MY WEEK WITH MARILYN

Did a young British third assistant director have a brief affair with Marilyn Monroe during the making of The Prince and the Showgirl?  If you believe what the Oscar-nominated My Week With Marilyn suggests and the autobiographies of Colin Clark then, well, yes. But those who question the story include Sarah Churchwell, professor of American Literature at the University of East Anglia in England and the author of The Many Lives of Marilyn Monroe.  She asserts that most of the film's historical data rings true, but points out that only Clark knows the truth about their relationship, and since he wrote two books after everyone else had passed away, there's not many who can dispute Clark's claims.  "He waited some 40 years after the fact to publish them," said Churchwell,  "which does make one think, you know, having read all of these biographies, that he capitalized on her fame and her familiarity and wrote a couple of books claiming a little bit more than happened."  And since Clark died in 2002, no one can give him the third degree.  Clark also reveals intimate details about Monroe's personal life in the book (i.e. having a miscarriage), but these can be found in other writings about Monroe, according to Churchwell.  Regardless of the facts, the acting rings true.  Both Michelle Williams as Marilyn and Kenneth Branagh as Sir Lawrence Olivier earned Academy Award nominations for their accurate portrayals of these legendary stars. An interesting story about Monroe's provocative 'bra-strap snapping' photo op to announce the making of Prince can be found here.

TOP "TRUE" FILMS of 2011

Once again, 2011 offered a significant number of films 'based on a true story', suggested by 'real events', or 'inspired' on factual material.   Below is a list of noteworthy motion pictures.

Moneyball
My Week with Marilyn
A Dangerous Method
The Iron Lady
J.Edgar*
Dolphin Tale 
Machine Gun Preacher
We Bought a Zoo
Soul Surfer
The Rite*
Anonymous*
Win Win
50/50
W.E. 

Most likely, some of these films will score Oscar nominations.
Feel free to add more titles and comment on your favorite.

*Featured on F2F

WAR HORSE

Two million lost in battle in World War 1.  Not soldiers, but horses.  That's a tragic figure by anyone's account.  And even some of those steeds lucky enough to survive were subsequently slaughtered for horsemeat.  The harrowing equine saga on the WWI frontlines took a back seat to the human conflict until recently, when War Horse evolved from a book to an award-winning play to a blockbuster film directed by Steven Spielberg.  In bringing the story to life, author Michael Morpurgo found inspiration from a variety of real sources, including accounts from veterans.  But perhaps most poignantly, the story's deep connection between a boy and horse came from an encounter witnessed by Morpurgo on a Devon farm (the story's setting). The author sponsored a special event enabling urban kids to spend time with animals on the farm. He met one troubled boy who a bad stammer and chose not to talk-- until Morpurgo spied the boy alone in a barn, having a private 'talk' with a horse.  The boy seemed confident and at ease; the horse appeared to understand what he was saying. This gave Morpurgo the genesis for his book.

The play's co-director also found inspiration in a letter sent by his great grandfather to his son, serving in the war.  In the note, a Devon farmer provides plenty of invaluable advice on the proper care and feeding of horses.  "When campaigning, there are lots of things you can do with horses which may say you a lot of trouble and a lot of danger," he said.  Unfortunately, most soldiers in the conflict were ill informed on how to tend to their mounts.

World War I marked a major transition in the use of horses in battle.  The film offers an authentic, yet sad depiction of these creatures caught in the crossfire and lugging huge artillery to the point of death.  Trench warfare, machine guns, poison gas, tanks and barbed wire took a major toll on the animals (some horses even wore gas masks).  As a result, horses were primarily used for transporting machinery and supplies rather than charging into the fray.

A unique exhibit entitled "War Horse Fact & Fiction" opened in 2011 at London's National Army Museum to coincide with the play and film. The exhibit chronicles the use of horses in wartime throughout history and gives insight into the story's background.

HUGO

A bullet-shaped rocket ship blasts off from Earth headed for a spectacular lunar landing.  On-lookers gasp as they literally watch the capsule face plant itself into "The Man In the Moon."  This iconic scene comes from one of the  most significant silent motion pictures ever produced-- A Trip to the Moon, by French filmmaker George Melies.
He created ground-breaking cinematic techniques (including inventive vanishing effects ) that changed the movie-making process forever.  Upon its release in 1902, the film captivated audiences around the world, including Thomas Edison who distributed the silent in the U.S.   A Trip to the Moon's  cultural impact continues to endure, helping to inspire author Brian Selznick to pen The Invention of Hugo Cabret, adapted into Hugo, directed by Martin Scorsese.

