Filmmaker of Destiny

Movie News - Posted by Playback on October 15, 2007

By Marise Strauss - Playback Magazine

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Charles Martin Smith hopes audiences will take to the underdog story in his latest feature, Stone of Destiny, which the Hollywood-actor-turned Canadian director is currently posting at Vancouver's Infinity Features.

The $13-million Canada/U.K. copro is Smith's second feature collaboration with Rob Merilees of Infinity, which recently scored a massive success with Capote, the inconspicuous release that ended up netting star Philip Seymour Hoffman an Oscar, and collected US$49 million in worldwide box office.

Destiny, which stars Scottish heavyweights Robert Carlyle (Trainspotting) and Billy Boyd (the Lord of the Rings films), tells the true tale of four University of Glasgow students who hatch a plan to retrieve the Stone of Scone, a symbol of Scottish pride, from England's Westminster Abbey.

Smith, who began directing after he moved to Vancouver in the early 1980s, is mostly known as a diminutive character actor, often playing an outsider who transcends his quirkiness. Memorable roles include the zany Terry "The Toad" Fields in George Lucas' American Graffiti (1973), and the accountant-turned-federal agent Oscar Wallace in Brian De Palma's The Untouchables (1987).

His directing career took shape with the low-budget horror Trick or Treat (1986), and later included Disney's Air Bud, which took in a reported US$23 million at the North American box office in 1997, and the Farley Mowat adaptation The Snow Walker, which received nine Genie Award nominations in 2003, but took in only US$200,000 in theaters, despite a $10-million budget.

In a recent interview with Playback, the amiable 53-year-old filmmaker talked movie budgets, television collaborations with Chris Haddock, and fond memories of working with Sean Connery.

How did the Stone of Destiny shoot go this past summer in Glasgow and London? 
It was a very, very intense shoot. I wanted to do so much and there's only so much you can do in the given time. It had that wonderful kind of intensity, where you feel that everyone's just rolling up their sleeves and diving in. Glen [Winter], my cinematographer, did a terrific job. We work very well as a team.

You have a great cast that includes Robert Carlyle and Billy Boyd. How did it work out? 
I've never worked with a cast that was so talented and so easygoing...it was just a joy to come to set everyday. Robert is a dream. Billy Boyd is very much underrated...I'm in the cutting room right now and it's just a delight to see his footage.

How do you feel about the commercial prospects of the film? 
I do leave a lot of that to Rob [Merilees]. To me, this film has the universal appeal of an underdog story...there's such heart and emotion to it. It's a feel-good story full of strange twists and turns. That's the way to market the film.