STRENGTH IN COLLABORATION

Co-directors Ren and Samuel Perry-Falvey continue their stellar collaboration which already produced the Camerimage-selected music video for “Hi Ren” at last year’s festival.

Having lensed the music video for “Hi Ren” in 2022, Samuel Perry-Falvey returns to work with the idiosyncratic musician Ren. This time, to shoot the visual accompaniment to the near ten-minute epic “Money Game Part 3” as both co-director and cinematographer. 

The creative and relationship between the pair extends far before 2022 however, as Perry-Falvey detailed the moment the duo met. “We met camping! When I was 16 or so and we were both teenagers. He was just playing around the campfire, not playing Wonderwall’, but his own creations. That blew me away from there.”  

First experiencing Ren in such an intimate setting was an appropriate environment to witness the artist. The songwriter rose to fame due to his raw, acoustic style and an openness with listeners that conjured up strong emotive responses to his music, including from Perry-Falvey himself. “When I met him as a teenager, as is typical, I wasn’t very opened up to my emotional side. So, working with him really affected me. When I first heard Ren’s song ‘Freckled Angels’ around that campfire I was in tears, and I had never had music do that to me before.”  

Responsible for some of Ren’s earliest videos, “the ones where you scrape through on a shoestring budget”, the pair’s artistic journey has come on leaps and bounds in the nine years of their creative journey: “because we’ve worked together for such a long time, you can see the gradual growth really clearly.” Despite an increase in technical proficiency, the output is still buoyed by Ren’s raw style and adeptness at visceral storytelling in his songwriting. “Money Game Part 3” is no different. 

The narrative of the song is a meandering journey through the persona’s high-stakes life, requiring a similarly grandiose setting and cinematic style – Perry-Falvey opted to shoot the piece as a oner – to immerse the audience in the story. “We wanted to reference our previous work as much as possible, whilst stepping up the production, cinematography, storytelling, narrative, character – all of it. We wanted more musicians, more extras, more moving pieces. We just wanted to really elevate it to the next level.”

One of the DP’s favourite films is the fellow oner Victoria, appreciating the film for not using the notoriously difficult style as a gimmick, but because “they don’t cut because they don’t have to cut. You don’t notice they don’t cut because you’re with them and you become another character in the story”, continuing, “that’s what we really wanted to hone in on with ‘Money Game Part 3’: you’re right next to the character through his journey of corruption and downfall.” For this highly technical style, the choice of kit was imperative.  

Armed with an ARRI Alexa Mini, Angénieux zoom lens and MK-V V2 AR Steadicam system, the details of camera movement were incredibly intricate and essential to telling the one-shot story. Perry-Falvey cited one of the shoot’s main difficulties as “making sure there is the physical space for the Steadicam to come in. Balancing the movement and motion of where the extras are in coordination with the camera was integral, especially when we’re making it as dynamic and interesting as possible.” Steadicam operator Beau Prichard-James was integral to the process, along with spark Josh Stiles. Both of their involvement “was very important for us…they already knew exactly what we were going for with the project creatively so we already on the same page.” 

The rainy crescendo to the piece was of particular importance and made difficult due to the potential continuity issues in making an entire studio wet. “We had to get everything so dead perfect before we could even let it rain. Working out if it was the right take and having to yell “Cut!” just in case you thought anything was even a little bit off.” But for Perry-Falvey, the payoff was absolutely worth it.  

“The whole last sequence is the moment that just captures what we were going for, for me. As soon as the strings section comes in, I always get tingles all over my body. The epic-ness to it just feels like it can’t be matched, especially with that moment where the rain comes in.” 

Perry-Falvey concluded where we began, reminiscing on his relationship with Ren: “It’s been amazing to have such a long-term creative collaboration. Ren always comes to the table with so much to bounce off. It doesn’t feel like the waters ever still. There are always things happening, being contemplated.”