April 26, 2024
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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?
So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.
And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.
There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.
I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.
So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.
But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”
My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher
“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.
~ David Simon
I Capture the Castle is a great little movie. I think that was the first time Bill Nighy caught my attention.
I love Michael Tolkin more than anyone I know (The Rapture and Changing Lanes are personal favorites), but The New Age really was an awful movie.
Want to second the love for I capture the castle. And Ebert has been banging the drum for Trucker for some time now. I might have to finally check it out.
Just the last two on Friday and the first two on Saturday for me this time around. See ya there!
I remember seeing Man with a Movie Camera in a double-screening alongside The Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello, which was a trippy and wonderful experience.
If I had to take just 10 DVDs with me to watch while I worked the winter shift at the Overlook Hotel, Barfly would be one of them.
I, too, liked I CAPTURE THE CASTLE. Unfortunately, the promising Tim Fywell followed it up with a rather weak Disney number, ICE PRINCESS, which seems to have got him booted back to British TV (although I’ve heard good things about AFFINITY).
BARFLY is a hoot.
if you can be bothered listing them joe, what are the other nine? just curious
(would they somehow stave off the inevitable grady/torrance train to whackadoo, homicidalmaniacville)
I capture the castle was alright. But I’m very glad to see Departures on there! That movie is criminally underseen, by far the best of the nominees that year, and the only really memorable film of the bunch.
Call me a philistine, but I’ve always preferred the 1979 release cut of “Apocalypse Now” to “Redux.”
Movieman- I agree about “Apocalypse”. Then again, I also prefer the theatrical cuts of “Aliens” and “Last of the Mohicans”.
Sometimes too much of a good thing is simply too much.
Apocalypse Now is my favorite film, and has been for quite some time, certainly long before Redux came out. And I’m of two minds on the extended version. While I do think the theatrical cut is the smoother, more accessible experience (and is the only one I would show to someone who had never seen it), I believe that the longer cut is a richer one.
Not all of the added scenes could be called essential by any stretch of the imagination, but of course one could say that of a few in the original version. But the French Plantation scene, abrupt left turn as it may be, manages to say a great deal culturally, about the war, and about Willard’s character. For this alone the Redux is worth it.
I’m not saying that I watch the Redux exclusively now, and I’m often not in the mood to sit through it. But it’s sure nice knowing it’s there, and that Coppola and Murch (whose judgement should really be above reproach with any serious cinephile) put a great deal of thought and care into it.
Maybe it’s because I memorized virtually every line of dialogue, every music cue and every cut from the ’79 version that all of the “new” scenes added for “Redux” seem extraneous to me.
I think I must have seen “Apocalypse Now” at least once a week during its original engagement at NY’s Ziegfield Theater.
Of course, I feel the same way about the director’s cut of “The Last Picture Show” which is my all-time favorite movie. I probably saw the ’71 release version at least 40-50 times before the 2.0 version ever saw the light of day, and every “restored” scene has the proverbial fingernails-on-a-blackboard effect on me. They just seem “wrong” somehow. I’m really sorry that (Peter) Bogdanovich didn’t include the original cut along with his preferred “extended” version on any of the “TLPS” dvds (I think there must have been at least three separate “editions” so far).
Agree on “Last Picture”, too. The annoying thing about it is, on the DVD I saw, the film stock of the added footage doesn’t match in clarity of the original footage, so it’s even more jarring to the eye when they cut to it.
The whole REDUX thing has ALWAYS been one of total suckage. I’ve NEVER met a fan of AN who preferred the 2nd cut of hte film. FFC had final cut way back when, so it makes this 2nd cut all the more useless. Shame that Ebert couldn’t get a print of the original cut. I saw it projected 2 months ago on a double bill with THE CONVERSATION and it looks as amazing as ever.
First time I ever saw Apocalypse Now was the Redux version and when I went to look at what was new in the Redux version I realise I didn’t like any of it. What about that villa sequence? Blegh.
Yes, he outtakes put back into ANR add NOTHING to the original. If anything, they only go to show how impressively and tightly it was edited in the first place.
If FFC had MERELY added outtakes and deleted scenes to “Redux,” it would, at least, have been “historically interesting” and wouldn’t be nearly the abomination it is, though, apart from the few extra snippets of Brando, they add nothing to the picture. The crime is that he actually went and re-edited ALL the scenes, using alternate takes and changing their rhythm. The dialogue scenes are even different — the pauses between speeches — it’s an entirely different (and worse) movie. What was once taut and tense is now draggy , rambling and meandering. Look how he fucked up the Duvall scenes and the tiger scene and the “who’s in charge here?” scene. It’s appalling and a much bigger crime against cinema than the comparatively minimal (but still criminal) changes Lucas made to the original “Star Wars” trilogy. The FFC who made “Jack” is not the same filmmaker who made “Apocalypse” (just as the Friedkin who made “Jade” wasn’t the same man who made “The Exorcist” — was it the drugs? Who knows?) and should have been humble enough to leave well enough alone. (Friedkin’s 30 years after-the-fact “recoloring” of “French Connection” comes to mind, but at least he didn’t change the content of the film). The “Redux” was all about ego and money, pure and simple. It came at the tail end of that terrible wave where the only way to re-release a classic film was to “improve” it. Friedkin fucked up “Exorcist,” Lucas screwed up “Star Wars,” and even Spielberg tampered with “E.T.” (though he was smart enough to acknowledge the mistake later and the original is now the one available on DVD).
The original was one of the best edited movies ever made — no studio put a gun to his head, he didn’t have to rush to make a release date (in fact, “Apocalypse” famously missed about 20 of them), he shot for a year and edited for 2 1/2 more, screened it in several iterations before arriving at the final product on which he owned the negative and, obviously, had final cut. Walter Murch, though obviously a legend, wasn’t the editor of the original — he did the sound design. Richard Marks edited the original, and by hijacking it, Murch shit all over Marks’ work.
I’m reasoning that Ebert chose the “Redux” because it was probably the best print available (the one thing Coppola got right was striking the new prints with Technicolor’s then-brand new dye transfer process), but, as a film lover and historian, he should have done the right thing and programmed the original.
My 2
The difference between Coppola and Lucas is that Lucas has actively tried to destroy any public access to the original cuts, and change the actual negative. Francis may have recut his movie, but the original is still available.
In preparation for Barbet Schroeder’s appearance at the Barfly screening, everybody should watch the JFK episode of Mad Man (season three episode “The Grown-Ups”) which he directed. Powerful stuff.
After watching the five-hour workprint, I still say there’s an even better film to be culled. I like the steal the surfboard scene, it bonds the men in a way the original doesn’t, and some of the takes of Brando are powerful and there certainly should have been more of him in the original. But I prefer the original, though I do have hardcore film pals who swear by the Redux.
dietcock, I heard the story that Coppola went back and re-edited all the scenes, but the most recent (I think) DVD has both versions of the film and it clearly only branches to Redux scenes, so I assumed that that story was apocryphal. I haven’t seen either version in a while, but are you sure that’s the case? Does the newer DVD have a different version than the theatrical Redux release?
Pause the AN argument for a moment:
Are they showing THE WALL in 70mm? That’s almost worth a plane ticket.
Roger’s opening nights are always a format homage… so likely a 70mm print of the wall… likely a new one he talked them into making for him…
Sorry, but an original 70mm print would be badly faded by now, and I can’t imagine Warners would spend the 25K+ a new blow-up would cost.