Melies

One of the story's key plot points concerns a young boy living in a busy Paris train station who encounters an eccentric toy shop owner called Papa George.  Selznick paid homage to the real Melies in his story, blending heavy doses of fact with fiction.  In truth, George Melies also sold toys for a living after his filmmaking career suffered a major setback.

Author Selznick also learned that Melies once was a magician and had a collection of automatons, or mechanical robots.  This, too, helped significantly shape the story.  In Selznick's research, he learned of magicians who created mechanical figures that could write poems and draw pictures.  The French magician Jean-Eugene Robert-Houdin constructed a mesmerizing automaton that swung on a trapeze.  In fact, at one point in his career, Melies bought Houdin's theater and eventually showed his films there (Houdin would also inspire perhaps the world's most famous magician--Houdini.   To learn more about automatons, go here.  On the "Hugo" book's website, Selznick offers plenty of rich information on Melies and other real sources of inspiration.

Also, for another intriguing look at Melies, check out a segment of the award-winning TV mini-series, "From the Earth to the Moon" entitled Le Voyage dans la Lune. This final installment of the series chronicles the final Apollo flight into space constrasted with the making of the filmmaker's silent masterpiece.

J. Edgar

It's a safe bet that throughout the release of Clint Eastwood's drama, J. Edgar, scores of historical commentary and criticism will pour out about the most powerful and notorious figure in law enforcement.  For instance, a television reality series entitled American Gangster profiles Hoover as a ruthless bigot bent on destroying Martin Luther King.  Allegedly the F.B.I.'s chief sought to expose the black leader as a Communist and a sexual deviant. The motion picture shows Hoover's attack on King's character by using wiretaps and exposing racy audio tapes of extra-marital affairs.  But there's definitely a grey area between fact and fiction. Government records show Hoover didn't instigate wiretaps and surveillance of King-- that was the work of the Kennedy administration. The President and his brother Robert tried to quell King's involvement with known Communist figures, and fearing potential political fallout, felt the need for controversial surveillance tactics.


Unfortunately, most of the media attention surrounding the film concerns Hoover's alleged homosexuality and relationship with Clyde Tolson--not to mention his rep as a cross dresser (a scandalous 1993 biography details this as does a scene in the film). Eastwood and the cast have played down those aspects of his life in interviews, but it's worth noting that screenwriter/gay activist Dustin Lance Black also penned Milk, starring Sean Penn as San Francisco's tragic homosexual politician who was assassinated by Dan White.  

Although Hoover attempted to keep his private life private, he wasn't shy about using his muscle towards a pro-F.B.I. image on celluloid. Upset over the glorification of gangsters in the 1930's-era movies, Hoover insisted that actors like James Cagney should die when playing a hoodlum. Hoover also had a heavy influence in the making of G-Men, which featured Cagney as a tough guy F.B.I. agent. As a consultant on 1959's The F.B.I. Story, Hoover personally approved the casting of James Stewart. 


Hoover's impact on Hollywood goes deeper, as he kept secret files on scores of celebrities, including Frank Sinatra, John Lennon, Abbott & Costello,  Jimi Hendrix, and Elvis.  Prominent figures and politicians, including Truman and Kennedy, feared retaliation against Hoover, unsure if the director had dirt on them. 


Read more about Hoover here.

