I highly recommend the documentary Filmworker to anyone interested in Stanley Kubrick's character.
It's about Leon Vitali, the actor who played Lord Bullingdon (the neurotic brother of Lady Lyndon) in Barry Lyndon. After filming Barry Lyndon, he quit acting and became Kubricks personal assistant / factotum for over 20 years. Although some would say he was Kubrick's personal slave. It is utterly shocking to see how badly Kubrick treated him at times. Vitali did the work of 4-5 assistants, completely neglected his family, destroyed his health, spend the best years of his life re-cutting scenes until 5 in the morning while listening to Kubrick's violent tantrums, and ended his successful acting career for him. But apparently he was paid so little by Kubrick that he ran into financial trouble after the director's death. Yet for some mysterious reason, he remained completely loyal to his master until his own death in 2022.
Leons daughter Vera talked a bit about her father, his relationship to Kubrick, art and family in “Sommar i P1”, a Swedish national radio show where people in “public interest” talk about whatever for an hour or so. It’s pretty interesting and provide some insights, but unfortunately it’s only in Swedish
There are many people who believe that something outside themselves is more important than their own personal happiness or even basic sustenance/stability. Whether that’s something to be admired, damned, or merely observed — it would seem Vitali made choices for reasons worth it to him, personally.
Lots of people make bad choices for themselves and others due to psychological control, manipulation, and/or abuse, such as people who willingly join cults.
I’m not saying that is what happened to Vitali, but I think it’s the open question being alluded to.
It is important to be aware and concerned about cultures or industries that foster cult like personality leaders.
Exactly right. But people today are extremely resistant to this fact.
It's very clear that many, many people would give up nearly anything -- including years of their lives -- to work with someone as talented as Kubrick. Is that crazy? I wouldn't do it, but others would.
I hope this doesn’t come off as snide, but is there a positive trait that abusive people won’t abuse for their own benefit?
In my view, if there is one I’ve yet to encounter it.
Which would suggest it’s largely the responsibility of each individual to decide what is important to themselves, and how much of themselves they’re prepared to sacrifice in pursuit of said thing.
For some, perhaps works of art that hold meaning for millions of people over many, many years would qualify. For others, it’s a highly paid dev job. I suspect the difference between the two (and all others) “exists” more in the eye of the beholder than folks on any side of the equation would care to accept.
You see it as unilateral loyalty. Perhaps he saw it as something different, or at least lived his life with both eyes open to his own experience. The only thing we can both say for sure is that we will never know for certain.
That is true. This is the belief on which this entire, perpetual, scam of "die working for this startup for peanuts" for the great purpose of "changing the world" has been running. Every time a founder finds such sheep, mostly fresh ones but some old ones too once in a while.
Sadly all that almost looks like "grateful to be abused".
I don't think there's a lot of people that wanted to work for Kubrick. But I also have an easy time accepting that there are many people out there that will make great sacrifices for something that they love and believe in.
MMA fighters, for example, put themselves at tremendous risk because they're chasing their own personal ideas of "greatness." And there are many examples of "struggling artists" throughout history that gave up on relationships and money because they were chasing something that they believed in.
I'm not defending Kubrick's managerial style, and I don't know anything about the individual that they are talking about and what drove him. I just don't have any difficulty imagining that this person believed in something very personal that he was chasing. Something that the rest of us can't relate to but that meant a great deal to him. We don't have to imagine that Kubrick had him brainwashed or "enslaved" to accept that he could have made a personal choice that the rest of us are incapable of understanding, in pursuit of a value that he held above all others, because it was a deeply personal choice.
>MMA fighters, for example, put themselves at tremendous risk because they're chasing their own personal ideas of "greatness." And there are many examples of "struggling artists" throughout history that gave up on relationships and money because they were chasing something that they believed in.
MMA fighters generally chase their own glory, to get their own hand raised in the ring. Not become a personal servant to another person's ego.
