U2's lead singer, Bono, donned his film-maker's hat and his trademark tinted glasses for last night's world premiere of The Million Dollar Hotel, which opened the 50th Berlin Film Festival.
Bono came up with the original story for the film, set in 2001 among outcasts and misfits in a rundown Los Angeles hotel, where a hard-line FBI agent, played by Mel Gibson, investigates the death of a resident.
Bono co-produced the film and provided and performed songs for the soundtrack, including one written by Salman Rushdie.
"Salman Rushdie had written this book about an imaginary rock band from India and he asked me to help provide lyrics," Bono said. "Wim Wenders thought the song would be perfect for the end of the film. We set up the movie in a recording studio in Dublin, and we played live to what we saw on the screen, working off the images."
He got the idea for the film in the 1980s, when he and the U2 guitarist, The Edge, were photographed on the roof of the hotel which gives the film its title, Bono said.
Asked if writing a movie proved harder than song-writing, he replied: "I will be bold, but not stupid. I had no idea how much work would be involved in getting it made. I showed it to Mel Gibson years ago and he's been like a bodyguard to the project, and I got this extraordinary man, Wim Wenders, to direct it. With a song it's just your own ass you stick out the window; with a film you stick a lot of other people's asses out the window, too."
One character in the film, Dixie, believes he wrote most of the Beatles' songs. "I've met a lot of characters like that," Bono said, "especially one who followed us around looking for royalties from The Joshua Tree. But he was much more dangerous than Dixie, a psychopath, actually."
Asked about his own fleeting cameo appearance in the film, Bono said: "Wim talked me into doing that. I still wince every time I see myself in that scene."