At Enigma Con recently, Harlan Ellison had this to say about the upcoming “War of the Worlds”:
“What annoys me is that Spielberg is such an egomaniac these days that it has to be ‘Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds. No, you puss-bag. It’s H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds, and it wouldn’t kill you to put his f–king name on it.”
I think Harlan’s right about that. I certainly think the authors of such classics deserve to be acknowledged up front.
On the other hand, I can just see William Shakespeare seeing the Baz Luhrmann-directed “William Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet,” calling his agent, and saying “Get my name the hëll off this thing.”
PAD
• 
Well, if Verhoeven hadn’t done such a simple minded job, he’d be better respected…but ignoring every single idea to make a statement that’s not supported by what he filmed, well….
I just checked the posters for the movie over at the official site…they have three of them. It looks more like Tom Cruise’s War of the World…his name appears at the top in huge letter on 2 of the posters, and he and Spielberg share smaller ghost billing in the third. And on all three, “Based on the novel by H.G. Wells” is included in the credits.
Sure, everyone knows its a Spielberg movie…that’s one of the selling points…just like Cruise is, despite his Scientologist ramblings that have made news of late. If Wells’ name alone was strong enough to carry the movie, the TV series based on the original movie would have lasted more than 2 seasons.
Harlan doesn’t know what he’s talking about. The STUDIO is the one who puts Spielberg’s name above the title as a selling point. If Ellison really knew anything about the guy he’d know Spielberg’s nothing near an egomaniac.
And yeah, pot meet kettle, btw.
RE: Spielberg’s “ego”.
Ellison’s rant is totaly off the mark. Spielberg, in addition to being talented and sucessful cares very much about his craft, about his art. It is why he waited years to allow “E.T.” to be made available on video.
He said something at the time of how he was just having a hard time reconciling putting this project that he cared about so much, that he and others had pur such blood, sweat and tears and emotion into, he just couldn’t see taking something he felt was so special and making it a piece of product – a commodity – to be put in a box. This was early in the home video age, and he obviously “got over” those feelings.
But that he had it at all says a lot
It must piss Harlan off big time that Warner’s packaged his adaptation [i]with[/i] the DVD.
I don’t mind updating some stories. WotW seems like it would be a very short movie with Martian death machines Vs. horse and buggies.
These books were more about Ideas than monsters anyways.
So it makes sense to update them and use them to be relevant to current problems and ideas.
That’s no guarantee of Spielberg and Cruse’s intentions.
They may just want to make another ID4.
It just means making changes or updating things aren’t always bad things.
I couldn’t be bothered to check out I,Robot as it had nothing to do with the story, and I’ve reached my limit on Will (Aw Hëll No!) Smith.
Likewise I’ve long since given up on almost anything with Tom Cruse in it.
And since Spielberg worked with Tom on the lame Minority Report,and the 50’s version is still holding up well, I’m not likely to give the new WotW a try .
Haven seen the film yet (obviously), but just from the previews Mr. Spielberg may actually be doing Mr Wells a *favor* by by acknowledling that this is *his* take on the story and in no way represents the original story in any way, shape or form.
Also, let’s look at it this way, 10, 15, or 100 years from now, when people think of “War of the Worlds” do you think they’re going to be refering to the the H G Wells version, or the mega, two-thumbs-up, block buster hit of the summer of 2005?
In the inmortal words of Homer Simpson: “Let the baby have his bottle.”
The author’s name should be attached to a title only if there’s some pretense of faithfulness to the text. The movie stopped being “H.G. Wells’s War of the Worlds” when the setting was moved to New Jersey. But by the same token, Spielberg owes too much creative debt to Wells to be slapping his own name on the title.
Verdict: Ellison, Spielberg … both wrong.
The one-sheet poster that I have for the film has Tom Cruise in big red letters on top, then in grey lettering “A Steven Spielberg Film”, then War of the Worlds (with War in the biggest font on the poster and Worlds in the next biggest font) in red, the “they’re already here” in small white lettering. There is grey lettering with credits at the bottom of the poster including “A Steven Spielberg Film” again on the first line, “based on the novel by H.G. Wells” on the third line, and “directed by Steven Spielberg” on the 4th line. It isn’t quite the poster at this link:
http://www.empiremovies.com/posters.php?id=3021
but it is close.
By the way, I thought that attaching a comic book writer’s name to a title was more the publisher’s idea to sell books than one of the writer’s ego.
Neil
Frankly, the poster tagline “They’re Already Here” makes me think of the late-80s television series where the invasion had happened and now, decades later, the characters deal with the fallout.
I’m pretty sure that’s not what Spielberg wants us thinking about his film.
I think Harlan, bless him, was just having a bad day. The “War of the Worlds” movie poster clearly states, “Based on a novel by H.G. Wells,” and is no different than the posters of a hundred other films based on novels.
First off, there’s THREE ‘War Of The World’ films coming out this year alone, in addition to several other versions of the story in varying media. Everything –and I mean EVERYTHING– promotional I’ve seen for the film credits it as “War Of The Worlds” (tiny print: a film by Steven Spielberg). I’ll stand by Harlan Ellison’s claims nine time out of ten, but I’ve got to take the other side on this one. (One could make the argument that including the author’s name in the title of the film hasn’t helped several recent film adaptations of novels [the previously mentioned “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” and “Mary Shelley’s Frankenstien” spring most immediately to mind], and in many cases serves only to anger the fans, who are expecting a word for word faithfulness to the source material. Can’t blame Steven Spielberg for the bad track records of others.)
