seeing the big picture

When John Boorman embarked on the idea of filming Hope and Glory, an auto biographical memoir of his childhood set in London during World War II, he found that he would need to reconstruct the street where he lived.

His reconstruction was done through the glazed eyes of 45 years of memories and with the aid of some research but he did manage to recreate that street on some old air field land strip at the cost of over a quarter of a million pounds.

Upon its completion he enthusiastically and proudly brought some of his family to view it, hoping that their response would be equally as enthusiastic.

But his sister, mother and aunt made the following observations:

The wireless is in the wrong place; you mother always had a vase on the front window sill and it's a pity that you couldn't get the right wallpaper for the lounge.

Six months of work, 1000s of pounds spent, 45 years of recollections but for a few minor missing details.

Well I am having that kind of day, where it doesn't matter how spectacular the potential of the project is, it matters little because I am dealing with people who are only focused on a few insignificant details.

Worst of all they are not family!