Apocalypse on the Set: Nine Disastrous Film Productions

by Ben Taylor

Overview

The book starts with Pulgasari--a North Korean Godzilla clone dreamed up by Kim Jong-Il and created by a kidnapped Korean director, with a budget of millions and a staff of seven hundred fed on truckloads of pheasants, wild geese, and deer.
The stories behind the other eight films, from The Adventures of Baron Munchausen and The Twilight Zone: The Movie to Apocalypse Now and The Crow, are just as astounding and gripping--this is a book film fans will devour.
These bizarre, often hilarious cinematic endeavors confirm that truth is stranger than fiction, reality more volatile than narratives, and fate more improbable than plots.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781590201886
Publisher:	Overlook Press, The
Publication date:	02/02/2012
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.10(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Ben Taylor is a contributing writer for DamnInteresting.com, a weekly online publication with 400,000 visitors a month, and contributed to their volume, Alien Hand Syndrome. He lives outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Table of Contents

Introduction 11

1 The Last Shot of the Night 17

Twilight Zone: The Movie

2 Hollywood Be Thy Name 43

Heaven's Gate

3 King of the Moon 69

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen

4 "The Idiodyssey" 97

Apocalypse Now

5 Adventure Is Over 121

Fitzcarraldo

6 It's Good to Be Kim 147

Pulgasari

7 Black and Blue 173

The Crow

8 Welcome to My Nightmare 197

The Abyss

9 Rough Waters 219

Waterworld

Conclusion 243

Notes 246

Acknowledgments 264

Index 265

Editorial Reviews

Selecting nine films plagued with problems, Taylor has wisely detoured away from tabloid exposé journalism to deliver informative in-depth essays on movies wildly out of control, noting, “The stories of the characters within the film were often secondary to the rumors of disaster and misfortune that enticed many to see these pictures.” Situations can explode due to conflicting personalities or personal dynamics between cast, crew and studio. Dangers are heightened by extreme risks, as in Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo: “The studio wanted it to be a plastic miniature boat pulled over a garden hill, but I said we will pull a real ship over a real mountain.” Twilight Zone: The Movie became a major news story in 1982 when the helicopter crash during a night scene resulted in three deaths. An outstanding chapter on the 166 days shooting Waterworld reviews production woes, escalating costs (a reported million) and the creative differences of director Kevin Reynolds and producer-star Kevin Costner. Pouring through books, published interviews, production footage, memoirs, newspaper stories, documentary films and magazine articles, Taylor shows how hopeful pre-production plans can easily erupt into confusing cinematic chaos and logistical nightmares. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

"Taylor details the excruciating, mind-boggling and downright insane conditions in which [these] films, both popular and obscure, were made . . . Pick this bad boy up when it hits shelves." — Cinebyte.com

"Taylor provides a thoroughly entertaining look at the trials and tribulations that plagued the film of nine now infamous motion pictures. A must read for film buffs or anyone curious about the many ways a film can go awry." — Booklist

From the Publisher

"Taylor details the excruciating, mind-boggling and downright insane conditions in which [these] films, both popular and obscure, were made . . . Pick this bad boy up when it hits shelves."

Cinebyte.com

Hollywood dreams are turned inside out in this tragic collection of some of the most disastrous film productions in cinematic history. The casualty list of the dead and broken is horrifying, and some of the true-life tales are staggering in their sheer level of insanity. Included in Taylor's rogues' gallery of misbegotten movies are big-budget Hollywood entries like The Crow, Waterworld and The Abyss, but lesser-known forays into the dark side of film production--e.g., the mind-boggling North Korean monster flick Pulgasari and the unbelievable Werner Herzog–directed Fitzcarraldo--are no less astounding. The author doesn't offer new revelations about how or why any of these failed projects were allowed to wander so far astray, but his cold, flat approach still packs a wallop. If nothing else, a few inchoate film students might be discouraged from yelling "action" before they're ready. The sweeping allusions made at the head of each chapter to such disparate figures as disgraced journalist Stephen Glass and Romanian despot Nicolae Ceausescu are something of a stretch. However, they do provide at least some perspective on the collected calamities and lend an appropriate amount of gravitas to the epic nature of the cinematic failures that follow. Believe it or not, knowing something about the housing-market collapse really does make the decision to greenlight a seasick saga about a post-apocalyptic Planet Earth a little easier to grasp. Ultimately, picking through this much celluloid wreckage is a sorry business, especially for those who view movies as a refuge from the cruelties and injustices of the world. Far from groundbreaking, but undeniably fascinating and sadly enjoyable.

Kirkus Reviews