You’ve also got to remember that you’re rebooting the story into a wildly different setting. I don’t really see the harm in dropping HG Wells’ name from the title card if the resulting film is not going to be set in Victorian England. With the exception of the one version coming out later this year (which I agree with whomever said it above: it doesn’t look that good), nobody’s ever done a major or significant media adaptation of “WOTW” set in Victorian England, starting with Orson Welles’ panic-inducing 1938 radio broadcast. Perhaps you disagree, but I feel it’s an important distinction to make. If Spielberg was doing a word-for-word translation set in Victorian England, and declared it “Steven Spielberg’s War Of The Worlds,” I’d be as mad as Ellison is.
Second, in regards to Spielberg’s “monumental ego,” yeah, he’s made a lot of on the fly changes/rewrites to the shooting script… but it bears mentioning that 95% of the time those changes improve the narrative compared to what was originally written. (If you don’t believe me, watch some of the retrospective pieces on the “Jaws” Anniversary Edition DVD where Peter Benchley waxes philosophic about his version versus Spielberg’s… if the film had been a word-for-word translation of the novel, well, let’s just say it wouldn’t have been as good. Every change Spielberg made to “Jaws” only improved the story.) You say “raving egomaniac,” I say “committed storyteller.”
On the whole “Spielberg rips off Orson Welles” thing, I have to point out that Welles was more of an egomaniacal grandstander than Spielberg and Harlan Ellison could EVER be, added together and squared. Yes, he was an unqualified genius, and yes, he revolutionized cinema, but he was also one of the most difficult people in the world to work with (google ‘Welles +peas’ and listen to the MP3 yourself). Most of the technical innovations evident in “Citizen Kane” are the result of Welles’ force of will in pushing his crew to think outside the box in making certain shots fit his vision; Welles certainly didn’t invent the deep focus lens himself. Cinematographer Gregg Toland is largely responsible for the cinematic success of the film; one can see the seeds of greatness, exploited to the fullest in “Kane”, in many of Toland’s earlier films (like “The Grapes Of Wrath” or “Wuthering Heights”). Welles’ ingenius use of sound design in the film was perhaps his most significant personal technical contribution to the film (and to cinema in general), so I’m willing to give credit where it’s due. But many people forget that “Kane” was a team effort: Welles’ genius was that he surrounded himself with the right people to bring his vision to life (Robert Wise, editor-turned-director of “Day The Earth Stood Still,” for one). I don’t think, however, that it’s fair to accuse Spielberg of stealing Welles’ directorial techniques. I mean, seriously, every director and their mother has aped Welles at some point… it’s to be expected (and I would think appreciated), because the man brought a whole new ballgame to the park.
I will not deny that “Citizen Kane” is a tremendous film, and it certainly deserves every scrap of recognition it’s been accorded over the years, but the cult of personality that surrounds Orson Welles tends to obscure the power of the film itself. And just to reassure Mr. Walsh that I’m not howling in the wind, I’ve read a LOT about Welles’ life, including some Lucius Shepard. I won’t deny that Welles is an unabashed genius, but one must admit that as far as levels of sheer egomaina go, Welles has Spielberg beat, hands down.
Oh, and “John Byrne’s Next Men” was called that specifically because there was a pre-existing group called the ‘Next Men,’ and I assume Byrne just wanted to distinguish his gang/avoid getting sued. But I guess the name recognition doesn’t hurt, either.
“Welles’ genius was that he surrounded himself with the right people to bring his vision to life (Robert Wise, editor-turned-director of “Day The Earth Stood Still,” for one)”
Right. Would this be the same Robert Wise who played the role of good litte RKO employee and went ahead and chopped Magnificent Ambersons to pieces? The same Robert Wise who admitted years later that the original Ambersons, the one that represents Welles’ vision, was the superior version? Is that the kinda right person you mean? With “right people” like that, who needs enemies?
I don’t think you’re howling in the wind as much as your yapping from your perch high upon the battered battlements built upon Pauline Kael’s deeply flawed assault on Welles. But feel free to keep lobbing those 65 mph meatballs right down the pipe and I’ll keeping hitting them out of the park.
All Best,
Mark
P.S.: I read Dickens too.
Wow. I disagree with pretty much everything Pauline Kael had ever said or written about cinema, so it’s more than a little disconcerting to be seen as one of her supporters. Welles led a fascinating life and played a major role in the history of film. I’ve read everything about the guy I could get my hands on since I first heard the old ‘War Of The Worlds’ radio broadcast as a kid. While I certainly never met the man, I’ve learned enough from the people who wanted to tear him down, and people who love him unconditionally, and the people in-between, to be able to form my own opinions of his life and his work, rather than accepting one film critic’s idea of who he was. Even Welles’ staunchest supporters agree that he was both egomaniacal and notoriously difficult to work with, which I think was about the worst I said about the guy.
As for Robert Wise, yes, he performed the horrible studio-mandated hatchet job on “The Magnificent Ambersons”, but that probably had something to do with the fact that he didn’t have the kind of clout (which Welles had) to defy the studio and still be employed after the dust settled. In everything I’ve ever read about “Ambersons”, Wise didn’t agree with the changes but was constrained by contract to comply with the studio’s wishes, and the task fell to him because Welles refused to make the changes himself and had left the studio in disgust, effectively giving up any change of personally fighting the changes in his fit of pique. I’ve never seen or heard any instance of Wise claiming his version was better than Welles’. In fact, I’ve never read anything that implied any malicious intent at all on Wise’s part in altering the film (though I would certainly enjoy reading about said malicious intent if there’s some source I’m not aware of).
