The Greatest Hits with Ned Benson and Marc Webb (Ep. 476)

The Director’s Cut - A DGA Podcast

Directors Guild of America

Tv & Film

4.6 • 806 Ratings

🗓️ 3 May 2024

⏱️ 29 minutes

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Summary

Director Ned Benson discusses his new film, The Greatest Hits, with fellow Director Marc Webb in a Q&A at the DGA theater in Los Angeles. In the conversation, he discusses filming at landmark Los Angeles locations to ingrain the city as part of the story, working with the cinematographer to artistically convey the time traveling sequences, and working with his composer to craft a soundtrack that compliments a musically-inclined story. The film tells the story of Harriet, who discovers that specific songs can transport her to the past to relive cherished moments with her former partner. But after meeting someone new in the present, she struggles to decide whether to alter the past and reclaim what she lost, or make peace with it and move on. See photos and a summary of this event below: https://dga.org/Events/2024/June2024/GreatestHits_QnA_0424

Transcript

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0:00.0	We thought a lot about articles of clothing that had a past and had a story just like we thought about all the objects in the movie that had a past and had a story.
0:07.7	So like thinking about clothing that represented the past to a degree.
0:11.6	So, you know, Harriet's clothes were a lot of hand-me-downs.
0:14.2	If you look carefully, like some of those clothes are the same clothes that Max is wearing in the past that she's wearing now in the present.
0:44.0	Hello and welcome back to the director's cut, brought to you by the Directors Guild of America.
0:49.8	In this episode, a young woman is transported through time by the music she loves,
0:53.4	and director Ned Benson's romantic drama, The Greatest Hits.
0:56.5	The film tells the story of Harriet,
1:00.2	who discovers that specific songs can transport her to the past to relive cherished moments with her former partner.
1:03.7	But after meeting someone new in the present,
1:05.9	she struggles to decide whether to alter the past and reclaim what she lost,
1:09.9	or make peace with it and move on.
1:12.6	In addition to the greatest hits, Benson's other directorial credits include
1:17.6	the disappearance of Eleanor Rigby Film Trilogy, and the short films, Yes, the Westerner,
1:23.6	and Four Lean Hounds. Following a screening of the film at the DGA Theater in Los Angeles,
1:30.7	Benson spoke with director Mark Webb about filming the greatest hits.
1:35.5	Listen on for their spoiler-filled conversation.
2:10.6	Hey guys, How you doing? Good. He's doing very well. I can tell. Him not so much. Weeping over here. Ned Benson. Great to be here. Wonderful film. Tell me, what came first, the concept of the character for this piece? Where did it come from?
2:17.9	Well, first of all, thanks for doing this, Mark. Five hundred Days of Summer was obviously a movie that was a reference for this and something we talked about at Searchlight when we first got into it as something as a North Star for
2:24.7	this as well. But yeah, I actually read this book by Oliver Sacks in 2008 called Musicophilia,
2:33.8	which is about how music interacts with the brain.
2:37.2	And then on top of that, I also have always been profoundly affected by music in terms of just as a personal time travel mechanism.
	...

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