On Monte Hellman, his three favorite films, and the recognizability of Filmbrain

Last night's screening of The Shooting at BAM was a near sellout -- great to be in a room with that many Hellman fans! As promised, it was a new 35mm print, and other than a few color-timing mistakes, it looked great. Hellman spoke afterwards, and it was preceded by a big announcement -- he is about to start production on a new film (and it's a western). He was tight-lipped about the screenwriter, though he did say it was based on a novel. (Cormac McCarthy? Just a guess.)

Hellman spoke about (amongst other things) the influence of Beckett on his films, his strong relationship with Warren Oates, and his absolute hatred of expository dialog (Roger Corman insisted he add some to The Shooting). He also corrected something concerning the end of the film -- the slow motion shooting was not inspired by the Zapruder film, but by the footage of Jack Ruby killing Lee Harvey Oswald. The Q&A session was interesting, and at one point somebody asked Hellman about his three favorite films, which he was happy to provide. A most interesting list:

• The Spirit of the Beehive (Victor Erice, 1973)
• Slave of Love (Nikita Mikhalkov, 1976)
• Outcast of the Islands (Carol Reed, 1952)

Filmbrain has only seen the Erice film, and it is indeed wonderful. Outcast of the Islands is totally unavailable, and Hellman has been pressuring Criterion to restore and release it on DVD. It sounds like an incredible film, judging by this review. Both Spirit of the Beehive and Slave of Love are on DVD, but only in Europe.

And then a strange thing happened at the end of the evening. As Filmbrain was leaving the theater, a woman approached him -- "Excuse me, are you Filmbrain?"
Completely stunned. "Um....yes."
"Ah...I had this feeling. I like your site. Glad I came to this tonight."
She waved goodbye and walked off. Filmbrain could not think of anything to say. He was flattered, but dumbfounded. What was it about him that gave him away?

Comments

[cynthia]

you don't even have any photos posted, do you? weird. cinetrix was the first person to ever recognize me from my blog, at a harvard screening months ago...but i do have photos posted so that makes more sense.

[cjk]

Yes, OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS is a great film and deserves to be rediscovered. (Only a DVD could do justice to its exquisite b&w cinematography.) It ranks with THE THIRD MAN and ODD MAN OUT, Carol Reed's two other masterpieces from that same period.

[Dave Cheung]

Just a small addition: Hellman's favorite recent movie is Arnaud Desplechin's LA SENTINELLE. Haven't seen any his movies despite all these hype about him; this one sounds kind of fun so hopefully I can get it off free from the library. :D

Maybe one of these days I can pick you out from a crowd...I've tried last night but obviously I didn't succeed! :)

[FIlmbrain]

I found it interesting that he liked La Sentinelle so much. It's a good film, but personally I prefer Desplechin's followup, My Sex Life: Or How I Got Into An Argument.

I'd love to know what it was about the film that appealed to him.

[SteveDollar]

I just discovered your site but I was at the screening at BAM. Very cool event. I got to hang out with Hellman (oh so peripherally) after the show, but didn't learn too much else about the actual new project. ("Desperados," it's called). Apparently, there are a lot of young actors, out of the PT Anderson orbit, who are interested in anything he winds up doing. I was amazed that the guy is so trim and chipper. Can't believe he's 72! Talked with the producer quite a bit, who also told me the long, strange saga of trying to get "The White Hotel" to the screen. But that's another story ...