Luc Besson lashes out at paparazzi in Taiwan film shoot

French director Luc Besson on Friday lashed out at paparazzi who harassed him while shooting his new movie "Lucy" in Taipei, but denied reports that he had considered leaving the island. The shooting of "Lucy," starring Hollywood actress Scarlett Johansson, attracted such intense media attention in the Taiwanese capital. Crew members were reportedly almost involved in a car crash with a press vehicle, while photographers once pounded on a car in which Johansson was resting in between scenes, prompting Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin to call for restraint. "We have a couple of problems with paparazzi during the shooting," Besson said during a press conference in Taipei on Friday. "The only thing they want is to make money and sell their picture around the world. I have no respect for this kind of people, they bother me in my job, that's a pain." But Besson said it was "never in our mind" to end shooting in Taipei, and added that the most offending paparazzi were affiliated with "two Hong Kong agencies" rather than the local press. "It's just more painful to shoot, we never really think to leave for sure... but then we have to take extra security. We don't want to have pictures of new dresses of Scarlett... We were just losing time for that and sometime I lost a bit of my concentration." He also dismissed reports on a US website surfacing a month ago claiming that "Lucy" was about a woman forced to become a drug mule. "I see a lot on the press about the drug and the mule, that's not the film. It's a little part of the film, it's probably five pages," Besson, the director of "La Femme Nikita" and "Leon", told the press conference after wrapping up the shoot. "What I read on the press what the film is about, I don't want to see the film. That sounds like a bad film. Just believe me, I do have a film better than this one." "Lucy" is about intelligence, Besson stressed -- adding that he did not mean secret spy agencies, but "pure intelligence". "It's more between 'Inception' in 2011 and 'Leon' mixed together, it's a trial," he said. "We basically use 10 percent of our brains, and what happens if we can use it more." Besson, who last visited Taiwan 15 years ago to promote his sci-fi thriller "The Fifth Element", also joked: "It's about intelligence so it takes me 15 years to write it". "Lucy", which is due out next year, according to Besson, is the biggest movie production in Taiwan since director Ang Lee's Oscar-winning fantasy blockbuster "Life of Pi", shot in 2011.