- 3 months ago
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00:00Hi, James.
00:01Hello. How are you, Sean?
00:03I'm well. Thanks for being here.
00:04It's great to be here.
00:05Do you remember the first time you met Friedkin?
00:07I do.
00:10When I met him, actually, he called me first.
00:12That was the first time he had seen a movie I did called The Yards.
00:16This would have been around late 2000.
00:19And it was very strange and great to get a call from someone who was a real hero of mine.
00:25And then I went to his house for dinner, which was great.
00:29I mean, it was like a dream come true in a way, you know, to hang out with this legendary person.
00:35And he totally disarmed me with lack of pretension and was very magnanimous.
00:41And he was very modest about his movies.
00:43I mean, he was not someone who sat around, except for The Exorcist.
00:47Except for The Exorcist, he said,
00:49That's the film that I made that's going to be reme... this whole thing.
00:54But other than that, I mean, he was very modest about the movies.
00:58And he didn't... I said to him one time, we were talking about The French Connection,
01:02which I regard very highly, as I hope many others do.
01:06And he said, The French Connection, it's boring.
01:11It's boring.
01:12I said, No, it's not. What are you talking about? It's not boring.
01:15Yes, it's boring.
01:16Okay, it's not, but fine.
01:19You know, he was always very funny and very honest.
01:23And, like, you would... I remember once I went with him to see the L.A. Philharmonic,
01:29and he said, The first, very nice.
01:34The second, bleh.
01:38He had a unique personality in that he was, like yourself,
01:44a real city guy and a real sophisticate simultaneously.
01:49He was a deeply cultured man.
01:50And he was an autodidact, you know.
01:53He had dropped out of high school, like, I think he was 16,
01:56to direct live television in Chicago.
01:59And he knew all of those guys in Chicago, you know, Studs Turkley.
02:04He played poker with them.
02:05And he was like Saul Bellow.
02:07He knew that whole group somehow had gotten in there,
02:10in the Chicago intellectual circles.
02:12And then when he came to Hollywood, he came to Hollywood, you know,
02:16in exactly the right moment in the late 1960s
02:19and became famous very quickly for being relentlessly honest.
02:24You know, he would...
02:25I remember there's a famous story about him telling Blake Edwards, you know,
02:29The script you have for Peter Gunn is shit.
02:33You know, when he was, like, 26 years old.
02:35You know what I mean?
02:36He's like, What are you doing?
02:37Yeah.
02:38How did he...
02:39Was it just by dint of his raw talent that he was able to withstand that?
02:43I know that that can be helpful sometimes, but he was...
02:45Well, let's be clear.
02:47People hated Billy.
02:49The town hated Billy.
02:50A lot of people hated him.
02:52And he created a ton of enemies.
02:54And when Sorcerer didn't do well, they loved that.
02:59Because there are a lot of filmmakers.
03:00I mean, every filmmaker makes a bomb.
03:02Everybody does.
03:03Everybody.
03:04And Billy was overtly obnoxious on purpose
03:09to studio executives.
03:11And I think he burned a lot of bridges.
03:14But when you've made the French connection and The Exorcist,
03:18you can't fake your way into those pictures.
03:20You're undeniable when you make those.
03:22And I think that the power of his ideas and vision
03:27always won out in the end.
03:29And he was always able to make pictures because of that.
03:32And he was magnetic.
03:34Very magnetic guy in person.
03:35And so actors gravitated towards that.
03:38Do you remember the first time you saw Sorcerer?
03:40I do.
03:41I remember exactly the circumstance.
03:43I had remembered in 1977 when it came out
03:46and this truck on the rickety rope bridge,
03:48a very famous image.
03:50And I didn't know what the movie was.
03:52It looked scary to me.
03:53But I remembered it coming out around the same time as Star Wars.
03:57And I didn't see it for several years after that.
04:00And I made a kind of mad search to find the film.
04:04It became a bit of a quest.
04:05I finally found a 16-millimeter print
04:08through a company called Swank Films, I remember.
04:11And we screened it at my school after a bake sale.
04:15And, you know, I just thought it was fantastic.
04:17What is it that you responded to when you saw it?
04:19What did you like about it?
04:19Because you were a teenager.