Agreed but you're missing the point, which is that the individual might have so believed in Kubrik's art that he wanted to make personal sacrifices in pursuit of that. For all we know (and others undoubtedly know more about the story than I do), this man might have actually been in love Kubrik and wanted nothing more than to be close to what he perceived as "greatness."
I'm not even saying whether I think it's morally right or wrong. Only that it's not hard to imagine the scenario.
You're missing the point, abuse is bad even if the abused accepts it for whatever reason. You can achieve great things without abusing people, it's not a requirement.
Your MMA example is also missing the imbalanced power dynamic that you usually have in an abusive relationship.
Jumping into this with a "spicy" personal opinion.
How I would rate 2001 depends entirely on my criteria.
For cinematography and vfx I would give it an 11 out of 10. Ground breaking.
For story and entertainment, I'd give it a -1. It is an anti-film in that sense. The most mind-numbingly boring and drawn out piece of "film" that I have ever had the displeasure of trying to sit through.
And I say that as a self-professed film nerd. I admire Kubrick a lot. But I can't stand 2001, at least when I judge it by the same criteria that I judge other films.
Film is visual story telling. Emphasis on "story."
Putting aside Dave & Hal (which make their appearance so late into the "film" that I've already been asleep for 3 hours - yes I'm exaggerating), when you take away identifiable protaganoists and antagonists, with backstories, goals, motivations and obstacles what you are left with is more of an exhibition.
2001 was more of a 1960s speculative endeavour into humanity's future at the dawn of the space age than it was a story told through imagery. It lacked plot, character development, relatibility and it's pacing was so slow and drawn out that it's hard to maintain your attention throughout.
When you judge it for what it was, there is a lot of greatness there. Many of its visual effects were truly groundbreaking and influenced filmmaking for decades to come.
But when you compare it to films that you actually want to re-watch for entertainment value ... I would put it in the "awful" category. But that's just my personal opinion.
Shades of that Twitter executive who shared a picture of herself in a sleeping bag at the office, presumably doing "hardcore engineering". She later got fired regardless.
Doesn't seem that controversial. A publisher commissioned a book about the films of Stanley Kubrick, agreeing that Kubrick would be able to veto publishing of the text if he didn't like it.
He didn't like it, didn't sign off on it, and the book was never published.
From the article, it appears the big sadness for the author was he wrote back and said he was happy to work with Kubrick to discuss getting it to where he was more comfortable with it, Kubrick never responded, and then sent lawyers. That's all that's rough for the writer, here.
> From the article, it appears the big sadness for the author was he wrote back and said he was happy to work with Kubrick to discuss getting it to where he was more comfortable with it, Kubrick never responded, and then sent lawyers. That's all that's rough for the writer, here.
Very. Who knows how many hours of sweat he poured into it, only to get it shelved when it was done.
This, IMHO, is a good reason to recommend everyone read The Mom Test at some point in their adult life.
What probably happened was that the author got the initial agreement from Kubric by being so persistent that Kubric agreed just to make them go away. A lukewarm reception from someone is just their polite way of saying "no".
> This, IMHO, is a good reason to recommend everyone read The Mom Test at some point in their adult life.
It is not. These things aren’t comparable. Most people will get nothing out of that book.
> What probably happened was that the author got the initial agreement from Kubric by being so persistent that Kubric agreed just to make them go away.
Why speculate to excuse Kubrick and victim blame Hornick, when the answer is in the article? He was commissioned to write the book:
> He had been commissioned to write the very first book on Kubrick by cinema specialist The Tantivy Press more than 50 years ago.
I disagree with this. Even if you're not trying to build a business, almost everyone would benefit from the ability to distinguish a "Yes (but not really - we just want you to leave)" and a "Yes (we're in agreement)".
Most people can't tell the difference between the two.
