7. Shooting Fish

"I always say that writing is the really hard bit, and directing is for pussies," laughs Arnold. "Once I've finished writing I think, 'yahooooo! Here comes the fun bit!'

"I love directing because I'm actually quite a sociable person. The more chaotic a film set, the calmer I feel. I think it has to do with my childhood – because I'm the eldest of four, life was fairly chaotic and wild," she recalls.

“To me, £2million seems like an awful lot of money,” says the director. “But it’s how you spend it. Instead of having a sizable crew and shooting for a few weeks, I’ve fantasised about having the smallest crew possible and shooting for three or four months. That’s what Terrence Malick did with Badlands.”

But for Fish Tank, she stuck to more traditional methods, except perhaps for the way she worked with the cast.

"I didn’t show anyone in the film the script beforehand so they didn’t know what they were letting themselves in for.

"I wanted to shoot in order so that the story would reveal itself to everyone as we went along,” the writer/director explains.

"I felt this was especially important for Katie, as I wanted her to feel she knew where she was all the time. I also didn’t want anyone to add anything significant to what they were doing.

"Not knowing the future meant that every moment had to be explored for just what it was and nothing more. A bit like life I guess. We never know what will happen to us in the next hour, the next day. I wanted each moment to have that innocence."

And while she knew what she was looking for, Arnold was still ready to be surprised. "I originally wrote Fish Tank for Estuary Kent, which I know well but decided to have a look at Essex because I knew it was similar in landscape.

"I drove out from east London along the A13 and loved it straight away. I love this part of the Thames, where it widens out to meet the sea. It’s where Elizabeth spoke to the troops before they went out to fight the Spanish. It just all felt good. Much of filming took place in one estate, the setting for Joanne and Mia's home."

And though the crew descended on the estate for several weeks' filming on this location, it was an easy shoot. "Film crews are so arrogant, taking over peoples everyday spaces like they own them. I always expect people to get annoyed with us and tell us to f**k off but we had none of that.”

Helping her out was Irish cinematographer Robbie Ryan, who has worked with her since Wasp. "The only stipulation was that it was to be as close to a photochemical sort of look as possible.

"As close as what you would get if you just shot it. So that’s the approach we took. Film it on film and then process it through a laboratory and not through a digital grade suite.  Because it actually had rough edges to it. It wasn’t sharp, you know. And it looked exactly like we wanted it. It was amazing."

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