Ever
the perfectionist, Oliver Stone has been refining
his latest film, Any Given Sunday,
which screens in competition at the Berlinale on
Saturday 19 February. The director, who will attend
the festival with this new version of the film,
has been keeping festival director Moritz de Hadeln
abreast of the re-editing developments over the
last couple of weeks.
"As proud as I am of Any Given Sunday
and the honour you are bestowing on it," wrote Stone
to de Hadeln, "I've had time to reconsider the work
as a whole since the film's domestic release and
revisited certain aspects of it.
"As
we only had a six-month go at the editing under
heavy pressure, that extra seventh month in January
permitted me a little calm and objectivity
as well as more
interaction with audiences."
The
film will be 12 minutes shorter than the one originally
selected, but still weighs in at 2 hours 30 minutes
of what Stone hopes will be a stronger and more
accessible film, "especially [for] European audiences
not comprehending football, but not for that reason
only".
In
a further letter, Stone reiterated that while some
clarifications about the game would help, he never
intended to explain the game's mechanics. "The 12
minutes we have cut have, in my opinion, enhanced
the speed and hardened the clarity of the film overall."