> Why speculate to excuse Kubrick and victim blame Hornick, when the answer is in the article? He was commissioned to write the book:
I'm not trying to excuse anyone, I'm just saying that there is probably more to this than we heard, and one possibility is that the author interpreted a lukewarm signal as a yes, when in reality almost all lukewarm "yes"'s are "no"'s.
> He had been commissioned to write the very first book on Kubrick by cinema specialist The Tantivy Press more than 50 years ago.
That just moves the problem by a single degree - maybe it was the Tantivy Press that pestered Kubrick until he said yes to make them go away.
PS I do not understand why parent, latexr, was downvoted so heavily. He's making an argument, and it's clear his making it in good faith, not merely being a jackass. I don't think that type of argument should be downvoted.
I this case the author agreed that Kubrick would read the final book and agree if it should be published. This removes the option he chose with all other books of simply ignoring them. Very different then Streisand effecting an independent author.
From article it sounded like the clause to 'veto' was really meant as a fact check. Kubrick would be able to get chance to leave sections out, or clarify. That he just rejected the whole thing was the surprise.
Like if someone hired you to do a Web Site, and there was of course some stipulation that you get to review it. Then you complain the buttons are the wrong color and just reject the whole thing.
I love Kubrick movies, but my one bit of criticism I'd give (from me - a random guy on the internet, who's never made a movie), is that both 2001 and The Shining both require the viewer to have read the respective books to fully appreciate them.
I know it's a cliché to harp on about the ending of 2001, but it really does make a lot more sense after having read the book, which in turn makes the movie a lot more enjoyable.
With The Shining, you really need to read the book to fully understand the back-story to Jack's issues, and Danny's premonitions. I was amazed at how much the movie left out, and after reading the book, the movie is so much better.
I agree with the befuddlement aspect that makes the mind rummage on it from time to time long after watching the movie. It's an incomplete resolution that causes us to think about the movie. It could be frustrating at times but I guess that's the whole point.
The Shining movie is different enough from the book in key elements as to go in a completely different direction. Also, though it's an enormously famous, atmospheric horror movie, Stephen King disliked it, especially because it changed certain key elements.
The odd thing about it is how it conserved the atmosphere of the book superbly, while also deviating so drastically in a very selective way.
Now, specifically:
In the book, the hotel itself is much more of a living thing of its own, with its own sentience, not just a haunted building. In the movie, it's more just a sinister building with a terrible past, now filled with malevolent ghosts.
The Wendy of the book is a tough, scrappy fighter who shows enormous resourcefulness in protecting her son both from his increasingly deranged father and also the deeply evil hotel that wants to eat the boy's soul. In the movie, Kubrick, for fuck knows what reasons, turned her into a partly hysterical, mousy shrew that saves herself and her son more by luck than by tough effort. This was one of the two things Stephen King most hated about the movie version, he felt that one of his good, tough characters was destroyed by Kubrick for no good reason at all..
The other thing King most hated in the film was the characterization of Jack Torrance. He tried to convince Kubrick not to use Nicholson because he felt the guy had far too sinister a presence in general. The novel Jack on the other hand was a mostly normal, likable guy slowly made insane by the hotel. The movie version was more of an already unpleasant man with repressed insanity trying to preserve some goodness, and failing horribly with the help of the hotel's evil spirits.
Having read a lot of his writing about writing, and having spent a lot of time (especially in my formative years) reading his writing, I think my understanding of his writing would sound totally foreign to him.
Like, I think he's got a lot of issues with father's and sex, to be blunt. I think Kubrick found a similar reading and built an excellent film around it. I think that King wrote an excellent novel about those themes precisely because he could do that with no self-consciousness, completely unburdened by that reading.
He focuses on craft, which is great and has made some terrific literature. At the same time, I think he too-easily dismisses reading text at any deeper level. That's great for writing but less helpful for digging up what makes the writing good. Similarly, it's helpful for living our day to day lives but less helpful for getting us out of dysfunctional patterns.
