Direk Olive on the KathNiel ‘challenge’

Filmmaker Olivia Lamasan readily agreed to take on the task of helming Daniel Padilla and Kathryn Bernardo’s latest movie, even though she was aware it wouldn’t be a walk in the park. The movie Barcelona: A Love Untold raked in P300M at the box-office. Everyone involved wanted it to be Daniel and Kathryn’s transition movie to more mature fare in the future.

“It was clear to me that it would be a transition film and that was the challenge — what kind of story and what kind of storytelling in order for their transition to be smooth,” explains direk Olive.

Direk Olive welcomed the challenge because she really wanted to work with Daniel and Kathryn, having missed on the chance to direct them in the remake of Pangako Sa ‘Yo. (Direk Olive was on the team that worked on the original version that starred Jericho Rosales and Kristine Hermosa some years back.)

“I did not get the chance to work on that project and I wanted very badly to do that. When Malou Santos said they wanted to do a project out of the country and I will handle it, I readily agreed and I was excited. I discussed it with screenwriter Carmi Raymundo. We thought, what would be our concept? What would be our story? And then I came up with the image of a guy, riding a train in a foreign land, then he sees a girl who reminds him of his past love. She wove the movie’s story based on that one image.”

?When the time came for them to shoot in Spain, direk Olive met with her team, including Daniel and Kathryn. She made it clear that she would be running a tight ship on location and she expected everyone to be on their best behavior and to do a great job.

“It is very expensive to shoot abroad and you cannot afford to waste precious time and resources. We had very little sleep and we were focused on work. I wanted my actors to study every scene and memorize their dialogs without ad libs,” she says.

There were times during their stay in Spain that direk Olive had to be tough on her stars, but she believes it was for the best because Daniel and Kathryn ended up giving the performances of their lives in Barcelona: A Love Untold.

“We had good rapport. We gelled. In every sequence we would shoot, there’s always a discussion between me and them,” direk Olive reveals. “They were interested to discuss what was happening with their characters. Daniel and Kathryn were so committed at alam nila may hangganan ang pagpapa-sweet. They have to move on and they were focused on their roles. They were truthful with their acting.”

?Direk Olive recalls that before they began working on the movie, she pulled Kathryn aside and asked her why she signed on to play the role of Mia. “She was very honest in saying that she wanted to prove herself. And she did. As for Daniel, I say, ‘He is very intelligent. Grabe ang depth.’ It is different when one has lived through pain. It shows in the eyes. And he told me, ‘I am so excited in this movie. It is here where I fully understood that I need to focus and study my role. Now, I know when people say acting is a craft.’”

Now that Barcelona: A Love Untold has become such a big hit, direk Olive says, “I’m very much fulfilled that we have achieved our objective — for the actors to transition.” —With reports from Almed Garcia and Julian Mauricio