I was quite keen not to do too much I never showed JoEllen any film of Jeffrey because I thought that that was unfair and would influence how she saw him. I didn’t talk too much about Jeffrey.
- How did you feel when JoEllen met Jeffery for the very first time?
The challenge of that is t recognise that the meeting is far more important than the film and to try and let the meeting be as natural as possible - radio mics are a god send as they let be a lot further away and less intrusive on the meeting.
But JoEllen made the point that the meeting was always going to be awkward whether there was a camera there or not - and sometimes the camera makes it less awkward because there is something outside that you can refer to.
The way that we edited that meeting we tried to keep that sense of awkwardness to acknowledge that it was difficult and to raise that question that it’s not an immediate recognition between two people that they are as one.
- You also filmed inside the California Cryobank so how happy were they to let you behind the scenes?
They were pretty happy because I think that they want to be known as a place that offers donated eggs and sperm so they were pretty happy to film there.
I used that footage to create a layer that acknowledged that although the film is about a personal story and how it plays out in a particular family there a whole industry that underlies that has a whole load of other issues and motives going on.
- There is still quite a stigma attached to being conceived this way, it’s not something that is openly talked about, so what do you hope that Donor Unknown will do for this subject?
The purpose of a documentary this this is to provoke a conversation in a way. I think that the technology of reproduction way outstrips our capacity to think about it ethically because as a society I don’t think that we are quite up to date with the scientific developments that are happening - so I suppose part of why I made the film is to encourage a conversation about that.
The film always attracts people with personal experience, either they have been donors or they are donor conceived or they are thinking about donor conception as parents, so I hope that that enables those parties to go into that situation having been able to think about what that must be like and go into it with a little more knowledge.
- Last year we saw the release of The Kids Are Alright - which tackles this very subject - so do you think that Donor Unknown has benefited from the release of that movie?
I try to avoid watching stuff that is about things I’m making a movie about so I haven’t seen The Kids Are All Right - but by all accounts it’s a great film. I don’t know whether it has benefited but it tends to get billed as the real The Kids Are All Right.
But there are things that documentaries can’t do that fiction can - a film like that is much better able to show or imagine the impact on the family after that meeting I couldn’t do that without living with them for the next couple of years.
But then there are things that documentaries can do that fiction can’t - they can actually bring you the interesting and quirky things that life throws up. While they are different mediums I think that they do compliment each other.
- You have made a string of documentary movies so what is it about this genre of film that interests you?
I think the fact that documentaries are an engagement with the real world you get involved with people and try to find ways of telling their story - then you get involved with audiences in working out what those stories mean - so it becomes more than just about making a film it’s about the impact of that film and the discussions that follow it.
I like the unpredictability of documentary making because you will start making one movie and then events will take you in a completely different direction.
- Finally what's next for you?
I have just finished shooting a movie called Town of Runners which is about two girls in an Ethiopian village that has a great track record of producing long distance runners.
The girls want to become athletes and I have been filming them since 2008 as they try to have a career in running. So it’s a film about African adolescence in a very rural part Ethiopia.
Donor Unknown is out now
FemaleFirst Helen Earnshaw