I have to disagree with you about 2001. Both endings were epic, but Clarke's vision in the book was more rational and scientific, while Kubrick's is more impressionistic and mystical. As a result, the two effectively diverge at the end and the book doesn't really "explain" the movie. (Although I certainly do encourage everyone to read the book as well.)
Agreed, and I’d be comfortable calling this incompetence.
Triggers cinemaphiles to hear a director that’s supposed to be ome of the finest being called incompetent, but I can’t see how it’s defendable. He failed at the _one thing_ a film is supposed to do.
> Agreed, and I’d be comfortable calling this incompetence.
You do know that in the case of 2001, the movie and book were done simultaneously, right? There’s no failure of adaptation because it wasn’t one. It makes no sense to fault the movie by comparing with the book in this case.
> He failed at the _one thing_ a film is supposed to do.
Which is what? Entertain? Make a profit? Be culturally relevant to an extent that is still felt decades later?
There is no rule which says a movie has to be a coherent linear story that spoon feeds you to be significant, good, or artistically relevant.
> You do know that in the case of 2001, the movie and book were done simultaneously, right? There’s no failure of adaptation because it wasn’t one. It makes no sense to fault the movie by comparing with the book in this case.
Yes, I know that. I don't see how it makes it a nonsensical comparison though. One form was done well, the other incompetently. It's not like they marketed it as "hey, you really need both for the full experience".
>> He failed at the _one thing_ a film is supposed to do.
> Which is what? Entertain? Make a profit? Be culturally relevant to an extent that is still felt decades later?
To convey something in the audio/visual format. It doesn't get more basic. Whether that's for pure entertainment, artistic intent, whatever.
> There is no rule which says a movie has to be a coherent linear story that spoon feeds you to be significant, good, or artistically relevant.
Neither is there anything saying that you're safe from criticism if your work isn't coherent either. There was a very clear, coherent story to 2001, and Kubrick failed to convey it.
Perhaps the key here is what YOU don't see, not the merit of the film.
2001 was ranked the 6th greatest movie of all time in the Sight and Sound poll, which is probably the world's most respected poll of industry professionals.
I’ve seen the movie a few times and no part of it is confusing. The movie and the story it tells is coherent and, I dare say, pretty obvious. It’s unfortunate that you were not able to follow it, both because of your obvious dissatisfaction and because now you’re making a lot of bad posts.
This film is definitely a trigger for me, so I'll concede that I'm over-reacting. However, I do not believe the ending was easy to follow, not just because I didn't understand it, but because I've never heard anybody who's only seen the film say they understood it either.
I've heard that 2001 was very much enjoyed by people who would come to the theater high. The visuals were a great trip for them, and helped make the movie a big success!
P.S. I've seen the movie countless times (never high), and sometimes I'll put it on as simply moving wallpaper.
“Leaving things out” is sometimes one of cinema's greatest strengths.
I’ll never forget a documentary I saw on martial arts film editors. They will deliberately cut the very frame where a fist would touch an actor's face. And not at all because it was badly choreographed. Instead, they realized that the strongest punch is the one you never see. It’s the one you complete with your imagination. And there’s no competing with that.
Likewise, leaving some of the plot to be inferred by the audience is a powerful narrative mechanism.
I listened to a podcast about it ages ago, and if my memory serves me correctly - the book was started first but wasn't finished until after the movie had been completed. Kubrick couldn't wait for Clarke to finish the book, so he carried on with the production of the movie. I think Clarke wanted to release the book first, but Kubrick wasn't going to wait for him!
I have to say that the 'critical' quotations from the book are uncharacteristic of a project where the target of the biography (and this is a kind of biography) is cooperating and participating - and particularly when they have veto.
Most writers know the score in this respect: unauthorized coverage is harder-hitting and may be more accurate, whereas authorized coverage has inside scoops, but is unlikely to be allowed to contain very critical barbs.
