In the video, the baker explains, "Brian De Palma has been here with his people. They have seen that the house was big. And I agreed, I gave them the house to make the movie." When Schrooten asks whether he met De Palma, the baker replies, "Yeah ... Himself yes, they have been here. And now we have an appointment tomorrow. Then they are back here." The baker continues, "The store is open, but if they want me to close then that's not a problem. That's no problem for me."

It was going to be the film shoot of the summer. A couple of weeks of filming in Málaga with a Hollywood legend like filmmaker Brian De Palma and one of the actors of the moment, Nicolaj Coster-Waldau, the blond 'Lannister' of the TV series, 'Game of Thrones'. A traveling production that passed through Belgium, Copenhagen and ended in Spain. And ever since the 'Domino' project was first discussed two years ago, Málaga was already listed as one of the main locations for this 'thriller' about the pursuit of a terrorist. The entrance of the director of 'The Untouchables of Eliot Ness' and 'Dressed To Kill' reactivated last May this production that was soon in search of its settings in the capital of the Costa del Sol. For script requirements, the main scene to film in Málaga was developed in the bullring of the Malagueta, but the lack of availability of the arena has caused the film to move to Almería.

"Until today - or yesterday - we have been pending to use other locations we had planned such as the Málaga Airport, but finally decided to centralize filming in Almería," said the Sevillian producer Antonio Pérez, who participates in this film which is also funded by Denmark and Belgium. The film will be shot in mid-July in Spain, which coincides with the concerts contracted in La Malagueta - among them the start of the tour in our country of Franco Battiato on the 13th - and that was finally the cause of the cancellation. The biggest impediment has been the impossibility of removing the stage installed in the arena so that a bullfight could be held in which the cop protagonists of the film pursue a terrorist.

Despite this coincidence in the agenda of the concerts and the film, producer Antonio Pérez highlights the absolute availability of the City Council of the capital and Málaga Film Office to facilitate filming, which was also to shoot scenes in the port. "We had all the support from the port authority and Málaga gave us a lot more play, because Almería has a lot of people and boats in July," said the producer, who also said that the airport was intended To be used for scenes set in the different European airfields in which the film is set. Finally, none of these plans will come true and the cast... will travel to the neighboring land of 'spaguetti- western'.

'Domino' narrates the hunt for a terrorist from the Islamic State by a couple of policemen who chase him across Europe to avenge the death of a comrade. Precisely, this police and action plot concludes in Spanish lands and has one of its scenes in the bullring, which is why production has decided to count on the Almerían coast where they had full freedom of use.

Shifting gears, a little, I am a big Brian De Palma fan.

LITHGOW: Ah, great!

Actually, you’re in my favorite of his: Blow Out.

LITHGOW: Oh yeah, that’s correct.

I feel like I’m the resident De Palma blurb writer for lists on our website, but sometimes I have to spent extra time explaining why I don’t think we should be offended by some of his films. I’m wondering, considering gender and gender identity, how so much has changed since he made his films in the 80s does it feel difficult to go back and watch now? I love watching De Palma, but I feel like I can’t really recommend a number my favorite films of his—like Body Double, Dressed to Kill—to too many people, and to a lesser extent Blow Out too because there are so many caveats to put with it, because I know people would get upset by things that happen in it, how groups of people are treated, how lovingly deaths are filmed. I’m just wondering, with a bloated lead in, if you have any thoughts on that triggered nature when we go back and watch these very psychological and interesting films?

LITHGOW: It’s funny, I haven’t been back to see them. It’s pretty rare that I see a film that I did a long, long time ago. I remember being unsettled by Brian’s vision, for want of a better word, even when I was doing many films with him. But I really admired the fact that he went there. For example, in Blow Out his version of women getting carved up in that was very different and much more warped than even a standard slasher movie. You know, I played the Liberty Bell killer, and I murdered women with an ice pick. I [laughs hesitantly] basically drew a Liberty Bell on their torsos with an ice pick; several women, several prostitutes, as I recall, to make it look like I was a psychopathic killer—when in fact, all I was trying to do was rub somebody out, without any motivation. This was not Jack the Ripper. There was no gross statement. Just pure desire to kill and knowing it would be accepted more if there appeared to be some crazy person with a trademark etch behind it. A ghastly premise. Absolutely ghastly. And I think maybe time has moved on to the point where that kind of thing is completely unacceptable. It was appalling, then, don’t get me wrong. It was a nightmarish idea, even then. But Brian is an old friend. He told me the stories of his own life—you must know this if you know a lot about Brian—which so completely connect with his obsessions on film. And I had a real respect for that and I think he was very adventurous in the 80s and it would be hard to find funding to be that adventurous into dark areas now. To me, of all the movie directors I’ve ever worked with, he was the most—this will sound like a crazy thing to say—he was the most like a director like Ingmar Bergman, who takes his own obsessions and puts them on film.

I can definitely see that. If you had that response to the script, what was it like to work on it?

LITHGOW: Oh, I would do anything for Brian. And yes, it’s lurid, it’s psychological thriller in the mode of Hitchcock for mass entertainment. It was gleefully gory stuff. Truly horrific films, but they came out of such a need to make art that critiqued our glee at such sights. Really, it sounds pretentious, but I really had to admire Brian for that. He had the courage of his own compulsions, really.