04:20Yeah, I mean, first of all, it's a sui generis movie.
04:25I mean, it looks very interesting and documentary-like,
04:29but it also has surreal elements.
04:31It also has tremendous suspense scenes, you know,
04:34just on a meat and potatoes level.
04:35And a very unorthodox narrative style and structure
04:39with these four stories that begin the film.
04:42So I thought it was a very strange and interesting movie.
04:45What do you think compelled Friedkin to want to make this movie?
04:49He's coming off of these twin successes.
04:50There's almost nothing like these successes
04:52that he's had before in the movies.
04:55Some years go by between The Exorcist and this film.
04:58What drew him to the material, to the idea?
05:00You know, Billy was an amazing guy and was a brilliant guy.
05:04He was also wonderfully contradictory
05:07and he loved to sort of play games publicly.
05:10But I think his major desire was to see
05:13how far he could push the most unsavory
05:17and difficult people into a narrative
05:21and have you love them and be involved by them.
05:24And this film pretty much puts it right at the edge.
05:28I mean, you've got Roy Scheider,
05:29who is a low-level mobster, pretty scummy guy.
05:34You have a Palestinian terrorist, really,
05:37blows up a bank, Amidou.
05:39Francisco Robal's a hitman.
05:41And, of course, Bruno Comer is an embezzler.
05:44So you have a group of people
05:46who are usually considered moral reprobates
05:50that we're meant to follow.
05:52And I think it was almost...
05:53It was like Billy was testing how far he could take that.
05:56And I think some of that stems from his...
05:58Really from the very beginning,
06:00a documentary he made called
06:01The People vs. Paul Crump,
06:03where he was examining the guilt or innocence of this man
06:05who had a confession beaten out of him,
06:07but really reached its kind of complete realization
06:12in The French Connection
06:13where you're following Popeye Doyle.
06:16You know, he had followed a cop named Eddie Egan
06:18who was a bigot and a vicious person.
06:21And Hackman had huge trouble playing him.
06:24You know, he'd say,
06:24Billy, I don't like this guy.
06:27And Friedkin pushed it so far
06:29and, of course, was rewarded tremendously for it.
06:31And I think this was a film meant to push that idea a step further.
06:36What is your profession?
06:39Mr. Dominguez.
06:41Dominguez.
06:43Ice hockey.
06:45And also, I know that he was very good friends with
06:48and wonderfully and friendly, in a friendly way,
06:51competitive with Francis Ford Coppola,
06:53who, of course, had his own Jungle Odyssey movie
06:56with Apocalypse Now, which he was creating.
06:58So, you know, it's hard to say always
07:00why anyone wants to make a movie.
07:02But I know that there were these things floating around
07:06that compelled Billy to make the film.
07:10And I also have to say,
07:11I think that the politics of the movie
07:15were very much in vogue with Billy and his circle at the time.
07:19And I think he was just good enough to put them in the film.
07:22I want to ask you about that.
07:23The film is adapted from the Arnault novel.
07:26There is, of course,
07:27The Wages of Fear, the Clouseau film,
07:29which Friedkin was careful to say
07:31this was not a remake of the movie.
07:33One of the ways it seems like it's not a remake
07:35is he does inject this political point of view into the film,
07:38particularly with the characters
07:39that he chooses to tell the story.
07:42What do you make of that?
07:43This was never something I think
07:45that Billy would ever have copped to in conversation.
07:49But there's no doubt that the film
07:51is an extremely left-wing motion picture
07:56that is a very rare thing in the American system.
08:00The government's been told it's an accident.
08:03What?
08:05Charms in this country, terrorists
08:06who blow up American oil wells are heroes.
08:08The most obvious example is that Billy used
08:12the board of Gulf and Western,
08:14which was the parent company of Paramount Pictures,
08:17as the board of the oil company in the movie.
08:19You see them on the wall in a picture frame,
08:21and it's become legendary in Hollywood circles.
08:24And it's very funny, of course.
08:27Now, when you know that, it's very funny,
08:28but it's also a real provocation
08:30to the corporate masters that he had.
08:34And so he knew what he was doing.
08:36It was a very subversive act.
08:38He was basically saying,
08:39I'm going to make a picture
08:41that is about hegemonic corporate power
08:46and what it does to exploit
08:48and destroy indigenous populations.