Think the issue is, Kubrick was so sensitive, that even the most mild criticism was taken badly. So the author knows the score, and treads lightly, and is still jumped on.
The author was hired to do a 'nice' book, and was pretty nice but the customer was a Prima donna and rejected it anyway.
Think we've all encountered bad customers like this.
I don't know - I think the author was hoping for tremendous indulgence from Kubrick when attempting to get him to green-light quotes like:
'There are good things in Lolita. But in too many respects it squanders, impoverishes and conventionalises its source material, draining it of its complexity, nymphetry and eroticism.'
It's valid criticism, because it's a point of view, but I wouldn't expect anything quite that harsh in a collaborative work.
Since Kubrick had opportunity to respond, he was able to respond to the draft, he could have used it as opportunity to explain the censorship of the time that lead to that outcome. The article even mentions that later Kubrick tended to agree with that view of Lolita.
Good, if Stanley was going to bully them into not publishing I am glad it got published eventually. I like Stanley Kubrick's films but every time I read about him he comes off as a generally unlikeable guy.
My understanding is that they didn't need his agreement in the first place, but they voluntarily entered into a contract with Kubrick that gave him the final say on publishing in exchange for him agreeing to be interviewed for the book.
If they didn't need his agreement, but entered into contract anyway that gave so much power. Why? Seems like we are still missing something here. The article didn't get into the legal side.
I said it in my previous comment and it's also in the article. The "why" is so Kubrick would agree to be interviewed for the book. They gave him publishing veto rights that he otherwise wouldn't have had in exchange for that, which is pretty common and typically well worth it.
Contracts to personal affairs not real property, I believe would terminate on his death unless deliberately constructed to use e.g. a trust. I repeat, I'm not a lawyer.
In some economies, Copyright falls to the heirs or assigned owner for a stated period after death. From the University of Melbourne:
Copyright generally lasts 70 years after the death of the creator or after the first year of publication, depending on the type of material and/or when it was first published: Artistic works, including photographs, Dramatic works.
I don't think a contract still stands when one of the party do not exists anymore.
And dead people don't have rights past what they have decided on inheritance and even this can be sometimes overturned by justice. This is the reason wealthy people sometimes give their wealth to a foundation but if the foundation doesn't find a way to make it sustainable and money runs out it also ends up dissolved regardless of the cause it was bound to serve.
Generally, a party has successors that would benefit from the contract.
But without seeing the contract, we don't really know. Perhaps it only bound the original publisher, and not the author, but some other contract had bound the author to only publish through that publisher, and that publication contract is no longer in force. Who knows, the article doesn't tell us.
That's too bad. I understand that as a young filmmaker with an ego, but your supposed to lose that ego as you mature both emotionally and as an artist.
Directors to a certain extent need to dominate, it’s the nature of the job.
If you’re the one organising 30 to 50 people on a set with a good many of them also being egos (think actors for example), you have to make hard decisions and to certain extent be that unpopular leader.
On the other hand, there also plenty of soft spoken directors that use soft power to manage a set.
Just want to point out that directing isn’t an easy job at times and how that gets handled various from director to director.
Kubrick movies left a big impact on me, whatever he did it seems to have worked. But I also think he was a bully who it was very hard and damaging to work with.
As surprising as it might be, narcissistic personality disorder won’t go away simply as people age, especially if they live in a social bubble where they are sent overall continuous positive feedback that society is very pleased at the global result of their behavior.
Apart that he was a film maker, I don’t know anything about him. If anything, this thread thrown more claims on the person than I have ever read before, as I couldn’t care less about topics that can perfectly fit gossip magazines.
Plus not being a doctor, I’m not even qualified to make a compelling diagnosis.
All that said, clichés don’t come from anywhere, and tyrannic personalities who destroy everybody around them as sure as they get social glorification for practicing some art is a well established one, so I wouldn’t be surprised that it would be the case. However I would rather have Picasso coming to my mind.
