Ironhandedness

He is amiable where iron[-]handedness is essential.

The actress Arletty, who feels genuine affection for Carne and believes that his ironhandedness on the set "was pure show," compares the director to conductor Herbert von Karajan, because "like von Karajan, he treats his shooting scripts like musical scores which he conducts entirely from memory ... We felt secure with him because he knew exactly what the final product was supposed to look like."