08:52I mean, that's much more in vogue now
08:54than it was in 1977 to talk about.
08:57Very much, though, part of the late 60s political movement,
09:01not in movies, very subversive in movies,
09:04particularly mainstream Hollywood movies,
09:05but in intellectual circles.
09:07And he was really in that countercultural late 60s aspect
09:11trying to say, fuck you to the system.
09:15And it's very interesting as a result.
09:17And I know that he was very into
09:21Gabriel Garcia Marquez's book,
09:23A Hundred Years of Solitude,
09:24and he regarded that as a kind of major influence
09:28on his desire to make the film.
09:31Gabriel Garcia Marquez's book is quite surreal
09:33and it plays almost like a dream,
09:36which Sorcerer has some aspects of.
09:38But I think that he,
09:40it's almost like he took more the politics of Marquez,
09:43who was, of course, left of center,
09:44and appropriated those,
09:46the approach to Latin America
09:48and the exploitation of Latin America
09:49by the northern part of the continent.
09:52So that's very much in the film.
09:54And that is extremely subversive.
09:57And he got kicked for that.
09:59There's a classic reading of the movie
10:01that it is very much a portrayal of hell
10:02or a sort of purgatorical stop
10:04before you get to hell.
10:06I've come to, as I get older,
10:08I come to view that
10:11with considerably less interest, I think,
10:13than I do the major thrust of the film
10:17about class
10:19and about what that means in the world,
10:22that you are really subject
10:25to the larger forces of economics
10:28and history and culture,
10:30and you have very little ability
10:32to change your lot in life,
10:34which is very antithetical
10:36to the American dream
10:38and culturally who we are.
10:40And I think that that is one of the major things
10:42that caused the film
10:44to have a difficult existence
10:46in the beginning commercially.
10:49You know, it's not easy to tell people
10:51that there's no real hope.
10:55That's the thing that we really need.
10:58The more I see it in, I guess,
11:00almost like classic lefty terms,
11:02maybe that's less interesting, I don't know.
11:05It's a sign of a good picture, though,
11:07that you can look at it in multiple ways.
11:09It allows people to remove political intent
11:11from their reading of it
11:13and maybe have a more comfortable access
11:15to what it was that he was trying to accomplish.
11:17Well, that's certainly true,
11:18but I would argue that your ability
11:20to distance yourself from the politics
11:21is impossible when you see
11:23the employees of the oil company
11:25unloading bodies
11:26and this incredibly perfect silence
11:30with the crinkling of the wrap
11:32on these bodies
11:33and the reveal of the charred corpse
11:36at one point
11:37and then the revolt that happens after that,
11:41the complete breakdown in order.
11:46And people throwing things
11:47at the image of the dictator
11:49that's been posted on the walls,
11:50the hopelessness of the town of Porvenir
11:53and what that reflects
11:55on the power of the oil company
11:58and its ability to destroy lives, really.
12:01It runs the town.
12:02It owns the town.
12:03It owns everybody.
12:04And you cannot escape that.
12:07And that quasi-revolutionary moment
12:09is crushed.
12:12Very powerful.
12:15Charles Bluthorn,
12:16the paramount executive
12:17that you're referring to,
12:18who also presided over Gulf and Western
12:20and owned large portions
12:22of the Dominican...
12:23He owned large portions
12:23of the Dominican Republic
12:24where the film was shot.
12:25And he visited the set of this film.
12:27He saw what Friedkin was doing
12:29and allowed it to happen
12:31in some ways
12:31despite some dispute
12:33during the production.
12:33Well, I'm not so sure,
12:35to be honest.
12:35You know, I'm always surprised
12:37at how little movie executives
12:39read scripts
12:40or really follow what's going on
12:42on their productions,
12:43which may be a good thing.
12:45I don't think he had
12:46a full understanding
12:47of what Billy was up to.
12:49In fact, there's a very famous story
12:50of him bringing
12:51a couple of ladies to the set
12:53when they were going
12:54to blow up the tree.
12:55And he was all excited
12:57and he said,
12:58look at this,
12:58it's going to be amazing,
12:59the tree is going to blow up.