Is there any other part of the above post you’d like to respond to, or are you content with merely disparaging Robert Wise’s character?
“I’d be pìššëd, too, except that I didn’t like the book, and much prefer the movie and the satirical spin it put on it.”
Dina Meyer’s breasts were satirical of what now?
“Frankly, the poster tagline “They’re Already Here” makes me think of the late-80s television series where the invasion had happened and now, decades later, the characters deal with the fallout.”
Maybe it’s actually a remake of BUCKAROO BANZAI.
Re Robert Wise– I think I’ve read Wise interviewed where he expressed the opinion that he hoped that he would have been the one who had the bast chance of preserving as much of Orson’s vision as possible.
One can’t completely remove the component of being able to work nicely with other people from the list of attributes that a film director MUST have. One can be a complete bášŧárd and be a great writer, as more than a few writing bášŧárdš have proven, but it is virtually impossible for one person to do everything on a film and if even one aspect of the film is subpar it will be noticed. The fact that Welles was difficult to work with cost him (and us) greatly.
“Welles certainly didn’t invent the deep focus lens himself. Cinematographer Gregg Toland is largely responsible for the cinematic success of the film; one can see the seeds of greatness, exploited to the fullest in “Kane”, in many of Toland’s earlier films (like “The Grapes Of Wrath” or “Wuthering Heights”). Welles’ ingenius use of sound design in the film was perhaps his most significant personal technical contribution to the film (and to cinema in general), so I’m willing to give credit where it’s due. But many people forget that “Kane” was a team effort: Welles’ genius was that he surrounded himself with the right people to bring his vision to life”
So, Welles is nothing more than some corporate CEO? All he did was point a figure and saying, “I don’t know, Toland, you figure it our!” If that’s not the Kael argument, line for line, then I don’t know what is.
And any argument that presents Welles as a product of the talent he surrounded himself with doesn’t hold up. When you look at all the disparate people who worked with Welles, from A-list Hollywood technicians to Italian cameramen to French set desingers and Eastern European film crews, and yet the vision in all his films remains breath-takingly consistent. Was there Collaboration? Of course. But there was his vision and talent first.
Now, I have no illusions about Welles temper, in fact I could not care less about the tantrums that he is accused of throwing. And niether could most of the people who worked for him: track down a copy of Graver’s “Working with Welles” or “Orson Welles in Italy: Rosabella” and discover what various actors and crew members thought of Welles. There was collaboration, but there was a hëll of a lot of guiding by Welles and above all there was admiration for what he wanted to achieve.
But shall we get into a list of great artists who were hard to work with? Is this now the criteria of the debate?
And no one is disparaging Robert Wise. I’ve long admired his work, “The Andromeda Strain”, “Run Silent, Run Deep” and “West Side Story” are my particular favs. But I will call an action what it is; and what he did to Welles was a betrayal. The same could be said for how Cotten handled the situation. But I still love his work, too.
Perhaps I’ve misunderstood the peramters of the discussion, Brak (it is Brak, isn’t it?). The only one we can disparage here is Welles? We’ll just water down his contrivutions through a series of back-handed ad hominem attacks, while we champion mediocrity? Is that it?
All Best,
Mark
“Dina Meyer’s breasts were satirical of what now?”
Ummmm….. A photo finish in a Zeplin race?
“If that’s not the Kael argument, line for line, then I don’t know what is.”
Perhaps I should amend my earlier statement to “PART OF Welles’ OVERALL genius was that he surrounded himself with the right people to bring his vision to life”… that’d be closer to what I was trying to get across. The fact that I’m saying something that Kael said is more coincidence than conspiracy; again, I couldn’t disagree more with Pauline Kael’s vision of ‘How Cinema Ought To Be’ without imploding. Nor do I think that the collaborative aspect of “Kane” is the reason why it’s a great film; Welles was a genius, and I do not dispute that the success of “Kane” was due more to Welles’ vision and force of will than to any collaborative effort with his crew. The problem I seek to address is that too many people give Welles ALL of the credit for the importance of his films: for example, “Citizen Kane” would not have been the same film had some cinematographer other than Gregg Toland been involved in its production, and I would argue that the same statement applies for Bernard Herrmann, Joseph Cotton, and the majority of his contributors. Obviously, Welles’ contributions are the most significant (“first and foremost,” as Mark put it), and I’ve read many accounts of people who hated working with him but just learned so much from him to be able to realize his importance to the field (I’ve read “Rosabella”, BTW), but the cult of personality surrounding Welles’ life tends to overshadow the significant contributions of Welles’ frequent and sometimes collaborators, and that’s something that just plain sticks in my craw.
So if I’m parroting a Pauline Kael line, I’m doing so not out of any effort to disparage Welles or to ‘water down’ his importance, and certainly not because I agree with anything Kael says, but in an effort to bring recognition to his often underlooked contributors. Too many people have a tendancy to regard Welles as the sole reason behind the greatness of his films, and that bugs me on behalf of the important people being overlooked. I agree with your statement that the “vision in all his films remains breath-takingly consistent,” and I agree that vision is unquestionably and uniquely his… but every time I hear somebody say, “Orson Welles was created deep focus photography,” I have to point out that it was **Toland** who took Welles’ vision of the scene and made them a reality.
