The Stunt Man (1979)
Anchor Bay DVD (region 1)
d. Richard Rush; pr. Richard Rush; scr. Lawrence Marcus, Richard Rush; novel. Paul Brodeur; ph. Mario Tosi; m. Dominic Frontiere; ed. Caroline Biggerstaff, Jack Hofstra; cast. Peter O'Toole, Steve Railsback, Barbara Hershey, Allen Garfield, Alex Rocco, Chuck Bail, Sharon Farrell, Adam Roarke (131 mins)
Few directors have been as closely associated with a single film as is the case of Richard Rush and The Stunt Man.
Taking years to get made and a prolonged effort for it to see even a limited theatrical release, this film is nevertheless one of the finest accomplishments in American cinema, almost unmatched in its audacity. Although it remains primarily something of a cult film, Rush has devoted much of his subsequent career to getting it seen, almost to the point of obsessive preoccupation. It thus took him some fifteen years to direct another film but that movie, the dazzling and unfairly dismissed Color of Night, was inevitably held up against his undoubted masterwork, which all discussion of Rush (the little that there is) inevitably circles back to. The circumstances surrounding the making of The Stunt Man have been incorporated into the film’s lore. Rush had a feeling for social comment and longed to make this film but was discouraged wherever he went, in the meantime making the hilarious Freebie and the Bean, until by the time he got to make it, much of its timeliness had slipped by. Rush merely incorporated this into the script. Studio hostility almost sank this quirky film however. Even in the face of some of the best reviews ever from all critics to have seen the film as Rush went from place to place with it, the studio would not properly distribute it. When it finally did emerge, and proved a popular video release, it was hailed as the last great masterpiece of the 1970s and Rush seemed on the verge of breaking out of his relative critical obscurity. The Stunt Man survives as brilliantly as ever.
A man (Steve Railsback) is on the run from the law. He evades capture and flees down a road. Along a bridge, he hopes for a ride, but when the situation turns alarmingly strange and he sees himself being observed by a helicopter after a possible accident, he flees again.
He wonders into a beachside spot, where a large crowd has gathered to watch a film crew shoot a World War One movie. The director (Peter O’Toole) steps out of the helicopter with the announcement, to a select few crewmembers only, that the leading stunt man has vanished, apparently killed in a car stunt. O’Toole may recognize Railsback. However, when the police (led by Alex Rocco) come to investigate, O’Toole convinces them that Railsback is the missing stunt man. Now Railsback becomes part of the crew and is trained (by stunt co-coordinator Chuck Bail) as a stunt man, whilst O’Toole continues filming his grand anti-war statement. Soon Railsback has interested the leading lady (Barbara Hershey) and begins to develop a playful rivalry with O’Toole as he becomes part of the crew. He has one worry though – the police wish to see the film taken of the incident on the bridge, in the hope of spotting their fugitive. Railsback fears the deception will be revealed but O’Toole insists he trust him. Soon, he becomes jealous of Hershey’s previous relationship with O’Toole and becomes increasingly paranoid when O’Toole wants him to do the stunt that had resulted in the lead stunt man’s demise. Now, Railsback fears that O’Toole wants to kill him and get it on film. Still, he hopes that he can interest Hershey in running away from the production. O’Toole has other plans however.
The lines between illusion and reality are repeatedly toyed with, as is the case in any film about the processes of filmmaking itself, but it is the evolving rivalry and sense of mind-game between O’Toole and Railsback that propels the film deliberately into paranoid uncertainty.
This sense, of establishing a given scene and then introducing an element that re-defines it and pushes it into an unexpected direction, makes for a study of the psychological relativism of individual perception (a theme director Rush would try again in Color of Night). True to the film’s promotional blurbs, it is a world in which nothing is what it seems, but more than that, the film thus explores how the mind reacts when confronted with this disturbing “truth”. The interplay of manipulation and deception and the constantly evolving narrative thus make for a tremendous sense of gamesmanship with film form. Its almost narcotic sense of rhythm also speaks to the theme of the individual quirkiness of perception, yet in that the audience is constantly allied to Railsback, discovering this world and its people as he does, paranoia becomes the defining feeling, the inevitable end; and its growth is what Rush considers the most insidious aspect of the human condition. Yet it is the basis of the film’s fascination, its main means of suggesting the psychologically transforming nature of this perceptual uncertainty as inherent in film as an art form. This admitted self-reflexivity is forever playful in a slyly humorous manner throughout the film, making The Stunt Man truly one of the great films about film (and filmmaking).
In the interplay of reality and make-believe is there an inherently paranoid yet passionate madness which can manipulate perception. In this world, the director is God-like.
Part of the film’s cleverness is the gradual way in which O’Toole becomes, in Railsback’s mind, the personification of a malevolent fate. Rush makes the viewer share in this increasingly uneasy distrust of appearances, so that O’Toole becomes almost Mephistophelian, the expert trickster and manipulator willing to do anything to realize his vision. Railsback, though guilty of a crime (the details of which are withheld for a long time) is almost an innocent in this world, increasingly adrift in a wonderland overwhelmed by fate. Although Rush forever questions the validity of what is seen and of what is thought to be perceived as going on, so too he never distances the viewer from the characters, instead creating a cinematic immersion in the processes of paranoia as they relate to the perception of a train of events. To both stress the notion of cinematic illusion and sweep the viewer into such a paranoid state, where uncertainty is the breeding ground for suspicion, distrust, deception and even possible delusion, is a bold intention and one which Rush handles expertly. For those with an understanding of film form and an interest in how it relates to the psychology of perception, The Stunt Man is an extraordinary achievement, fully deserving of its increasing reputation and as many people have found, a film which rewards repeat viewings.