13:01And the tree didn't blow up
13:02and then he just turned
13:03and got in this helicopter
13:04and went away.
13:05I don't think
13:06that Bluedorn understood that.
13:08I mean, Bluedorn also was the person
13:10who okayed, in a way,
13:12the making of The Godfather.
13:14And of course,
13:14The Godfather Part II,
13:15which is overtly left,
13:17particularly with the Cuba sequences
13:19in its politics.
13:21So I think that his awareness
13:23of what Billy was doing
13:24was pretty limited.
13:26Friedkin famously contracted malaria
13:28when he was making this movie.
13:30There's tremendous physical danger
13:32throughout the production.
13:34Some people quit,
13:35some people left,
13:36some people were fired.
13:37Every day felt dangerous.
13:39What must it have been like
13:41to have been doing this?
13:41I'm sure every day was dangerous.
13:43I mean, part of that
13:45is the pressures.
13:47See, it's weird
13:47because you have these pleasures
13:49in old pictures
13:50where they do amazing things,
13:54but you can always see
13:55the artifice in it
13:56because they're fake.
13:58And the pressures
13:59of the new Hollywood
14:00was to match
14:01the same amount of thrills,
14:03but you could no longer
14:04get away with
14:05the rear projection
14:06as people are driving.
14:07You had to do it for real.
14:09And it's pushing the envelope.
14:14I mean, he had these crews
14:16pulling the trucks
14:17with the ropes one way,
14:18then the other,
14:19and the truck kept falling over
14:20and stuff on the bridge.
14:22And then, of course,
14:22Francis tried to top it
14:24and sort of did
14:25with the largest
14:26practical explosion,
14:27I think still,
14:28in the history movies
14:29for Apocalypse Now.
14:30But you can't do that anymore.
14:32That is over
14:33because nobody's life
14:34should be lost
14:35making a film.
14:35And a lot of this
14:37ended, of course,
14:38with the disaster
14:39of the Twilight Zone
14:40where Rick Morrow
14:41was killed
14:41and the children
14:43were killed.
14:44So I think now
14:47also we can get away
14:47with more with CG
14:48and stuff,
14:49which was not the advantage
14:50they had back then.
14:51I myself have been
15:01in the jungle
15:02to make a film
15:02and it was an extremely
15:05difficult experience.
15:07The jungle doesn't
15:08want you there
15:09and it is as punishing
15:12physically as it gets.
15:14He fired his first
15:16cinematographer,
15:17a man named Dick Bush,
15:18who was a very famous
15:19cinematographer.
15:20Dick Bush had huge
15:21trouble lighting the jungle.
15:23Something that Billy
15:24warned me about actually
15:25when I went off to do
15:27the film that I did
15:28in the jungle.
15:29And he said,
15:30it's the toughest thing
15:31that anybody is going
15:33to do is light the jungle.
15:36I said, well,
15:36why is that?
15:37He said,
15:37you lose the light
15:38at 2.30,
15:40they can't balance anything,
15:42you can't put a plug
15:43of light in,
15:45it's the ultimate challenge
15:46for the cinematographer.
15:48And he's right.
15:50You have so little control
15:52over what the film
15:53is going to look like
15:54that finally Billy
15:55got a guy named
15:56John Stevens
15:57to come help him
15:58who was very much
15:59a documentary cinematographer
16:01because that was
16:02the only person
16:02he could find
16:03that would accept
16:05the lack of finesse
16:07in the lighting.
16:08There's an incredible
16:09amount of detail
16:10in his memoir
16:11about the things
16:12that Stevens did
16:13and the trouble
16:13that they had
16:14that you don't often find
16:15that this movie
16:16is a real technical,
16:18physical production
16:19and we maybe
16:20understand that about it
16:21more than in other movies
16:22where we have
16:23suspension of disbelief
16:24where we just say,
16:25oh yeah,
16:25they use special effects.
16:26But somehow,
16:27you feel everything
16:28physically in this movie.
16:33The trucks on the bridge
16:35sequence,
16:36you know,
16:36that's like one
16:37of the greatest pieces
16:38of thriller
16:39or action directing
16:40in the history of movies.
16:43I also love
16:44blowing up the tree.
16:45I think that's done
16:47with wonderful finesse
16:48and detail.