Regarding Welles being a bášŧárd, I realize that’s not neccessarily a BAD thing, but rightly or wrongly it the most visible aspect of his personality. Welles had a tendency to approach every project with a certain amount of ego and arrogance, and that very ego/arrogance forced his crew to push the envelope of technology because Welles never settled for anything unless and until it met his exacting standards. I agree with Bill that the bášŧárd element is necessary (though I’m a little fuzzy if Bill is 100% behind that; perhaps I’m misreading his statement), and I would go so far as to say that if Welles WASN’T a complete bášŧárd, none of his projects would have ever gotten off the ground. It’s certainly true of “Citizen Kane”… if not for Welles’ desire for perfection, many of the most incredible shots in the film would have been composed much differently (and therefore would’ve been much less incredible). That’s one of the reasons Gregg Toland’s presence was so important to the film: had Welles asked the same of any other cinematographer, they would’ve gone, “nope, can’t be done, next”, where Toland said “well…. maybe if we do this here…” and made it happen.
I brought up the bášŧárd angle because you (Mark) were complaining about Spielberg’s ego in ‘ripping off’ Welles and “Kane”. Excoriating Spielberg for having a bigger ego than Welles strikes me as a little like a mountain complaining about a molehill taking up all the room; Welles wrote the book on ego-driven projects. Regardless of whether you think Spielberg is as good as, or even a comparable director to, Orson Welles, well, Spielberg must be doing something right because he’s far more successful in his time than Welles was in his. Whether that’s because Spielberg ‘sold out’, or because Welles’ rise and fall was so meteoric, I’m not sure that’s an argument anyone can quantify, and I’m certainly not going to try it. But I will say that, in my opinion, it’s tremendously unfair to Spielberg’s talent to say that every scene he’s ever shot is a derivative of the Thatcher Memorial Library scene.
Regarding Robert Wise, I am glad that you can appreciate his body of work, despite his involvement in the recut of “Magnificent Ambersons.” Suffice to say that I don’t see it as quite the act of Shakespearean betrayal as you do. I certainly don’t seek to champion mediocrity, though I do try to give credit where credit’s due… even if the credit’s not so good.
Brak, I WAS pretty unclear. I think you are correct that the bášŧárd element of Welles was an important part of why KANE was so great but it is ALSO part of the reason why he never was able to replicate its success.
Picasso could afford to be an insufferable monster. All he needed was paint, a brush and a canvas. Welles spent the majority of his life going hat in hand to studios, watching project after project fail.
Of course, the same thing happened to George Pal so even being a nice guy may not help.
“Perhaps I should amend my earlier statement…”
Thanks for the clarification.
Just one additional response, and it’s based on this: “Spielberg must be doing something right because he’s far more successful in his time than Welles was in his.” I don’t know what you mean by ‘success’ here. Do you mean this in the commercial sense? the artistic sense? the personal sense? But moving beyond that, there still seems to be something faulty in that statement. John Grisham, for example, has had tremendous success writing sub-par books; thanks to diligent corporate test marketing, Bon Jovi has enjoyed a prolonged and lucrative run while churning out cookie-cutter pop metal. Whereas a writer like Milan Kundera, or a group like Husker Du have had limited success but have produced work of superior (and, I would argue, lasting) quality. So, I would have to disagree with the assertion that moving units of a product and the inherent quality of the product should be viewed as equal values.
And just to follow up and the issue of Welles-would-have-been-more-productive-if-he-had-been-nicer issue. That argument never made any sense to me. Because if bad behavior is a barrier to artistic production, then how can we explain Van Morrison? Or (an even better example) Harlan Ellison? Or Barbara Steisand? Henry Irving? Bernard Herman? Ismail Merchant? All of whom were difficult personalities and some of whom, in the case of Morrison and Ellison, are far more short-tempered and tantrum-prone than Welles. Yet all of the people mentioned above enjoyed long periods of success while throngs of people groussed about what jerks they were/are.
No, I think the answer lies in the fact that Welles wanted to make a certain type of picture and Hollywood wanted to make another type. The trouble was, at the time, there was no apparatus in place that could provide Welles with the support he needed. Were he around today, with the Sundance Film Festival, the IFC chanel and all the other venues available for “independent” filmmaker, one could argue that he would have been twice as productive.
Best,
Mark
Mark,
As I said before, it’s much easier for a writer or musician to be a misanthrope–their art dosn’t require the cooperation of an army of co-workers.
Even given the high liklihood that what Welles wanted to do was uncommercial (though I DON’T think he was uncommercial for its own sake–he was very upset that CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT was such a flop) it seems surprising that NOBODY was willing to give him many opportunities in his later years. The sixties are chock full of expensive experimental uncommercial crap. Hëll, you’d think that a bunch of A list actors would have kicked in enough funds (or just forgone their salaries) to get the chance to work with Welles (I know I’d take a year off without pay if Kurusawa called. Well, first I’d freak out because the man is dead but my point remains).
Now Welles is a misanthrope. Jaysis. Since when does a nasty temper constitute a comprehensive hatred for mankind? And if that was the case, then how do you account for the scores of people who worked with Welles that remained loyal to him, or people who suffered his outbursts but also benefitted from his kindness?
And I’m not buying the line that a tough-to-get along with musician has it any easier. Musicians are surrounded by a large contigency of people, a number, if not as big as a film crew, certainly not that much smaller. Buddy Rich was a notorious tempermental bášŧárd and he had to deal with a big band, plus touring crew, booking agents, pr peoople – most of whom didn’t enjoy condictuing business with him. But they did. And what about Elton John? You want to see a tempermental headcase at the head of a large group of people, check out “Tantrums and Tiaras.”
