Roman Polanski feels the pressure as 'Oliver' premieres

PRAGUE - His last film may have been The Pianist, for which he won a best director Oscar, but that's no guarantee of fame and funding for Roman Polanski, who attends the world premiere of his latest work Oliver Twist on Saturday.

Polanski's rendition of the Charles Dickens classic was the biggest budget film of his 50-year career at some $60 million.

But the 72-year-old director said that a golden statue for his 2002 Holocaust drama added pressure, not money to his newest venture.

"Naturally when you win a prize certain things become easier; dealing with distributors, producers, studio executives. But that doesn't give you carte blanche," Polanski said ahead of Saturday night's screening in the city where he shot the movie.

"But it didn't give me any money to make this film!"

Taking three years to make a follow up to The Pianist added even more pressure, according to the Paris-born, Polish director of such classics as "Chinatown," "Rosemary's Baby" and "Tess."

Polanski said the reality of filmmaking these days meant taking more time to put together a movie than it did when he first began his career in the 1950s.

"From film to film it's more and more difficult to decide what you're going to do next. And it takes longer and longer between films," he told reporters.

"I remember when I was beginning to make films, a year already seemed like a long time. I knew people who would do two films in a year. Now if you do one film in two years it's a lot. Usually it's one in three years. It's not only my problem, but a problem in general."

TWIST SEEN AS GAMBLE

A remake of Oliver is seen by many as a gamble as it faces off against the likes of the hugely successful Harry Potter series, but Polanski said the film was as much about making something for his own children as it was for himself.

The father of a daughter and a son with his wife, actress Emmanuelle Seigner, Polanski said making the film was about intersecting his career with his family.

"After The Pianist, I wanted to do a film that my children could somehow identify with," he said, adding it was his wife who originally brought up the idea of filming Twist.

While his professional life is strewn with honours, Polanski's personal life remains a constant talking point.

He is wanted in the United States after admitting having sex with a 13-year-old-girl in 1977. He fled the country in 1978 while on bail, and has lived in France ever since.

In July he won a libel case against Vanity Fair magazine over an article saying he tried to seduce a Scandinavian "beauty" soon after his wife was murdered while 8-1/2 months pregnant in 1969.

Though reluctant to talk about the case in detail, Polanski said the trial was his way of forcing out the truth.

"They simply went a little bit too far. Not a little bit, a lot too far. There are certain limits and beyond them I would not let anyone step," he said.

- REUTERS