want from me? It's poorly lit, ok?), the thing really is pretty sexy, in a voyeuristic sort of way. I don't, however, feel a greater need to buy trashy fancy lingerie than I did before watching it, so I'm not sure it actually worked as an advertisement for the company. But at least I've heard of them now, so that's something. Good work, Mike.

So in case you somehow missed it, the "Read" link below is NSFW.

[via fimoculous.com]