And yes, you would think a bunch of A-list actors and Hollywood types would have been interested in working with/helping Welles with his movies. People like, oh, I don’t know, Steven Spielberg, who had considerable clout in Hollywood in the early 80s, someone who Welles approached to help him with the film version of “The Cradle will Rock”; someone who wouldn’t help him with the project but would, after Welles’ death, fork over big bucks to purchase the Rosebud sled.
Give me a break, will ya?
Mark
Brak Yeller wrote:
“Welles certainly didn’t invent the deep focus lens himself. Cinematographer Gregg Toland is largely responsible for the cinematic success of the film”
Just to complicate matters a bit, they cheated some of the shots. There were occasions where, despite the lenses they were using, they couldn’t get the depth of field they wanted, so they made use of a few oversized props here and there for some of the famous foregrounded object shots.
Mark Walsh wrote:
“And any argument that presents Welles as a product of the talent he surrounded himself with doesn’t hold up. When you look at all the disparate people who worked with Welles, from A-list Hollywood technicians to Italian cameramen to French set desingers and Eastern European film crews, and yet the vision in all his films remains breath-takingly consistent. Was there Collaboration? Of course. But there was his vision and talent first. “
If I recall correctly, at the time, Welles and Toland presented themselves as having collaborated to produce Kane. I’m pretty sure there were articles in both the popular and the trade press (probably American Cinematographer) which emphasized their work as a team.
Also, regardless of Welles’ talent, by the same logic, Toland should be given some props as well. Look at the great films he lensed for other directors – look at “The Best Years of Our Lives,” if nothing else. Maybe he just lucked out and got to work with great directors (Wyler, Ford, Welles), but there’s probably a reason why they worked with him. The man knew how to shoot a film.
Either way, hey, Kane’s a great film, but then again, so is Jaws. (And truth to tell, I’d rather watch Jaws again than Kane.) I’m betting WotW won’t be in the same league as either of those films, but I could be wrong. That’s my take on it.
Nice discussion you guys are having, by the way.
Oh, almost forgot:
Mark Walsh wrote:
“And yes, you would think a bunch of A-list actors and Hollywood types would have been interested in working with/helping Welles with his movies. People like, oh, I don’t know, Steven Spielberg, who had considerable clout in Hollywood in the early 80s, someone who Welles approached to help him with the film version of “The Cradle will Rock”; someone who wouldn’t help him with the project but would, after Welles’ death, fork over big bucks to purchase the Rosebud sled.
Give me a break, will ya?”
Haven’t heard about this, so I can’t comment directly, but as a counterexample (regarding someone Ellison mentioned in his rant, by the way), a couple of other “Hollywood types,” Lucas and Coppola DID help Kurosawa get Kagemusha made when he couldn’t get financing in his own country. So they can’t all be bad. (Or should that be, they can’t be all bad?)
“Brak, I WAS pretty unclear.” Not really, Bill. I initially got what you were saying, but I just wanted to make sure I was reading you right. It’s so easy to be misunderstood on the Internet…
“Do you mean this in the commercial sense? the artistic sense? the personal sense? …there still seems to be something faulty in that statement.”
What exactly is faulty with the statement? Spielberg has been extremly successful, commercially, artistically and personally. As you noted, Mark, he ‘moves a lot of product.’ My point is that being able to move a lot of product does not automatically make said product artistically worthless. Setting aside numbers and income, Spielberg’s usually critically well reviewed by professional and layman alike. Personally, well, he’s 1/3 of SKG, so I think he’s doing all right. He’s got a stable family (being married for a decade and a half is practically a miracle in Hollywood), and he’s done a goodly bit of charity work, most notably with WWII- and Holocaust-related groups.
Mark, you very obviously have a strong affiliation with Orson Welles, and I’m not seeking to change that. I do think you’re giving Spielberg a short shrift, especially since I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that Spielberg is more successful now in our time than Welles was in his. By any system of arbitration (save the fact that Welles produced “Kane”, considered by many [including myself] to be the pinnacle of cinematic achievement), Spielberg comes out ahead: net gross (adjusted for inflation), awards won, sheer volume of body of work. Hëll, even using a ranked AFI Top 100 list, Spielberg out-cumes Welles by a significant margin. Who do you love, the guy who hit the finest grand slam home run of all time and spent the rest of his career with the occassional double or triple, or the guy who hit the occasional grand slam, with a solid and lengthy career of homer, triples, doubles, and RBIs?
But I suspect that’s a quantity-versus-quality argument which is not likely to sway you, and, our discussion aside, it’s not really a fair way to way to quantify “who’s better.” Your tastes are yours and mine are mine, but fairness is universal… and I don’t think it’s fair to dismiss Spielberg as a success simply because he’s not as artistic as Welles, or he’s a corporate sell-out, or he once looked at Welles the wrong way, or whatever. You don’t have to be obscure to be good, help though it might. Welles and Spielberg don’t have to be mutually exclusive in their merits, and that’s the bottom line I’m trying to get across.
Bad behavior is NOT a barrier to artistic production, but it can definitely become a major obstacle. Certainly you can see how it would limit one’s choices to have a reputation as someone who is difficult to work with. To be clear, I’m not saying that one has to tamp themselves down and become Mr. Happy Supernice in order to realize their artistic vision, but in Welles’ case one could argue that his reputation became a liability. After “Kane,” he had a reputation (deserved or not) as a loose cannon. Many of the people he worked with were happy to work with him again, yes, but there was an equal (or larger, depending on who you believe) number of people who absolutely refused to work with him for reasons ranging from perfectly valid to violently petty. Regardless of his undeniable genius, it’s not hard to see why he had a hard time getting people to pay attention to him later in his career.
