26/6/24 The film director Stanley Kubrick
This an utterly fascinating chronicle of a brilliant writer's experience with a director who didn't seem to care about writers.
Stanley Kubrick was the reclusive genius of film, an American who had chosen Britain as a base from which to create his masterpieces. Frederic Raphael was an Oscar winning screenwriter, novelist. He also wrote biographical studies of Somerset Maughan and Lord Byron.
Stanley Kubrick impressed him as the leading living director and Paths of Glory was one movie that astounded him.
Spartacus was based on a novel by Howard Fast and Dalton Trumbo worked on the script despite being blacklisted by Mc Cathy.
When a scriptwriter is reluctant to do a job his price can rise till the produces hopes are irresistible. The writers money comes in slices on delivery of the first draft the second and then the "polish"
Kubrick had been a ranking chess player, this is a game of bloodless sadism and schemed execution.
A man who displaces himself to visit another is conceding his superiority.
Raphael was born in Chicago and went to school in NY
1862 to 1931 Arthur Schnitzler from Leopoldville Vienne and was Jewish. The movie is based on his novella the Dream Story. This had to be transferred to current New York from Vienna then. This story was impregnated with Jewishness. This story lacked any neat explanation, because to explain a dream is to rationalize it. Vienne was under the Austro-Hungarian Empire and because of Franz Josef's longevity it gave his monarchy the illusion of permanence.
Kubrick like good directors wants from the script only the competences that he can't supply himself. " I have been selected to be his outside caterer but it is still his party." Raphael would only start writing once he had the contract. Usually he was prepared to write novels and stories without a though to payment.
In Paths of Glory Stanley wanted the 3 condemned soldiers reprieved. However thanks to actor Kirk Douglas the original pitiless ending was restored and it became an uncompromising success.
Peter Sellers was one of Kubrick favorites male stars but he had no preference for females stars. The contract had forbidden Raphael to do any other work while on this. He objected as book reviewing was relaxing and kept him sane.
Kubrick never showed his hand to Raphael of what exactly he wanted. Kubrick wanted to strike into undiscovered territory but must be sure it contains gold. Only once the scriptwriter 's work is finished does the production begin. Nobody knows what Kubrick looks like.
It is the producer /directors job to encourage the troops. Sex and war in the ancient world shared the same vocabulary. Stanley is a sedentary wandering Jew rootless in his own defenses.
1501 Oct 31st the Dukes of Valentino threw a notorious sex party in the Vatican which Pope Alexander VI attended. Called the Bouquet of Chestnuts. Cesare Borgia arranged a banquet. (controversial ?)
Kubrick do not really know what kind of story he was intending to tell . What interested him was the atmosphere of eroticisms and distinct sexuality of conjugal love.
He read up about orgies in Rome because wealthy Romans did as the pleased all the time. By the 1980 prostitution had become part of the entertainment business.
1964 Dr. Strangelove was the best starring Peter Sellers. But they almost refused to show it at cinemas. Peter Sellers had been a radio actor and it was remarked that he is so ugly that he is lucky there is a medium where he cant be seen acting in public.
It is absurd to try understand Kubrick without reckoning on Jewishness as a fundamental aspect of his mentality if not of his work in general. He said he was not really Jewish but happened to have 2 Jewish parents. He exposed many aspects of ugly human behavior but never confronted anti-Semitism. Judaism has laws but no timetable for salvation.
Love was never his theme but desire not least for money went right back to his earliest work. He was not exempt from travails and unsurprisingly he too endured rejections and humiliations. Kubrick may be a genius but fears to look a fool. He had many disappointment and nursed many projects that never got legs.
1956 Killings was Kubrick's first movie to excite critical and professional attention.
The screen writer has duties without responsibilities. Kubrick welcomed Raphael's conversation as well as his dialogue. He never wanted a partner but rather a skilled mechanic who can crank out the dross that he will later turn to gold. Slowly Raphael realized that not only did he want no jokes he was not eager that the characters. Kubrick regarded Raphael as a means to an end. wanted a particular personality, and was not going to do the stuff that was markedly characteristic of Raphael's. Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman would be cast by Warmers as the leads in the movie they were married at the time.
Woody Allen once said that show business is a business other wise it would be call show-show..
Raphael was asked for rewrites not because there was something wrong because Kubrick had time and looked forward to something better. Directors can never believe that there are people who find it easier to invent things than to steal them Note the OJ Simpson trail was taking place at this time 1995 onwards.
A tyrant is a man so threatened by apprehensions of being overthrown that he must reduce everyone to impotence and repudiates all advice. Kubrick deals with the collapse of safeguards against unjust violence and unpunished cruelty as seen in Path's of Glory. Life is about power not sincerity
1971 Clockwork Orange based on the novel by Antony Burgess of 1962- the cure for evil is itself evil. All human attempts to control the devil are conducive to greater cruelties. and nastier devils.
Eyes Wide Shut finally started shooting in Nov. 1996 2 years after Raphael had started on the first draft. Kubrick had been trying to find a way to transfer this Schnitzler story to the screen for 25 years.
1957 Kubrick made the movie Paths of Glory on WW1 it was made in Germany near Dachau as it was cheaper to do it there at that time. German police were recruited to do it. Battlefield's are not fun to film in.
1987 The full Metal Jacket was filmed in England a story that took place in Vietnam.
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Autobiography. 28/10/19
He was a self made person and had the loving support of his mother and later wife.
He was brought up in the area of Elephant and Castle where you join a gang for protection not to attack others. He was married young and had a daughter by his first wife. He later Shakira in married him in 1973 because she saw the way he treated his mother. His father was a porter at the market and uneducated. When he was with celebrity actors his mother pointed out one who met every body but did not come to meet the old women. Zulu 1964 was his first movie. "Alfie" gave him a unique personality. He says he always made sure to arrive on time and know his lines. Marylin Munro never arrived on time or knew her lines but people were prepared to pay to see her. He says that records are kept on who delays production, so if you cause a delay it won't be easy to get your next job.
John Huston was the greatest director. Only in the 60s did opening come to him as the class system was starting to break down even though he could play any accent. From 1958 till the present "King of thieves" he met every important actor and many of them died young from drinking or drugs.
He says "The First Marigold Hotel" was a success as it addressed the baby boomer generation and their old age issues. He concludes that the 60s was an important period.
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