The Storms of Jeremy Thomas review – love letter to a legendary producer

Jeremy Thomas is the Oscar-winning producer of iconic films such as The Last Emperor and Crash, who has spent the last five decades bringing the dreams of not only Bertolucci and Cronenberg to the screen, but those of Nicolas Roeg, Takashi Miike and Jonathan Glazer. Mark Cousins is the film critic and filmmaker whose insightful documentaries are made hypnotic by way of clever editing and his own gentle, lilting voiceovers.

Cousins' latest film, The Storms of Jeremy Thomas, falls into his usual style of visual tone poem, but this time he intercuts it with home video footage. The title comes from an incident Cousins witnessed one year at Cannes when, during a lunch with Thomas, a storm began to set in. Naturally, everyone ran for cover. But not Thomas. Instead the producer stayed put and braced for impact with an excited glint in his eye. For Cousins, it became the thesis of this piece: the storm as a metaphor for Thomas' projects – his films as turbulent, creative hurricanes to be weathered.

This loving portrait, much of it shot back in 2019, is unafraid to risk coming off as a hagiography. Right from the start, Cousins refers to Thomas – who at 72 projects a quiet, unassuming intelligence – as a “Prince” (his father and mother were Ralph Thomas and Gerald Thomas, of Doctor and Carry On). And while the film is keen to spotlight Thomas' successes, it leaves out the misfires and failures. Would addressing them have spoilt the dream-like mood that has come to define much of Cousins work?

The conceit here is that Cousins will join Thomas on his annual car ride down through France to Cannes for the unveiling of his latest feature (Takashi Miike's First Love). On the five-day-long trip, Cousins attempts to find out just what makes the producer tick, intercutting footage from their journey with scenes from Thomas' films and splitting his own into distinct chapters and making thematic links (cars, sex and politics – all of which Cousins' suggests are key elements in both Thomas's personal life and his projects – are but just three of the chapter headings).

As usual, Cousins casts a mesmerising spell through the careful assemblage of archive footage, but the project ultimately feels more like an enlightening profile of the man's work rather than the man himself, or what it means to produce a film. It doesn't help that the way people talk about Thomas – including Tilda Swinton and Debra Winger, who appear in talking heads – often falls on the cryptic side, like he's forever slipping through their fingers.

Projects like this one live or die on the chemistry of their partnerships, of course, and though I'm sure the trip was a pleasant one, the car ride section reveals little and seems over and done with far too quickly, while the relationship between Cousins and Thomas seems hinged more on a formal question and answer type scenario than of two people who share a deeper rapport.

Thomas is deserving of this film, though – as a showcase to the diverse range of projects he's brought to the screen, it's particularly fascinating. “How” he achieved what he did remains a mystery. Maybe that's the way Cousins wanted it to stay. After all, who really wants to know the magician's secrets? Better to just sit back, this film supposes, and watch as the dreams are made a reality.

The Storms of Jeremy Thomas was screened as part of the BFI London Film Festival 2021. It is released in UK cinemas and on Curzon Home Cinema on 10 December.