Fox Movie Channel

Tom Rothman

A shout out to Tom Rothman,  former Chairman and CEO of 20th Century Fox and co-chairman of Fox Filmed Entertainment. As host of Friday's Film Legacy on the Fox Movie Channel, he talks in depth about great films, such as The Grapes of Wrath (which aired on 11/04/11).  Not merely providing facts on the how the film was made, he adds relevant parallels to present times that helps draw in viewers who might have difficulty relating to say, a film from the 40's like Grapes of Wrath.  In a lengthy segment which aired before the film, Rothman compared the dust bowl to the current mortgage crises, contrasting homeless farm owners forced to relocate to homeowners in 2011 facing foreclosure.  In addition, Rothman details truths surrounding the Great Depression and the plight of families torn from their land, which became the basis for John Steinbeck's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. He also provides behind the scenes struggles in getting the film made.  To make sure the film's story was based on truth, producer Daryl Zanuck hired investigators to verify among other things, the plight of Oklahoma sharecroppers. When satisfied that the events in Steinbeck's book were authentic, he greenlighted the production, despite fears that the film would be criticized as pro-Communist.  The film won a Best Director Oscar for John Ford and Best Supporting Actress nod to Jane Darwell as Ma Joad. 

ANONYMOUS

Words, words, words.

            --Hamlet , Act II, Scene 2 by William Shakespeare

According to the makers of the film, Anonymous, who wrote A Midsummer’s Night Dream?

 

1.)   William Shakespeare

2.)   Christopher Marlowe

3.)   Edward de Vere

4.)   Sir Francis Bacon

Director Roland Emmerich and screenwriter John Orloff credit Edward de Vere for writing A Midsummer’s Night Dream when he was 8 years old!  In turn, this child prodigy would play Puck in a production staged for Queen Elizabeth, and later would secretly sire a child with her majesty.  The film also claims Shakespeare was a buffoonish bit player and illiterate drunkard who murdered Christopher Marlowe. 

How much of the film is based on truth?  There’s been centuries of debate over who wrote Shakespeare’s plays.  Great minds such as Sigmund Freud, Charles Dickens, Mark Twain,  Henry James , and members of The U.S. Supreme Court have examined the situation.  Scholars have dedicated their lives to debunking or defending the Bard.

Edward de Vere

Emmerich points to several ‘facts’ to support his theory: no handwritten notes of Shakespeare’s writings exist; he never traveled to many of the countries detailed in his plays; Will’s background (his parents were illiterate) suggests he’s not smart enough to possess such a rich vocabulary and literary capabilities. Another theory suggests that de Vere’s illegitimate child with the Queen Mum –the Earl of Southhampton--was mentioned in a sonnet and Hamlet was based on de Vere’s life, including the murder of a servant that parallels the death of Polonius.  In essence political motivations forced the ‘true’ author’s identity to be kept secret and use Will as the front man.

It’s important to point out that Emmerich is no stranger to outlandish claims of authenticity. The Day After Tomorrow played fast and loose with global warming issues. He also created quite a stir with the film, 2012, postulating that the world was doomed to destruction based on an ancient Mayan calendar and unique alignment of the planets (read the F2F entry here).  Emmerich admits that Anonymous is is ‘Hollywoodized’, but videotaped a segment pointing out 10 reasons why he thinks Shakespeare is a fraud.  Critics and scholars have pointed out several historical inaccuracies in the film, which should remind moviegoers that filmmakers often plays with the facts to create a rollicking good tale.  As Hamlet once said ‘doubt truth to be a liar.’ 

Read an article about the controversy here

Bad Cops on Film

Dateline: October 2011.  Los Angeles sheriff deputies face accusations of abusing inmates. Supervisors fail to document report of unwarranted beatings.  Civilian eyewitnesses, including a chaplain, see violence and/or cover ups firsthand.  Tales of corrupt L.A. law enforcement officers aren’t infrequent, sadly, and date back several decades.  Sometimes they wind up on celluloid, thinly disguised as fiction or as real events within a storyline.  Notable films include L.A. Confidential, Training Day, Internal Affairs, Colors, The New Centurions,  and Crash.

L.A. Confidential (1997) chalked up several Oscar nominations for its gritty, realistic portrayal of LAPD’s dark side during  the early 1950’s.  Based on James Ellroy’s acclaimed novel, director Curtis Hanson and screenwriter Brian Helgeland skillfully infused true crime stories into the film noirish narrative.  We see the notorious Bloody Christmas incident, sparked by a scuffle between a pair of cops and a group of Latinos in a parking lot.  In truth, when officers learned that their comrades had been hurt, they hauled the Hispanic suspects into prison. While in jail, some 50 cops took part in beatings of the prisoners lasting over an hour.  Sound familiar?  In 2011, reports of jail beatings at Los Angeles County jails prompted the F.B.I. to investigate and demand the resignation of Sheriff Lee Baca. A probe led to punishment of 30 jail employees.

