5/21/24
Newsletter #602
The Crack of Dawn
When I shot my film, Alien Apocalypse (2005), in the spring and early summer of 2004 in Sofia, Bulgaria, I had the good fortune to work with a highly experienced director of photography named David Worth. Among the many pictures that David had previously photographed, two were films for Clint Eastwood, Any Which Way You Can (1980) and Bronco Billy (1980), both good looking movies. David’s camera operator was a fellow named Jack N. Green. As he will do, Clint Eastwood promoted Jack Green to director of photography, then had him shoot his next ten films, including the Best Picture winner, Unforgiven (1992).
David Worth is a very funny, smart, acerbic guy. If he didn’t like a movie, it was “hammered shit.” Being the oldest and most experienced DP with whom I’ve ever worked, he was also the fastest, and his lighting was always beautiful. And since he’s a real movie buff, it was a pleasure sitting beside him all day talking about old movies.
So, after a good day of shooting – that whole shoot was terrific – David and I were in a car being driven home. Being an inquisitive fellow, David was asking me about my other films. I told him about Running Time: it’s a heist picture, in black and white, all in one shot and in real time, mostly shot on a Steadicam, with some exceedingly long, complicated shots. David’s eyes were wide, and he said, “That sounds great. Brilliant. Why aren’t you as big as Quentin Tarantino?” Thank goodness that occasionally I can be quick. I replied, “Why aren’t you as big as Jack Green? He was your operator.” David gasped, “Oooh,” looking like he’d been punched in the gut, then said, “Good one.”
Meanwhile, in the small world department, Jack Green shot the pilot for Bruce Campbell’s show, The Adventures of Brisco County Jr. Bruce said he was wonderful, and really fast. He’d have to be fast to be Clint Eastwood’s favorite DP.
BTW, for the first ten years of Eastwood’s directing career he consistently worked with the cinematographer, Bruce Surtees. Bruce Surtees was the son of the great cinematographer, Robert Surtees. Therefore, in today’s parlance, Bruce was a “nepo baby,” except that nobody hires a cinematographer based on their dad’s fame, it’s too difficult of a job. Anyway, Clint Eastwood met Bruce Surtees in the 1960s, when Surtees was a big shot camera operator, when they made several films together for director, Don Siegel, Coogan’s Bluff (1968) and Two Mules for Sister Sarah (1970). On The Beguiled (1971) Don Siegel hired Bruce Surtees as the DP and gave him his break. That’s where Clint got the idea. Clint started directing that year and hired Bruce Surtees to shoot his first directorial effort, Play Misty for Me (1971).
Bruce Surtees then shot most of Clint Eastwood’s movies up through Pale Rider (1985). I saw an interview with Clint at the time and he jokingly, and rather offhandedly, mentioned that he had just “given his cameraman a nervous breakdown” on Pale Rider because he just kept wanting it darker and darker. It’s a pretty dark movie. Anyway, word on the street in Hollywood was that Clint wasn’t being euphemistic, he really did give Bruce Surtees a nervous breakdown.
But still David’s question was valid, as was my response. Why weren’t we famous? Why indeed?
Here’s one reason. In 1997, when I was thirty-nine years old, and having made three features that hadn’t set the world on fire, I thought I was finally in the right place at the right time with the right movie, Running Time (1997). It was the perfect film festival movie – it was audacious, all in a single shot in real time, in stark black and white, starring Bruce Campbell, and it got 100% positive reviews in all the L.A. papers. I could not be denied.
Oh yeah?
First of all, Running Time opened in L.A. the same day as Titanic (1997). Running Time and every other film at the Laemmle 6 Theater in Santa Monica, including Woody Allen’s new film, Deconstructing Harry (1997), were killed that week. Standing at that theater on 2nd Street, I could see the line for Titanic on the 3rd Street Promenade stretching off into the far distance.
Then, one by one, I was turned down by every big film festival – Sundance, Telluride, Vancouver, New York and Toronto. But then I got a call from Slamdance, the alternative festival to Sundance, also in Park City, Utah, at the same time. An excited young man said, “Running Time is great! We all love it. We can’t wait to show it.” My breath was taken away. I said, “Wow, that’s great.” The fellow then said, “That’s the best first feature we’ve ever seen.” I said, “Yeah, but it’s my fourth feature.” There was a long pause, then he said, “Oh, then we can’t show it. We only show first features.” I couldn’t help but ask, “Why?” He didn’t know, and they didn’t show the movie.
Running Time was welcomed by the second level of film festivals, where no films have ever gotten noticed; as well as the underground film festivals, where films also didn’t get noticed. So, I attended any film festivals that would fly me in and put me up, from Helsinki, Finland to São Paulo, Brazil, but of course that’s the consolation prize.
It really seemed like fate had ganged up on me. But I’m pleased to report that back there in the late1990s, I was simply undeterred. I just put together another indie feature, If I Had a Hammer (2001), which I really thought was good, and very possibly my best work, and maybe it was, but it was never released at all.
Except that I have fairly recently signed a deal with Synapse Films – who did a nice job releasing both Thou Shalt Kill…Except and Running Time – to release If I Had a Hammer, at least on Blu-Ray. Finally seeing that film, which was beautifully shot on 35mm negative by the DP, Kurt Rauf, properly transferred to 4K digital will be a great pleasure.
And there you have it.
Me, too.
Go ahead, rub salt in my wounds with compliments. Thank you.