DVD DETAILS:
Vision
The visual transfer on this DVD was overseen by director Rush himself as part of his ongoing effort to keep the film alive in popular film culture. It was remastered from the original negative and thus one suspects is as fine as it can get short of an expensive complete restoration. Despite some clarity issues, Rush’s dazzling cinematic virtuosity is preserved intact. Particularly remarkable is what is an almost narcotic sense of ebb and flow, of peaks of intensity slowly dissipating until rising again, that is very much the hallmark of Rush’s directorship. Just as the audience is comfortable within a scene, Rush introduces new sights or angles which expand and redefine the nature of the scene. As the plot evolves, this sense of uncertainty slowly becomes allied with paranoia and the thematic purpose of this remarkable style becomes finally evident. Camera movement is often sly, as when O’Toole and Railsback first meet and circle each other, and tricks are continuously played with the notion of point-of-view (an aspect of the film’s gamesmanship which is established at the outset of the movie). Indeed, much of the film is about people looking, with Railsback forced to wonder just what meaning there is in what he sees and thus thinks he perceives. The use of frames within frames is also wryly amusing (as when Hershey is framed in profile through the hotel door window as if through a looking glass – another reference to “wonderland”) and the idea of natural vs. artificial (film) lighting also becomes a dominant self-reflexive motif in a film that causes one to doubt everything that is seen or perceived to be going on. The film-within-the-film scenes are intriguingly integrated into the narrative. As Railsback’s paranoia increases, some of the visuals seem subtly sharper, less diffuse or open.
Sound
The soundtrack, originally released apparently in mono, has been fully re-invigorated and re-mixed for home theatre. This process was again overseen by Rush. Thus the transfer is available as originally intended or in Dolby digital 5.1 or even DTS. In the film’s sound mix, the amusing score by Dominic Frontiere plays an enormous role, often enhancing the afore-mentioned narcotic sensation of movement in and out of scenes that is almost unique to The Stunt Man: the result makes for a hypnotic immersion in the film. The score both repeats and builds until the almost ecstatic burst of score at the film’s end – the perfect summation and an emotional release. Sounds are often withheld (as in the bridge scene), just as visual details often are, increasing the sense of uncertainty and revelation in a very fluid mix. Source sounds are always crisp and authentic and the lone song, used repeatedly, functions as a thematic comment on the situation as it unfolds. The remix often nicely locates sounds and voices in space, adding depth to the scenes when needed: it is never merely flat. There are nice silences with just voices, as these people repeatedly seek a bond possible only through human communication: indeed, the guarded need to connect with another also seems to impel Railsback’s nervous delivery (he seems forever tense). Sounds and score carry over from “reality” to the film-within-a-film, further enhancing the playful sense of illusionism which runs through the movie. Overlapping sound and voices are used cleverly, particularly in the closing scenes. Although not designed for a home theatre experience, this transfer is an admirable treatment of the movie.
Special Features
There are numerous special features on the Limited Edition DVD of this marvelous oddment of a film experience. There are three trailers and a teaser, still galleries from the film itself and from behind-the-scenes activities as well as a look at the evolution of the distinctive advertising and poster art. For viewers with a DVD-Rom capability, the original script (with director’s notes) is available for perusal on PC. Also included are two deleted scenes (which are rather amusing although perhaps were wisely deleted). The commentary track is by director Rush, and features edited-in contributions by Peter O’Toole, Steve Railsback, Barbara Hershey, Alex Rocco, Chuck Bail and Sharon Farrell. In it, Rush describes his visual approach in some detail as well as the notion of fatalism as it is carried in the film. He also talks in depth of the notion of “subjective reality” as a governing stylistic principle and of his intention to convey a mounting paranoid uncertainty through the film by approaching it as a kind of puzzle for the audience to assemble. He considers the idea that nothing is what it seems to be the essence of the film. There is talk of how the actors approached their roles with several anecdotes of the process of making the film (as well as with reference to the deleted scenes) and Rush reveals the one subliminal shot he decided to cut into the movie. Rush discusses his preference for films of some socio-political comment and about how this had changed between the time of the film’s conception and its eventual making (and how he adjusted). He feels that at the time of post-Watergate and Vietnam disillusionment, the time was right for a major film about truth and illusion. He talks also of his preference for individual angles rather than master shots, his dislike of storyboards, the use of multiple cameras and on how he deliberately sought to change the established visual syntax of Hollywood moviemaking.
On the second disc of this two-disc Limited Edition is a feature-length video documentary written and directed by Rush. Entitled The Sinister Saga of the Making of “The Stunt Man” it is a quirkily directed documentary, always calling attention to itself, in which Rush discusses his involvement in the film and the long battle to see it released in the face of a seemingly malevolent studio intent to crush it. He again further discusses the theme of illusion vs. reality and includes a dramatic scene he once considered integral to the movie but later cut out (and is not part of the deleted scenes included on disc one). He talks again of “subjective reality” (which the documentary itself plays with), on the reasons why the project was turned down as often as it was and of the lengthy re-write process and the changes so necessitated to keep it relevant. It is clear that Rush was intent on conveying the theme of the inter-relationship between paranoia and perception (having once been involved with an early attempt to mount a screen version of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest) and of the symbiotic interplay of manipulation and deception as contributing to such paranoia. He also discusses one key aspect of his visual style in great detail – his use of “rack focus” and his coining of the term and technique which has since become an accepted means. Much of the last third of the film concerns Rush revealing the distribution nightmare he went through in order to have the film seen at all. Included are extracts from the reviews that greeted the film’s original release. The Sinister Saga… is more of a personal statement than a traditional documentary however, evidence of its maker’s continued obsession with his one masterpiece and a nice perspective on Rush as an individual. Both the film of The Stunt Man and the documentary are available for individual purchase – they are together only in the Limited Edition Box Set.
