Day 5: "A film where a character has a job you want."
Okay, I'm going with ED WOOD (1994, directed by Tim Burton, screenplay by Larry Karaszewski and Scott Alexander) and the title character (played by Johnny Depp) has the job of screenwriter/film director. There are probably other films with characters that have that job that I could have chosen, but I feel that Ed Wood in ED WOOD seems most appropriate. Wood's filmmaking efforts are arguably sincere but leavened with some limiting circumstances (like a lack of sufficient funds) and Wood's own dubious creative choices and tastes. The difference between Wood and myself is that he actually finished some projects.
Shot in black and white, Depp is quite wonderful as Ed Wood, boyish in his energy and enthusiasm, and determinedly positive in the face of difficulty. Martin Landau is terrific as Bela Lugosi (winning an Oscar as Best Supporting Actor) and the ensemble cast is also excellent. For me, the appeal of director Ed Wood, in this film and in real-life, is his insistence to make art despite circumstance and possibly even talent or skill. Arguably, I might have more directing skill than Wood (emphasis on arguably), but I lack his tenacity to follow through on projects, a quality I seriously need to develop and/or tap into.
Other possible films featuring the same job, this time on vivid display in two documentaries, AMERICAN MOVIE and HEARTS OF DARKNESS: A FILMMAKER'S APOCALYPSE.
AMERICAN MOVIE (1999) focuses on independent filmmaker Mark Borchardt (as well as his friend, Mike Schank) and his efforts to make his B&W horror film, COVEN (which Borchardt's determined to pronounce as "COH-ven"). At first glance, the film seems like a study of a not quite capable filmmaker trying to make a film. You hear some of his plans and ambitions and the way he describes his film and the scenes he intends to include, and well, his description sounds like wishful thinking and the audience feels already the execution will be far less than he imagines. As an example, we see him directing a scene in the woods. Borchardt's manning his own camera, and as he lies on the ground and has set up his shot, he tries to direct his handful of actors. He gives them a specific direction regarding blocking - a fine tuning of where they already are standing - and, if I remember correctly, no one moves at all in response. And, after a beat, he shoots the scene. I remember watching this film and my wife walked in and started watching it as well and then she said she had to leave the room, "This reminds me of you..."
Ummm...
HEARTS OF DARKNESS (1991) is the brilliant documentary of APOCALYPSE NOW (1979) with filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola as the subject of his troubled film and his efforts to get through the agonizing process of shooting, which was faced with many setbacks and delays, cost overruns and his near bankruptcy. What makes me embrace this film is the portrait of an artist trying to achieve something on an ambitiously grand scale, not only in physical scope but artistically. In one scene, he compares the original concept of APOCALYPSE NOW to an Irwin Allen film. Film producer Allen was known for his disaster films, like THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE and THE TOWERING INFERNO. Coppola's comparison is based on his idea that initially APOCALYPSE NOW was simply full of spectacular, crowd-pleasing scenes and exciting, thrilling (but arguably superficial) moments. BUT, now that he was in the middle of the production, he realized he was wasting an opportunity to properly consider the subject matter, the Vietnam war, and so he was re-writing and trying to figure out how to improve things as he went along. And he feared his efforts were going to be horrendous. In reality, Coppola ultimately made another cinema classic, but his process was typically difficult and perhaps, even self-destructive.
In all three of these films, I'm fascinated by the artist and his dreams and then the difficult reality of trying to achieve those dreams: lack of money, lack of assistance, lack of inspiration, the limits of one's own talent and persistence through hardship, the general difficulties of trying to shape an idea into reality.
"Alright, let's shoot this fucker!" - Bela Lugosi (as played by Martin Landau) in ED WOOD.
#30DayFilmChallenge
No comments:
Post a Comment