Oh, and reputation aside, Spielberg was a VERY busy guy in the early 80s. He had plenty on his plate keeping him busy, which might be why he turned down Welles’ requests for help. Perhaps that’s a rationalization, but it doesn’t seem that far-fetched a scenario to me.
“Just to complicate matters a bit, they cheated some of the shots.”
I’d forgotten about the oversized props. Still, I don’t know that I’d call that ‘cheating’, as it’s still a pretty clever way of overcoming the technical problem to bring Welles’ ideas to life. If anything, the ‘cheating’ indicates more genius than falsehood.
Hitchcock would do the same type of ‘cheat’ twenty years later with the shower scene in “Psycho”; in order to shoot the shower nozzle from Janet Liegh’s point of view, he constructed a huge shower nozzle and mounted a camera rig ‘underneath’ it to get the scale right. I guess I don’t consider that ‘cheating’, more ‘good effects work.’
“Kane’s a great film, but then again, so is Jaws.”
I’d certainly agree with you. I read an article based on the premise that “Jaws” is a ‘perfect movie’: there is no dead weight, every scene is necessary to the narative and contributes to strengthening it, right up until the climax and after, where the film ends exactly where it should… a minute after the death of the shark. Despite what one may think of Spielberg, and despite the fact that “Jaws” suffers from an inaccuracy of shark knowledge that is embarassing by today’s standards, the film is like a finely tuned watch, and has aged pretty well.
If one can get what one wants done on time and done right (ie, as we wish it) by being Mr. Nice Guy, so much the better. But I don’t seem to recall de Mille’s crankiness having hurt his long and successful movie-making career any.
Brak: My defense of Welles springs up from the 1970s, when I would watch other celebs constantly berrate and cheap shot him on Merv Griffin and Johnny Carson and proceeds through the general popular consensus that he was profligate, fat, lazy and not as good as his first film suggests. And it was further strengthened by Gore Vidal’s first-rate essay on Welles, circa 1985. Vidal confirmed my intial gut reaction to how Welles was portrayed in the popular culture, a portrait that was deeply distorted and in many instances flat out wrong. So I bristle anytime he is discredited because, it’s all been done, too much so, and much of it is overstated.
Now, I’m certainly not out to convert you or get you to mend your ways or anything remotely like that. Actually, I was simply enjoying the back and forth over the last few posts. It’s clear that you have a different opinion than I do and I was just seeing how far we could move the argument. I never expected you to give in; likewise, I never intended to concede that Spielberg is a solid, middler director. I hope you haven’t taken it too too seriously; any tweaking on my part was certainly done in jest. And I took yours that way as well.
Best,
Mark
Brak Yeller wrote:
“I’d forgotten about the oversized props. Still, I don’t know that I’d call that ‘cheating’, as it’s still a pretty clever way of overcoming the technical problem to bring Welles’ ideas to life. If anything, the ‘cheating’ indicates more genius than falsehood.”
Oh, hey, there’s nothing negative about the term. “Cheating” is a common term some filmmakers use when they fake something, or do something that is literally, logically, or technically incorrect (say, in the staging of a shot), but which has a desired effect on the viewer, and reads well on screen, usually without the audience detecting the cheat. Same with “cheating the shot.” Not a perjorative term at all, but instead one which does indeed imply ingenuity, as well as getting away with something (insofar as the audience probably won’t notice the cheat).
And I’ll agree with your agreement about Jaws – it’s Hollywood storytelling at its finest.
Mark wrote: So I bristle anytime he is discredited because, it’s all been done, too much so, and much of it is overstated.
Then don´t read Theodore Roszak´s great novel FLICKER or Kim Newman´s latest addition to his Anno Dracula series “The other Side of Midnight” 🙂 in which both Welles plays a part.
He must have really been a fascinating man to become a part of the pop culture.
Another postmod writer making his bones off deconstructing others? How orignal! Read “Flicker” years ago, kid. You want conspiracy threories and proverbs for paranoids, stick to Pynchon.
Best,
Mark
“Actually, I was simply enjoying the back and forth over the last few posts.”
As have I. And I’ll agree that Welles ended up on the business end of a lot more than his fair share of misery… even if one could quantitatively prove that he brought any of it upon himself, there was still a lot of unwarranted crap which was unfairly dumped upon him.
I take it, though, that you’re still unwilling to concede that you’re being overly harsh toward Spielberg? 🙂 Fair enough.
Wow. I hardly dare say anything more in the midst of all the Welles v. Spielberg feuding going on above. I just wanted to say that it seems to me whenever a director feels compelled to put an author’s name above the title, it generally means that the movie is going to deviate widely from the novel — Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein being two fine examples.
As far as “modernizing” Shakespeare by putting modern clothing and weapons in — all of Shakespeare’s plays were performed in Elizabethan garb, regardless of the time period of the play, so as someone else above said, I seriously doubt he’d have a problem with modern directors doing the same.
Brak,
You’re a good sport and fine debater. So, in the spirit of good sportsmanship, yes, I will concede on my harshnessto S.S. Especially since I love the Indiana Jones movies and again will restate that Catch Me if You Can was a fun period piece.
What shall be our next topic? the Mental Health of X-Ray?
Best,
Mark
Well, that’ll be a short debate, since I don’t think there’s anyone representing an opposing side in that argument…
“What shall be our next topic? the Mental Health of X-Ray?”
