Gere hints at filming in UAE

Director Nicholas Jarecki and actor Richard Gere have both expressed their desire to work in Abu Dhabi film projects.

Richard Gere has hinted that he might be looking to film in the UAE, and that he had already been in discussion with people in the industry in Abu Dhabi.

"I was talking to some people yesterday about possibly shooting here," the actor said at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival the morning after Arbitrage, in which he stars, opened the event at the Emirates Palace. "One of the next few movies I'm doing could definitely be shot here."

The film's director, Nicholas Jarecki, was also positive about the possibility for production in the country.

"We're excited to do more stuff with our collaborators here," Jarecki said. "We met with some of the local leaders in the film industry here and talked about Richard's new thing and my new thing."

In Arbitrage, which is now showing across the UAE, Gere plays a corporate chief executive at the top of the Wall Street food chain, whose decisions lead to the collapse of his business and family.

The 63-year-old actor, whose character spends much of the film trying to hold the situation together as his web of lies unfolds, praised Jarecki's screenplay.

"It was a human story about our personal sense of morality and how everyone of our decisions resonates through our lives," Gere said.

"The writing was skilled and insightful. Most young filmmakers don't write movies like this. It was kind of movie we used to make in the '70s, intelligent and character-driven."

Gere, who admitted he had never had much call to worry about stock market fluctuations thanks to an "incredibly conservative" business manager he once had, suggested the motivations that drove characters such as his in Arbitrage, which was written amid the financial crisis in 2008, were immature.

"It's still little boy's stuff about adrenalin and simplistic ideas of power," he said.

"It's about the adrenalin of the gamble. It's a young man's energy. Not a mature energy that changes worlds in a positive way, but definitely a flow of energy."

Gere said that in researching the film he met an 83-year-old man who had been working in the stock markets since the age of 17.

"He couldn't imagine doing anything else. He had more energy than any of us."

Despite hinting at shooting a film in the UAE, Gere said he would also like to explore the country as a tourist. "I've only got out of this hotel once since I've been here. I'd love to have some time to not be a movie star here and see the country."