An Education Director Lone Scherfig: 'It's Almost Like the Future is Coming Into That Home'

Only three women have ever been nominated for Best Director at the Academy Awards, but this year alone can boast three more that are in the running: Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker, the previously-nominated Jane Campion for Bright Star, and Danish director Lone Scherfig. Scherfig has gotten great buzz for her work helming An Education, and while the film's been a great launchpad for star Carey Mulligan, it's also shone a spotlight on Scherfig, who initially gained notice for directing Italian for Beginners and Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself.

Movieline recently caught up with Scherfig to debate several important matters: London vs. Paris, Sundance vs. Berlin, and British food vs...well, actually, there was no debate about British food. It was tough to make a case for it.

So I was just talking to Carey Mulligan, and she said you were obsessed with these British snack cakes while making the movie.

You mean Battenbergs?

Yes!

Well, I like props. It's not just Battenberg! Sometimes you can make a scene if you use the furniture correctly. It's just one of the many tools you have, in this case Battenberg. The cake is...ugh, it's hideous! Yellow and pink-checked.

Is that exclusive to the period era of the movie, or do they still have those in England?

Yeah, they do, unfortunately. [Laughs] They still have them. But it is typical for the period. English food is not great.

Having grown up in Europe, did London and Paris hold the same allure for you as they do for Carey Mulligan's character Jenny?

Yes. London still does. I genuinely think London is the greatest city in the world, and it's fantastic to shoot in.

What makes it great to shoot a movie there?

Well, it's complicated in terms of traffic and all of that. But the architecture, the choices you have, and primarily the quality of actors you can use are fantastic. I'm hoping to go back and shoot a film there in the near future. And the language! Even if I'm not in English, there is a richness and detail to the language that we don't have in my own language. You have more words, quite simply. Ten times more words.

Is that daunting?

Yes, it's hard, because I don't have the precision I have in my own language. Like, some of Alfred Molina's lines are so hilarious, and that type of person you wouldn't find in any other country. That class system, that sense of people taking themselves so seriously...it's horrible to live in, but it's great to get comedy out of. It's such a pleasure even to hear Carey talk now. When you take the train back and forth between London and Paris, as we did, London is much more beautiful, much better maintained. Except the sights we shot in Paris were so wonderful. It's such a dream that I would shoot the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame. I was a film student in Paris when I was Jenny's age, eighteen, so it was great to go back there.

When you went to film school in Paris, did you find the city to be as heady and dazzling an experience as Jenny did?

Nooo. [Laughs] I'm not that old!

I didn't say you were!

I mean, we had television when I was a child. [Laughs] I did grow up in a city, an old city, and it's probably more exotic to go to Paris if you grew up in the Midwest.

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