Scorsese in post with George Harrison doc

Director Martin Scorsese was in Cannes to announce his latest project , Living In The Material World: George Harrison, a music documentary about the late Beatles star.

The film, which is currently in post, is being produced by Harrison’s widow Olivia, together with Nigel Sinclair, who  produced Scorsese’s 2005 Bob Dylan doc No Direction Home. It will feature never before footage and interviews with big names including Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton and Yoko Ono.

Speaking to Screen at the Cap D’Antibes Beach Hotel outside Cannes, Scorsese described the project as a “labour of love.”

“I’ve been a great admirer of his music for years, so I was interested in the voyage that he took as an artist,” added the director, who worked on the project whilst making Shutter Island.

“On the weekend I was looking at footage and cuts. Even though it’s hard to do, in a very complicated way, it frees me from the strictures of a feature and makes me think, I hope, a little more clearly about the feature,” explained Scorsese.

Exclusive Media Distribution is handling international sales on the project, which is due for a 2011 release “We haven’t yet decided what to do with the American rights yet, but obviously we’d be honoured to be at Paramount, and Marty has a relationship with them,” said Sinclair.

Olivia Harrison told Screen: “I was being approached by a lot of different people and production companies who wanted to do a documentary on George from the moment after he died. The way this came together seemed to be very natural, the timing of it, the group of friends that brought us together. Marty had a connection with George, they spent time together.”

“It is about how a person goes through life and deals with his own life and what he is confronted with. It’s really about what it is that allowed him to get through everything and the thread that run through his life,” she added.