16:49And also,
16:50that's the thing, right?
16:50Friedkin's attention
16:51to detail,
16:53which is so intriguing
16:54and so enticing.
16:56And movies do process
16:57very well.
16:58So when you see them,
16:59you know,
16:59whittling the tree branch
17:00and you're bringing
17:01the nitroglycerin
17:02onto the tree
17:03and poking it,
17:05this elaborate thing
17:06that Amidu rigs
17:08to blow up the tree,
17:09we cannot help
17:10but be fascinated
17:11by the process of it.
17:16And then,
17:16of course,
17:17the bridge sequence
17:18is astounding physically,
17:20but it is also
17:20so memorable looking.
17:23That sort of
17:23lowered blue color,
17:26the scumbled blues,
17:27the pouring rain,
17:29the striving,
17:30you know,
17:30Amidu,
17:31stop, stop,
17:32yelling,
17:33and the rain coming down
17:34and him falling
17:35into the river
17:36and all this tactile stuff
17:38that is impossible
17:40to do today.
17:41It really is.
17:42Stop!
17:42Stop!
17:44One thing that's really striking
17:45looking at the Clouseau film
17:47is that the truck
17:48is a truck.
17:49In Sorcerer,
17:50the truck is a monster.
17:52It's an animal.
17:52It's a crazy thing
17:53that he has constructed to.
17:55John Box was
17:55the production designer.
17:56He was a legendary
17:57production designer,
17:58worked with some
17:59of the greatest films.
18:00And he designed
18:01those trucks,
18:02you know,
18:03the grill of the truck
18:04almost looking like
18:05a mouth
18:05and the eyes
18:06of the headlights
18:07and the sound design,
18:09which, of course,
18:10Billy was notorious
18:11for being obsessed
18:12with the mix.
18:20And certainly,
18:21that reached
18:22its full flower
18:23with The Exorcist
18:24and the introduction
18:25of Dolby,
18:26that all of this technology
18:29and the betterment
18:30of sound,
18:32Friedman's at the forefront
18:33of that,
18:33and you hear
18:34the most amazing things
18:35on the track
18:36of Sorcerer.
18:40The guttural cries
18:42of animals
18:43are all over the track.
18:45There's a moment
18:46where Roy Scheider
18:47hits one of the guerrillas
18:50with a shovel
18:50and kills him.
18:54And on the track,
18:56you're hearing
18:58slaughtered pigs,
18:59you're hearing
19:00a slowed-down moan
19:02of an animal,
19:03a person,
19:03I'm not sure.
19:06There's this uncomfortable,
19:09animal,
19:10primal idea
19:12that runs through
19:13the whole track
19:14of Sorcerer
19:14that lends part
19:16of an unconscious level
19:18part of the film's power.
19:19It's half the experience sound.
19:20Hopefully you can help me
19:26understand the audience reaction.
19:28Even though you didn't
19:29see the film at the time,
19:30it's often cited
19:31that this film opened
19:32two, three weeks
19:33after Star Wars,
19:34that eventually
19:35Star Wars bumped it out
19:36of many of the theaters
19:37after it was released.
19:39And there was this desire
19:40to have a kind of
19:41escapist,
19:42post-new Hollywood fantasy.
19:44Is that...
19:44Do you see it as that
19:46kind of linear
19:47and binary as that?
19:48I kind of do
19:50because if you look at...
19:52One thing I will say,
19:53I didn't see the film
19:54the year it was released,
19:55but I remember
19:56its release very well
19:57and I remember
19:58the response to the release
19:59because even by that time,
20:00I mean,
20:01I was very young,
20:01but I was following
20:02the movies pretty closely.
20:05And I remember
20:06the reviews of Star Wars,
20:08which were basically
20:09finally a good time
20:10at the movies again.
20:12Not that I think
20:13Star Wars is bad,
20:14but there's no question
20:16but that the style
20:17is a very different thing.
20:18It's almost like a...
20:20Like the kind of
20:20Flash, Gordon,
20:21Buck Rogers serials.
20:23Whereas Sorcerer was
20:25one of the last
20:26of what they call
20:27the new Hollywood.
20:28And I think there was
20:29a desire to say
20:32enough of the negativity
20:33and to start promoting
20:35the globalized aspect
20:37of the movies.
