Filmmaker describes job as a royal performance
For Thai filmmaker Chatri Chalerm Yukol, writing and directing “The Legend of Suriyothai” could be described as a royal performance. After deciding young people didn’t know enough about their country’s origins, Queen Sirikit of Thailand decided to fund a motion picture that would provide a history lesson about events during the tumultuous 16th century. She approached Yukol, a prince in the royal family, to use the filmmaking skills he developed with motion pictures such as “Out of the Dark” and “Doctor Karn” to create the cinematic work.
“At the time we started, I didn’t think of it as a huge film,” the 60-year-old director said at his hotel during a Philadelphia publicity stop for “The Legend of Suriyothai,” which opens July 25. “Then one day, I flew to the set by helicopter, saw all of these extras and (160) elephants and thought to myself, ‘What did I agree to do?’
“It was particularly difficult working with the elephants, because they have minds of their own. From 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., they won’t work, because it’s too hot. They just want to go into the water and get cool.”
The queen gave Yukol five years to create the film. Three years were devoted to planning, while the last 24 months were allotted to shooting, all of which was done on actual historical sites including palaces and royal grounds. More than 3,500 extras were used in battle scenes, which were captured on film by a 400-person crew. (The original four-and-a-half hour version was a hit in Thailand, but Yukol asked for help from his friend, director Francis Ford Coppola, to cut the epic to 142 minutes for American audiences.)
Yukol insisted the film be honest and not whitewash his country’s violent birth, which is vividly captured.
“I didn’t want ‘The Legend of Suriyothai’ to be a glorified history of the royal family of Thailand,” said the prince, who recently completed “The Last Love,” a three-character film about the fallout that occurs from a romantic relationship between an older woman and younger man. “I wanted to capture the real story and show things like the murders and decapitations that happened.
“I discovered that the history of our country has sex, passions, double crosses and battles – all things that make a good film.”
Herzlinger needs your help
Delaware Valley native Brian Herzlinger is dreaming of meeting Drew Barrymore and needs your help.
With a budget of just $1,100 and two filmmaker friends, Herzlinger is completing “My Date With Drew,” a documentary about his efforts to meet the “Charlie’s Angels” star. On his Web site, www.mydatewithdrew.com, Herzlinger, who graduated from Cherokee High School in 1994, shows a preview of his documentary and asks people to sign a guest book.
“I plan to get the guest book to Drew and use it to help get a date with her,” said Herzlinger, who has worked as a production-staff member on shows such as “Chicago Hope” and “Ally McBeal” since moving to Los Angeles after graduating from New York’s Ithaca College. “I’ve liked Drew since I was 10 years old, and I think just about everyone has a dream of meeting someone who seems unattainable.
“This documentary chronicles my attempt to do that.”
A new ending for ‘Days’
British director Danny Boyle (“Trainspotting”) is giving something extra to fans of his summer horror hit, “28 Days Later.”
Beginning July 25, all theatrical prints of “28 Days Later” will contain an alternate ending, one darker than the R-rated picture’s current conclusion. The bleak finish was originally on the film, but preview audiences found it too depressing, causing Boyle and writer Alex Garland (“The Beach”) to close the film with something more hopeful. That original ending will now appear after the end credits for “28 Days Later.”
Sinatra sinks ‘Slovik’
To become a respected director, Frank Sinatra knew he would have to tackle an artistically challenging project.
The singer-turned-actor, who later directed the uneven World War II drama “None But the Brave” (1965), believed he found suitable material with a politically liberal tale about an ill-fated American soldier. In “Mr. S: My Life with Frank Sinatra” (Harper Collins; $24.95), George Jacobs, who was the singing superstar’s personal assistant for a number of years, reveals that the Chairman of the Board dropped the project due to protests from one of the few people he feared. “Old Joe (a reference to John F. Kennedy’s father, political powerbroker Joseph Kennedy) made Mr. S feel low on two occasions. The first was when he was trying to put a movie together based on the book ‘The Execution of Private Slovik,’ about a soldier who was executed by the U.S. Army for desertion,” Jacobs writes. “Mr. S was planning to direct it, his first effort behind the camera.
“It was a total downer, but, as Mr. S put it, ‘You don’t win Oscars for comedies.’ He really wanted that Oscar…But he made a fatal mistake. In trying to get a great script, he hired an old friend he thought was a great writer, Albert Maltz, who had scripted such films as ‘This Gun for Hire’ and was known as a master of ‘message’ movies.
“Unfortunately, Maltz was better known as one of the Hollywood Ten. Blacklisted in the McCarthy witch-hunts as a ‘red,’ Maltz had fled to Mexico. Mr. S was giving him a chance at a comeback…But not Joe Kennedy. Sinatra’s movie plans hit all the papers, and Joe freaked out over what he read.
“The ambassador (Kennedy) unloaded on the Chairman over the phone, and Mr. S took it…He said, ‘Yes, sir.’ And that was it. This shows that politics were more important to Mr. S at this point than Hollywood. If winning an election meant dropping the film, so be it. JFK was considered left enough, compared to Nixon.’
“Mr. S justified dropping Maltz (he paid him in full) and the project on the grounds of helping Jack, but it killed him to have to eat Joe’s humble pie and give up his own dream.”