Award-winning movie director comes home to Wigan to talk about his work on latest Hollywood blockbusters

Chris Jones has made an international name for himself by producing - and teaching others how to make - movies on a shoestring.

But the Billinge 56-year-old’s latest career move has put him on the sets of the year’s biggest blockbuster.

And before attending the London premiere of Dead Reckoning Part One, he came home to Wigan to visit Winstanley College where it all started for him.​

Chris had been due to go to university to study geology in the mid-1980s when he and a friend decided to make a zombie movie which received such a huge and positive reception from Winstanley students that he decided that film was for him and he was granted an extra year at the college by the then principal Dennis Lavelle to explore these new avenues.

It led to increasingly ambitious, if still low budget, films – including the 2008 short subject Gone Fishing which was shortlisted for an Oscar – and the writing of The Guerilla Film Maker’s Handbook for all those wanting to put together a movie on the tightest of budgets.

And it was an old friend of Chris – who has worked on Cruise’s recent Top Gun spectacular and is also on the latest Mission: Impossibles - who put Chris's name forward to direct what is called a “splinter unit” for these mammoth projects.

A non-disclosure agreement prevents a lot of detail being revealed about Chris’s work in the last 12 months, but splinter units are small film crews who can lavish more time on filming details, other angles and special effects.

And he says that being involved in such a massive enterprise with Cruise and director Christopher McQuarrie was a wonderful and revelatory experience from which he has learnt much.

Chris added: “I was very aware of the standards expected when stepping into something like Mission and that delivering that would be very, very challenging.

"All that said, once we started working, I did know what I was doing!

"However I learnt huge amounts from having the privilege to work with Chris McQuarrie and Tom Cruise.

"Tom is an outstanding producer as well as actor and he has this indescribable energy which everybody warms to and leans into and we do everything together like a family.

"He’s always first in and last to leave. Some actors you work with will say “is that OK?” after two or three takes, but Tom will always suggest another one if he thinks he can enhance the scene further.

"Making a film is very different from how most people think. Once you get your hands in the mud, there’s no ego hierarchy, everyone has to do their job and deliver. You just get on with it.”

At the college Chris paid tribute to Mr Lavelle for setting him on his film career path and encouraged students to be ambitious, reckless even (“with a small R”), and not just stick to their comfort zone social groups.

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One goes on general release on July 11.

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