Not gonna touch that one with a ten foot cattle prod. Anyways, sorry if I came across as overly snide back there… I have a tendancy to forget that you lose tone and body language over the Internet. I truly enjoy spirited discussion with someone who knows their stuff.
Perhaps we can both gang up on the evils of director Ewe Boll?
Brak: I didn’t think you were snide at all; something akin to trash talking on the basketball court. Apart from the fact that he makes creep-out horror movies, I don’t know too much about Ewe Boll. I’d have to brush up first.
Patrick: I was thinking more along the lines of debating the particular pyschosis. Dimentia? Paranoia? A repressed somethingorother? You decide!
Best,
Mark
I strongly doubt that Harlan was being literal in saying that this upcoming film has a Steven Spielberg writing credit. I believe that Harlan is doing what he’s been doing for decades: slamming smart-aleck directors for proclaiming themselves the “auteur” of a film by calling it “A Steven Spielberg film.”
I can recall an anectdote about the buzz surrounding Frank Capra when he made films. The “Capra Touch” became a catch-phrase that ticked off one screen-writer when he challenged Capra to put “The Capra Touch” on hundreds of blank sheets of paper. It’s far too easy for most movie-goers to forget that SOMEONE WROTE A SCRIPT for that movie/TV show and the director/producer is the one who takes the credit for its success, at least in The Court of Public Opinion.
It’s an ongoing debate whether the Original Writer should get credit for a work that was dramatically altered from his vision(incidentally, “I Robot” was by no means the first time that Ellison’s work was passed over for an abomination of cinematic “slickness,” as anyone who read his essays over the decades can attest), but at least nobody can accuse Ellison of inconsistency, as his attacks on Disney’s “credit-hogging” and Trek’s re-structuring of “City on the Edge of Forever” will testify.
I dunno, the script’s important, it’s often the starting point and can provide the foundation for a good film, but it’s not the be-all and end-all of the film. There’s more to film than what’s in the script.
Keep in mind that scripts generally say little or nothing about staging, cinematography, editing, music and sound design, all things which can have as much of an impact on the viewer as dialogue or narrative, or which either enhance or detract from the dialogue or narrative, depending on how things go. Plus, there have been good films made without a script, or made with little reference to the script. (Johnny To’s “The Mission” is one example – Anthony Wong, one of the actors has said it was largely a collaborative process between the director and the five lead actors.)
Given that film is generally a collaborative medium, if one wants to get picky, there’s no single author of a film – hundreds of little decisions get made by various people every day over the course of a production, chance circumstances can affect the crew’s plans, etc. Given that the director and producer more or less orchestrate things, however, it seems fair to me that they get top-billing. Nothing smart-alecky about it.
That said, personally, if I see a good film, I’m interested in knowing not only the director, but the scriptwriter, the D.P., the editor, etc.
Well, of course Harlan has a big ego, but I doubt that anyone in the creative arts has a little ego. As far as War of the Worlds is concerned, I am a little worried because of Tom Cruise being in it. The fifties movie was relatively faithful, as much as Hollywood could be to a novel anyway. It wasn’t a star driven movie; Gene Barry as the lead was pretty good but didn’t dominate the action. I’m afraid the new War of…will be dominated by Tom Cruise, and not be faithful to the novel, where the aliens….SPOILER……
are killed by germs in the Earth’s atmosphere.
I’ve already figured that this movie doesn’t have a chance with the internet “critics,” especially since it’s been stated that the way Spielberg’s trying to set this one apart is by looking at the story through the eyes of one (Cruise’s character’s) family. Since it seems to be trendy to hate Tom Cruise for some reason, if there’s “too much” of him, people will whine. If it focuses more on the Martians smashing šhìŧ, it’ll be just another alien attack movie and Spielberg will be called a hack. *shrug* There’ll always be reasons for people to piss and moan.
Me, I’m going to do something that seems to be fairly passe these days. I’m going to buy a ticket, get a Coke and maybe some Reese’s Pieces, and sit and just enjoy the movie.
-Rex Hondo-
1 I get extremely wound up when novels that are set in the UK are transferred to New York and Los Angeles in the film version. I am very relieved that this hasn’t happened with ‘V for Vendetta’ as first planned.
“Anything that approaches genius in a Spielberg film, a n y t h i n g you can think of, he stold from Orson Welles.”
Well, if we are thinking that way, then Stanley Kubrick was the most unoriginal director ever. His best scenes were simply ideas he stole from Freud, and his most famous character, Dr. Strangelove, was a TOTAL ripoff of Fritz Lang’s Rotwang in “Metropolis” (not to mention what he did to Peter George’s fantastic novel “Red Alert!!”) Also, look at what he did to “Lolita.” She was supposed to be TWELVE not sixteen!(Nabokov would be devastated.) AND he couldn’t even get an orignal score for “A Clockwork Orange,” Instead, he TOTALLY ripped of Beethoven!! Or “Spartacus?” No relation to the novel it was based on. Hëll, you wanna get right down to it, ALL filmakers are ripping off Tom Edison’s “The Sneeze” by using a movie camera. All artists borrow from other atists. When they invented the idea of perspective, you didn’t see anyone complaing that Raphael was ripping it off. Or when they invented fresco’s, no one complained about Michelangelo’s painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Welles invented some techniques and improved on some. Ditto Spielburg. That is the way art works, you borrow, and seek to improve upon a basic idea. Besides, if Spielburg had been born first, we might be complaining about how Welles was ripping of HIM.