> "There are good things in Lolita. But in too many respects it squanders, impoverishes and conventionalises its source material, draining it of its complexity, nymphetry and eroticism."
I think anyone who has read Nabokov's novel would agree that Lolita really isn't a great adaptation of the book. I think it is by far Kubrick's weakest film. There is a deep cynic darkness to the book that the movie misses completely. In later interviews, Kubrick always tried to downplay this and only admitted that the movie lacked eroticism:
> "If I could do the film over again, I would have stressed the erotic component of their relationship with the same weight Nabokov did," the director admitted. "But that is the only major area where I believe the film is susceptible to valid criticism."
I sometimes wonder how a Lolita movie by Francis Ford Coppola would've turned out (maybe with Gene Hackman).
Not publishing a book at the height of the subject’s popularity, but instead launching it half a century later when the money and recognition won’t matter is a nice sales trick?
Sure, maybe this would have provided more attention then, but also more troubles to the author and publisher. So the "look that stuff that a famous person absolutely didn’t want this to be read by anyone" is still a good click bait.
Kubrick’s film simplified the psychological depth and literary nuances of Vladimir Nabokov's 1955 novel, adapting its themes and character dynamics to fit both the cinematic form and the censorship norms of its time. Constrained by the Hays Code and societal taboos of the 1960s, it toned down the explicitness of the sexual elements of the story. The was more overt humor and satire in the film, partly as a way to address the censorship regulations of the time. This approach changes the tone from the intensely personal and tragic to something lighter and more accessible, though still deeply disturbing.
Actually in the book she is really not. She is a 12 year old child being sexualised in the mind of the narrator. She doesn't act seductively, the narrator sees whatever she does in a perverted way.
There is a famous interview on French TV where Nabokov says as much (in French) [0]
I suppose that your interpretation would be dependent on if you are postmodernist or not and if you believe in the death of the author.
I have never read the book or seen the file but the work is very interesting to me as when it get brought up people will start claiming all sorts of things from it.
I think the most insane from my point of view was when I heard/saw(can't remember if online or in person) an argument that all men are perverted and want to rape children. The proof was quotes from Lolita....
I recommend you to read the book, I think that the film doesn't (can't?) do it justice. The book being written from the point of view of the narrator is crucial: the reader is put in the mind of a pedophile (we are told that he is in jail). I also suggest imagining the girl as a child, before puberty at the start of the story.
The case study of Lolita is interesting because there are two competing readings. The fact that the character is often associated to seduction and jailbait in popular culture is arguably symptomatic of a culture of blaming the victims of this kind of crimes. Obviously not all men are perverts but I sometimes wonder if those of us who aren't don't underestimate the number of those who are.
I was thinking the same, but it’s easy to do so when it’s not your life’s work— especially something that took so much time and dedication. The quote about the Lolita film was pretty damning, and imagine the shame of accepting that you had botched the adaptation of such a prolofic novel.
So what, everyone is supposed to pretend that everything Kubrick touched was completely perfect?
That would be a hagiography, not a serious artistic critique.
It seems more than fair to point out that Kubrick was touchy and thin-skinned. You could argue that it's an inseparable part of his overall genius -- but only if you're allowed to criticise him in the first place!
It's about Leon Vitali, the actor who played Lord Bullingdon (the neurotic brother of Lady Lyndon) in Barry Lyndon. After filming Barry Lyndon, he quit acting and became Kubricks personal assistant / factotum for over 20 years. Although some would say he was Kubrick's personal slave. It is utterly shocking to see how badly Kubrick treated him at times. Vitali did the work of 4-5 assistants, completely neglected his family, destroyed his health, spend the best years of his life re-cutting scenes until 5 in the morning while listening to Kubrick's violent tantrums, and ended his successful acting career for him. But apparently he was paid so little by Kubrick that he ran into financial trouble after the director's death. Yet for some mysterious reason, he remained completely loyal to his master until his own death in 2022.