His horror and erotic thriller films are so extremely icky that if we’re worried about misogyny and misogynistic depictions, his films are so extreme that way that it doesn’t make it look appealing, it’s perfectly ugly for something ugly that exists in the world, stares it right down and wants you to look away but we don’t. And I think that that’s why they’re still fantastic movies and deserve to be looked at in how he shoots misogyny not just dismissing as misogynistic. I was just curious about that because I re-watched a number of his films recently.

LITHGOW: I haven’t seen the documentary on Brian yet.

Oh, it’s great.

LITHGOW: I will catch up with that.

The Antwerp filming for the movie Domino of Hollywood director Brian De Palma started yesterday in the Eikenstraat, a side street of the Meir. [Note: Meir is the major shopping area in Antwerp.] For the new film production, De Palma works together with actress Christina Hendricks, especially known for the Mad Men series, and actor Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, or Jaimie Lannister from Game of Thrones. Of the latter we are sure that he was already in Antwerp for the scene in the Eikenstraat yesterday. Also today, in the walkway of the authentic building with rental apartments, more filming took place.

Wednesday the film team moves to Borgerhout. A scene is to be filmed in the loft complex at the Kattenberg 122. The loft complex also has a courtyard. Where the filming will take place exactly in the building is not clear. But it will not be in the loft of Petra De Pauw and her husband Herman Verbruggen, residents of the complex.

"A long time ago, all residents of the loft complex received a letter in the mailbox that stated that this location would be suitable for filming and whether we wanted to cooperate with them. We did not really pay much attention to that letter and also did not know what film production it would be. We were about to go to South Africa to film for a long time, and were more involved with that," says Petra. "We recently wondered what it actually meant with those filmings, because we know a lot of F.C. De Kampioenen is not over. This week a crane was installed on the inner courtyard. We first thought that there was work on the roof, but apparently it would be for the filming. We also know that it's a movie by Brian De Palma. But nothing more."

...

The scene that was filmed yesterday in the Eikenstraat was a fight scene. To this end, the hall of the building in the Eikenstraat had to be emptied, said owner Guido Vandamme. "I could follow the shots what the purpose of the scene was. One of the actors had to fall through a window and in the elevator a combat scene was filmed. Graffiti was sprayed on the walls, but I was promised that they would be painted."

Parking on the Sint-Jaconstraat and the Lange Klarenstraat were prohibited yesterday. There had to be space for the dozens of crew trailers and caravans. Director Brian De Palma drove to the trailers for his lunch. It was only a few hundred meters further, but he was hidden by a tinted car. On leaving, a large cloth was tensioned between the building and the carriage so that the press could not catch any glimpse of the director.

The filming will continue in Antwerp in the Bleekhofstraat in Borgerhout, on the Kiel, on the Left Bank and in the district house of Deurne.

You’ve spent 50 years as director of photography. How do you keep up with it?

It's quite simple: it's about tackling everyday problems that you may have and trying to solve them as best as possible, not try to do the same thing you've done, but always look forward. That is the way to keep up, and it happens with all professions. Somehow it is also about being at ease in the profession you have, something important over the years: it makes you come up with new things and solutions every time and allows you to bring a seemingly young spirit to all the films for which they call you.

Is there a single label of José Luis Alcaine in the films on which you’ve worked? Or is it more complicated because there have been so many?

It's difficult but it's about always making a movie whose photography is not too powerful, mine, but one that fits the needs of the film. I want to be in second term, in the service of the film. And I run from the genres. If they offer me a horror movie I do not try to make a horror movie, but a photograph that is quite recognizable and everyday so that terror can enter people's lives saying, "Damn, this could happen to me!". An example is ‘Se puede matar a un niño', Chicho Ibáñez Serrador, which is about absolute terror and occurs in August on an island that could be Ibiza. Chicho wanted a film of great shadows on the walls, which frightened the public, and I said no, I had to make a daily film, where things happen that shake and suddenly shake and hope that that does not happen to you. In 'The Skin I Live In', a thriller, I tried not to create the picture of a normal thriller, but a recognizable environment for the viewer with small details of terror or threat, which surprises more…

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…How is the relationship with the directors? Because it can be complicated ...

I do not influence them at all. I simply try to listen to what they propose and try to be as practical as possible, without getting in the way because directors should not be moved too much away from the way they’ve plotted. The only thing that has to be preserved is that it is a living movie. John Ford said at the end of his life that what he was most proud of in his films were the things that were not expected to happen and changed the meaning of the film. Because that, normally, is the life that bursts into the movie.

Being called back by the same director must be a satisfaction ...

It is always a good sign. It means that they had a good time on the set, first of all, and they liked the job I did. And to repeat with really creative directors is always important. But it's also important to be suddenly called by a director you've never worked with and who tells you that he wants to work with you because he likes what he has seen of you. That was the case with Brian De Palma, who called me and told me that he thought that I was one of the best cinematographers at illuminating the actresses of the world. It's something that impresses a lot.