The film also includes the arrest of real-life gangster Mickey Cohen, who once worked with Bugsy Siegel, and shows the affair between Lana Turner and hoodlum Johnny Stompanato (who later was stabbed to death by Turner’s daughter, Cheryl Crain).

In Training Day, Denzel Washington sought to pattern his bad boy character, Detective Alonzo Harris, in part after LAPD officer Rafael Perez, who was implicated in the notorious Rampart Scandal of the late 1990’s.  In the film, Harris is a narc who uses questionable tactics, rips off drug dealers, and is tied to gang members.  Perez was involved in robbery cover-ups, resold $800,000 worth of stolen cocaine, and was accused of being a member of the Bloods, a notorious L.A. gang.   It’s interesting to note that during filming, technical adviser Cle Shaheed Sloan found a way to include real life Rollin’ 60 Crips gang members on screen. Also, the founder of the Black T. Stones Bloods, T. Rodgers, allowed filming in his neighborhood in exchange for casting gang members.

Of course, Los Angeles isn’t the only city plagued by bad cop stories that are translated to the big screen. New York, for instance plays host to several truth-based crime sagas, including Serpico, Cop Land, and Prince of the City.

BIGELOW UNDER FIRE?

Talk about avoiding a landmine.  The Hurt Locker recently faced a lawsuit from Sgt. Jeffrey Sarver, who claimed the filmmakers used several details of his life in the film.  In truth, Mark Boal interviewed Sarver and his unit in Iraq while compiling his story, which first appeared in Playboy.  On October 13, 2010, U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Nguyen dismissed Sarver's claim against Boal and director Kathryn Bigelow.

Bigelow also is working on a Osama Bin Laden project with writer Boal.  On the fast track following Bin Laden's death, the movie project in embroiled in a different kind of controversy.  Republican Congressman Peter King accused Obama of jeopardizing U.S. national security following suggestions in a New York Times article that Bigelow's production team had been given "top-level access to the most classified mission in history" during their research for Kill Bin Laden, which is due to arrive in cinemas less than a month before the November 2012 poll.
Watch where you step, Kathryn!

Read the F2F piece on The Hurt Locker. 

CONTAGION

Here's something to sneeze at.  Director Steven Soderbergh contacted a renowned virus expert to make sure the science and situations in his film, Contagion, were credible.  Dr. Ira Lipkin is famous for his work on the West Nile virus and SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome).

"I wanted to make sure first of all that the science was accurate," Lipkin said. "The truth can be more interesting than anything you fabricate."

As a result he spent six week on the film, carefully examining the script for inaccuracies.  Case in point, there's a scene where Dr. Hextall (Jennifer Ehle) injects herself with a hypo right through her pants. Lipkin's alarms went off and called for a reshoot. "They tried to persuade me that it was OK - that she's in a real hurry," said Lipkin, the director of Columbia University's Center for Infection and Immunity. "And I said, 'No, no, she's not in that much of a hurry.' 

In addition, the film was made in cooperation with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  And Contagion's screenwriter, Scott Z. Burns, admits to waiting for the outcome of 2009 swine flu epidemic before finishing his script, in an attempt to include the latest scientific data.  Not only is this film 'ripped from the headlines', but experts claim this type of pandemic could actually occur. 


Viewers interested in learning more about disease and how to prepare for emergency situations can look to one of the film's backers, Participant Media.  They're creating a social action campaign with videos and posting articles intended to inform people about the film's real content, including viral pandemics.


Often these kind of doom and gloom films reflect the times.  An interesting Los Angeles Times article explores parallels between Contagion and Panic in the Streets, another 'outbreak' film made in the 1950's by Elia Kazan.  Both Kazan and Soderbergh have directed socially conscious films (i.e. On the Waterfront and Erin Brockovich).  During the 1950's, the Cold War, nuclear fallout, and McCarthyism generated a lot of anxiety.  In 2011, those concerns have been replaced by fears of economic collapse, big government and greedy corporations.  In the 50's, sci-fi films with big monsters created from radiation accidents often reflected public worries.  In the last few years, sci-fi films like District 9 have also commented on social issues.