Posted by: The StarWolf at June 5, 2005 03:32 AM
I’m no fan of rock music, generally speaking, but I still LOVED Jeff Wayne’s musical adaptation of WOTW, if only because it was the truest to date. And makes me sadder still that Richard Burton is dead. His voice was perfect for the central character. He’d have been great for a film version early in his career.
Another very interesting frock/folk/blues adaptation of a classic novel — fantasy this time — is Jhnson & Knight’s 1977 “The King of Elfland’s Daughter”, featring Mary Hopkin, Christopher Lee and Alexis Korner, among others. Was avalable on CD from Edsel Records, but is apparentl out of print now.
As for Baz’s R&J, sorry, the 1968 Franco Zeffirelli version beats the crap out of any ‘modern adaptations’.
Absolutely.
Posted by: Mark Walsh at June 5, 2005 08:49 AM
Welles and Toland, through their collaboration on Citizen Kane gave film makers their cinematic language; I can’t think of anyone who has made more use of this language than Spielberg. As I said before, I enjoy Speilberg’s films but have never come out of one thinking that he brought something new to the party.
Another who gave us major parts of the ceinematic language was Hitchcock (and his cameramen), both by elaborating/adapting Welles and Toland’s and creating some — the “vertigo” shot for instance; used with good effect by Spielberg in the beach scene with Roy Scheider, and in reverse by Truffaut a nightmare scequence in his Fahrenheit 451.
Posted by: Bill Mulligan at June 7, 2005 08:58 AM
Hëll, you’d think that a bunch of A list actors would have kicked in enough funds (or just forgone their salaries) to get the chance to work with Welles.
The problem with that idea is that, pretty much all of the way through Welles’s active career as a director, the Studio System, with everybody — writers, directors, actors — on contract to the studios, still reigned. You had to get permission from your studio to work in a project that wasn’t the studio’s, and, in turn, uf the studio wanted you in a project, no matter how much you disliked it, you did it. More than one “difficult” director or actor was punished by either being denied work or by being forced to do projects that were well beneath their level.
And he already did have a reputation of being hard to work with.
Posted by: Stew Fyfe at June 7, 2005 11:54 PM
And I’ll agree with your agreement about Jaws – it’s Hollywood storytelling at its finest.
And a blatant riopoff of a teevee movie a couple years earlier — you know, the one with Dennis Weaver and a truck?
Posted by: Mike Pigott at June 19, 2005 02:24 AM
I get extremely wound up when novels that are set in the UK are transferred to New York and Los Angeles in the film version. I am very relieved that this hasn’t happened with ‘V for Vendetta’ as first planned.
Some of my favourite such shenanigans: “The Laughing Policeman” — a Swedish police procedural set in Stockholm, moved to San Francisco for the film. A Ðìçk Francis novel — and i’ve just blanked on the title — originaly set in England and the US, transferred entirely to a Canadian setting as a teevee movie. And, of course, less egregious, but still amusing — Bogart’s character in “African Queen” being switched from Australian to Canadian ‘cos Bogie couldn’t handle the accent.
Further, i may be wrong — it’s been a looong time since i read “V for Vendetta”, but wasn’t it set in a (future? post-Thatcher?) fascist Great Britain? If i’m remembering that aright (and please correct me if i’m wrong) the apparent decision to put it in an alternate universe where the Nazis succeeded in conquering Britain is a bit annoying.
If i’m wrong — well — “Oh. Never mind.”
As to Welles’s reputation for an overbearing egotist and being hard to work with, there’s a “Spirit” story from somewhere in the Forties featuring an overweight ham actor/director named “Awesome Belles”…
On the subject of Orson Welles, I’d suggest that anyone who’s interested try to seek out a copy of _With Orson Welles: Stories From a Life in Film_ which aired on TNT in 1989 or 1990. It included a number of interviews with Welles made a few years before his death.
I understand that it was a truncated version of a British Documentary, _The Orson Welles Story_, made in 1982. So perhaps that might be the better version. I can’t say, since I’ve only seen the TNT version.
At any rate, in the interviews, Welles talks about a variety of subjects, including _The Magnificant Ambersons_.
He also recounted how someone had approached him in a restaurant some years after _Kane_, and inquired whether he’d made any films since then. Welles had politely, and in a conversational tone of voice, listed some of the films he’d made post-_Kane_. He then told the interviewer the version of that encounter as it had appeared in one of the gossip columns: That without preamble, he’d loudly proclaimed that he’d made this, that and the other film after _Citizen Kane_.
Of course the documentary _The Battle Over Citizen Kane_ is available on the two-disk _Citizen Kane_ DVD. If I remember correctly, some of the Welles’ comments in that are taken from the above documentaries.
On another note, Welles sometimes poked fun at his himself and/or his reputation. He starred in the classic Lucille Fletcher story “The Hitchhiker” on radio at least twice. In the version which aired on _Suspense_, the broadcast was preceded by an introduction by Welles, who commented about how “puzzled” he seemed as to why he was being called upon to perform in stories with some sort of science fiction/fantasy/horror connection.
If I remember correctly, he mentioned the word “Mars” by name, and with feigned innocence said he didn’t understand the connection.
Or words to that effect. I have the program at home and can provide his exact words, if anyone’s really interested.
On a similar note, in a 1940 or 1941 (I’ll have to check the date) episode of the _Burns and Allen_ radio program, Welles’ then-wife, Rita Hayworth, guessed starred, and helped poke fun at Welles’ reputation for being a genius. Gracie was hoping she’d have tips on how George could become a genius as well.
Rick