20:38And I think that those movies
20:40played better globally
20:42than the new Hollywood pictures.
20:44The new Hollywood pictures
20:45didn't cost very much,
20:46generally didn't lose very much.
20:48Then all of a sudden
20:49you started getting Sorcerer,
20:50you started getting Apocalypse Now,
20:51movies that cost a lot,
20:53so the risk went up exponentially.
20:55And I think when people
20:57saw Sorcerer,
20:58I mean,
20:58it's not that most critics
21:00would articulate it this way,
21:02but I think they saw
21:04the...
21:05the left-wing thing
21:09that we're talking about
21:10and were angry.
21:13They were angry
21:14because there isn't a way
21:16to distance yourself
21:18from being part of the system
21:21in that film.
21:23This is a tall order
21:24for people to ask,
21:26to accept.
21:27And so I think Sorcerer
21:29was a feel-bad day
21:30at the movies,
21:30and I think the critics
21:31responded also.
21:33But one other thing,
21:35Sorcerer is a weird movie.
21:38I mean, in the best way,
21:40but it is weird.
21:41And the structure of it is weird,
21:43and you're following
21:43four different people
21:44at the beginning
21:45in different places.
21:46You gonna tell me
21:47where I'm going?
21:48I swear to Christ,
21:49I don't know.
21:50That is a very strange way
21:52to start a movie.
21:53And when you are introducing
21:55a unique or different
21:56kind of picture to people,
21:58the reaction is generally
22:00to say it is no good.
22:02That is the knee-jerk reaction.
22:04It's not to say,
22:04oh, this is an interesting movie.
22:06You should see it.
22:06It's usually to say,
22:07what was he doing here?
22:08He screwed it up.
22:09So I think there was
22:11that element, too,
22:12just the fact
22:13that it was different.
22:14But if you look at it now
22:15with any kind of distance,
22:17it's such a remarkable thing
22:19to put a picture like that
22:20into the mainstream.
22:22That is an incredible,
22:23incredible achievement.
22:30You mentioned you saw it
22:32in 1985.
22:33Yeah.
22:33By that point,
22:35Friedkin is in sort of a rebirth.
22:38He's to live and die in L.A.
22:39is probably right around that time.
22:41That's right.
22:42November of 85, I think.
22:44But still,
22:45he never quite got back
22:46to that place
22:47where he was with Sorcerer
22:48as a filmmaker
22:48despite making many
22:49great movies after that.
22:50Yeah.
22:51And yet this movie
22:52has had such a parabola
22:54of a life
22:55and it's sort of
22:56a reverse parabola now
22:58where it's commonly accepted
23:00as one of the great films
23:01of the 1970s,
23:02maybe one of the greatest
23:03American productions
23:03of all time.
23:04Yeah.
23:05And this doesn't really
23:06happen very often.
23:08What happened?
23:08Why did this movie come back
23:10the way that it did?
23:11Well, I must tell you,
23:12I beg slightly to differ
23:13with you on that,
23:15which is that most pictures
23:17that are considered great
23:20are not released
23:22to huge fanfare
23:23or great reviews.
23:24That's very uncommon.
23:26The Godfather
23:27is, of course,
23:27an exception.
23:29But if you were to look
23:30at Citizen Kane,
23:30which was a financial flop,
23:32and Vertigo
23:33was not considered
23:35a great picture at all,
23:37Hitch misses it this time
23:39and it was a bomb,
23:40you know,
23:40It's a Wonderful Life
23:41pretty much destroyed
23:42Frank Capra's career,
23:43actually.
23:44So, Wizard of Oz,
23:46I could go on and on.
23:47I mean, it's actually
23:48more common than not
23:49that a film considered great
23:52now was not considered
23:54great then.
23:56and, in fact,
23:57many pictures that were
23:58great upon release
23:59have withered,
24:01you know,
24:02on the vine.
24:02So, you know,
24:04the sorcerer trajectory
24:06is not unusual
24:07and I think it has to do
24:09with the fact that
24:10filmmakers find it impressive
24:13on a technical level,
24:14but it's also structurally
24:16interesting and odd.
24:18It has surreal elements.
24:21Towards the end of the picture,
24:22particularly,
24:23it gets quite surreal.
