"A film is - or should be - more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. The theme, what's behind the emotion, the meaning, all that comes later." These are the words of a photographer, a filmmaker and an artist. On July 26, 1928, the renowned American filmmaker and photographer was born, and has been frequently cited as one of the most influential filmmakers in cinematic history. Born and raised in the Bronx, New York City, he attended William Howard Taft High School from 1941 to 1945. He received average grades, but displayed a keen interest in literature, photography, and film from a young age, and taught himself all aspects of film production and directing after graduating from high school. From the late 1940s to the early 1950s, he worked as a photographer for Look Magazine. Afterwards, he began making short and feature films on shoestring budgets, such as Day of the Fight (1951), Flying Padre (1951), Fear and Desire (1953), The Seafarers (1953) and Killer's Kiss (1955), and made his first major Hollywood film, The Killing (1956). This was followed by Paths of Glory (1957) and Spartacus (1960). In 1961, after creative differences arising from his work with Kirk Douglas and the film studios, a dislike of the Hollywood industry, and a growing concern about crime in America prompted Kubrick to move to the United Kingdom, where he spent most of the remainder of his life and career. His home at Childwickbury Manor in Hertfordshire became his workplace, where he did his writing, research, editing, and management of production details on top of his personal home with his wife Christiane and their three children, Katharina, Anya and Vivian. This allowed him to have almost complete artistic control over his films, but with the rare advantage of having financial support from major Hollywood studios. His latter productions in Britain consisted of Lolita (1962), Dr. Strangelove: Or How I Learn to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), A Clockwork Orange (1971), Barry Lyndon (1975), The Shining (1980), Full Metal Jacket (1987) and Eyes Wide Shut (1999). Though mostly adaptations of novels or short stories, his cinematic body of work cover a wide range of genres, and are noted for their realism, dark humour, unique cinematography, extensive set designs, and evocative use of music. A demanding perfectionist, Kubrick assumed control over most aspects of the filmmaking process, from direction and writing to editing, and took painstaking care with researching his films and staging scenes, working in close coordination with his actors and other collaborators. He often asked for several dozen retakes of the same shot in a movie, which resulted in many conflicts with his casts. Despite the resulting notoriety among actors, many of Kubrick's films broke new ground in cinematography. The scientific realism and innovative special effects of 2001: A Space Odyssey were without precedent in the history of cinema, and the film earned him his only personal Oscar, for Best Visual Effects. The film is regarded as one of the greatest films ever made. For Barry Lyndon, Kubrick obtained lenses developed by Zeiss for NASA, to film scenes under natural candlelight. With The Shining, he became one of the first directors to make use of a Steadicam for stabilized and fluid tracking shots. While many of Kubrick's films were controversial and initially received mixed reviews upon release—particularly A Clockwork Orange, which Kubrick pulled from circulation in the UK following a mass media frenzy—most were nominated for Oscars, Golden Globes, or BAFTA Awards, and underwent critical reevaluations. On March 7, 1999, at the age of seventy and shortly after the completion of his last film Eyes Wide Shut, Kubrick died.
The real reason to watch it is to observe a filmmaker examining one of the most popular and one of the most enigmatic filmmakers of all time, and to see what he's learned in the intervening years between Kubrick and Ciment. Notable French critic and author, Michel Ciment, is in a fine position to have the inside skinnny on the enigmatic director. Monro alternates theory with production specifics to give a fully rounded and fleshed-out account of the singular achievements that is Kubrick's filmography. Not influenced by ego or career, Kubrick is sincere and matter of fact as he gives the definitive oral history of his entire body of work. While some of the stories have been told elsewhere from other people, you get the feeling here that Kubrick's truly an open book and relishing the opportunity to dig into his work between 1975 and 1987. Insightful, thought-provoking, and candid in a matter that's befitting of Kubrick's own enigmatic personality, the film is a must-see for anyone who loves Kubrick. Monro gives us a Kubrick master class on the creative process of film and a set of expertly told stories that thrill and inform. It just doesn't get better than this. Not lacking any presentational flash whatsoever, the film also proves the show-stopping power of a transfixing interview subject. These are not astonishing anecdotes, but they are, by and large, entertaining ones: Kubrick is as deft a storyteller on record as he is behind the camera. Monro believes that the only thing more fascinating than a Stanley Kubrick film is Stanley Kubrick himself and the legendary filmmaker is a great documentary. The legendary filmmaker remains an articulate and forceful presence on record, refreshingly unburdened by modesty and clearly keen to display his highbrow cultural smarts. While hardcore fans of the auteur will be au fait with pretty much all the topics on the discussion here, the film is still a riveting masterclass from a great filmmaker.
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