24:24And, of course,
24:33it's also intriguing
24:34for what it says
24:35about the dominant
24:37imperialist power
24:38to the north
24:39of this place
24:40called Porvenir
24:41and what damage
24:42it's done
24:43to this country
24:44and its people.
24:46And that is an
24:47unsavory idea
24:48for some,
24:49but that tends
24:50to wear very well
24:51over time
24:52because there's
24:53a kind of
24:53ugly truth about it,
24:55I think,
24:56that gets revealed
24:56to us in the world.
24:58Maybe part of what
24:58I'm reflecting on
24:59when I say that
25:00is that it seemed
25:01like Friedkin,
25:02at least publicly,
25:03had been sort of
25:04beaten into submission
25:05on the failure
25:06of the movie
25:07and there was a period
25:07of time where
25:08he talked about it
25:09in relatively negative terms.
25:11Said it was a failure,
25:12I made mistakes.
25:13Yeah.
25:13And then that stopped.
25:15Rough ten years ago
25:16or so,
25:17he started to embrace it
25:18the way that other
25:19cinephiles were embracing it
25:21and then said,
25:22this is the film
25:22I'm most proud of.
25:23You're absolutely
25:24right about that.
25:26I think Billy
25:27was ashamed
25:28of its failure
25:29and I think
25:31he was chastened
25:32by that.
25:33And you have to remember
25:35also it wasn't
25:36just Sorcerer.
25:37It was the double whammy
25:38of Sorcerer
25:39and Cruising.
25:40And Cruising
25:41was a big failure.
25:43Publicly,
25:43he was just humiliated,
25:45you know,
25:45this whole idea
25:46that the film
25:47is anti-gay.
25:48And I can only speak
25:51about my own
25:51personal interactions
25:52with Billy
25:53about Sorcerer
25:54where I was very,
25:56you know,
25:56I told him
25:57what I thought
25:57of the film
25:58and what everybody
25:58I knew thought
25:59and how much
26:01we loved it.
26:02And he was always
26:03very gracious
26:04about it
26:04and very accepting
26:06and, you know,
26:07I think it was just
26:08the public face.
26:09I think he was having,
26:10he felt the need
26:10to explain himself
26:12to get back
26:13in the game
26:13a little bit.
26:14But you're right,
26:15it changed him
26:16and it also changed
26:18the movies.
26:19The fact that the film
26:20is so embraced now
26:22that it plays
26:23repertory theatres
26:24all the time now,
26:25what do you think
26:26that says
26:27about the current
26:28film-going climate
26:29or the desire
26:30for what film lovers
26:31want to see?
26:32It's always hard
26:33to predict the audience.
26:35I don't think
26:36there is the audience.
26:37I think there are
26:38several different
26:38kinds of audiences.
26:42It's true,
26:43the film has,
26:45it now plays
26:46repertory,
26:46sells out,
26:47all that sort of thing.
26:48It has a success
26:49in that way.
26:51I think always
26:52when you have
26:53one side
26:54of the equation
26:55that's being,
26:56that's overwhelming
26:57everything else,
26:58in this case,
26:59there is such
26:59a kind of
27:02commodification,
27:03globalized
27:05banality
27:06that has affected
27:07the movies
27:08overwhelmingly
27:08on a mainstream
27:09level.
27:13That I think
27:14it invariably
27:14will create
27:15a desire
27:16to see something
27:17interesting,
27:19subversive,
27:20dark,
27:21strange,
27:22and something
27:23that really shakes you.
27:25And I think
27:26that's part
27:27of what the audience
27:28that goes to
27:29Sea Sorcerer
27:29is looking for
27:30and finds
27:31because I think
27:33that, you know,
27:33the world
27:33is a very harsh
27:35and beautiful place.
27:39And I think
27:40the soul
27:41needs art
27:42that reflects
27:43that contradiction
27:44and that complexity.
27:46And I think
27:46that's why
27:47people see it now.
27:48I think that's
27:49the reason
27:49it's out there
27:50and still
27:51we talk about it.
27:51is there
27:52some
27:54are
27:56?
27:57I think
27:58are
27:59you
27:59all
28:00there
28:01are
28:01Transcription by CastingWords
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