To
many filmgoers, the name Walter Murch means nothing. Despite having
won multiple Academy Awards and having been nominated several times,
Murch is not a household name. Nor is he a relic: He was nominated
for his work on last year’s Cold Mountain.
Murch remains relatively unknown because of the quality of his work.
Editing and designing sound for legendary films such as The
Godfather Part II and Part III, Apocalypse Now, The
English Patient, American Graffiti and The Conversation
has required him to stay in the background. Think about it—if
a filmgoer is jolted out the viewing experience by editing that
calls attention to itself, then the editor has failed. The job of
the editor or sound mixer is to contribute to a single cinematic
moment. While some of his fellow late-’60s graduates of the
California film school era—Lucas, Coppola or Spielberg—now
are known by last name only, Walter Murch has happily stayed in
the shadow and quietly perfected his art. His book In the Blink
of an Eye (Silman-James Press, first published in 1995) explains
his views on the aesthetics and issues of movie-making and is required
reading for many film students.
His first major project, THX 1138, is being released in
a new director’s cut version on DVD and on the big screen
in 20 theaters across America this month, including the State Theater
in Ann Arbor. Because the film was unavailable for over thirty years,
this new version, with special effects and increased size and scope,
will be many viewers’ first experience with THX 1138.
The film began as 10-minute student project written by Murch and
film maker Matthew Robbins and directed by some young guy who was
the star of University of Southern California’s graduating
class named George Lucas. After forging an alliance with a fellow
named Francis Ford Coppola and forming an underground film studio
named American Zoetrope, the students made a feature-length version
of the short. Warner Bros., betting on the promising talent of the
recent grads, agreed to finance and distribute the film. The future
for THX 1138 looked bright. But not one person at the studio
knew anything about the film, and after executives saw the cold,
sterile, depressing science-fiction world of THX, the studio
demanded its money back and doomed the visionary movie to limited
release as a double-feature B movie.
Murch’s talent as both a sound designer and editor radiates
in the film. When the character of THX (played by Robert Duvall)
is tortured by chrome-faced policemen, every painful zap of their
electric sticks bolts through the ears and minds of the audience.
As THX suffers through a mental breakdown at his high-stress job,
the screen rapidly cuts back and forth from our hero and those keeping
a close eye on his downfall, placing us directly into his flash
of madness. Murch’s expert work draws us into an incomparable
science fiction world. Soft-spoken, insanely intelligent and constantly
witty, Murch was as much as a pleasure to speak with as his films
are to watch.
Ann
Arbor Paper: How did your passion for film develop?
Walter Murch: Well, I was fifteen and I’d
gone to the typical number of films that a boy growing up in New
York would have gone to. Then I saw a film called The Seventh Seal
by Bergman. I remember coming out of the theater just being dumbstruck
by the idea that someone had actually made this film. That was something
I had never thought of before. I suddenly realized that is was actually
people making these films. That idea kind of percolated around in
my head for a while then I realized that was the direction I wanted
to go towards. I knew that was what I wanted to do.
A2P: Do you feel that film school is still essential
for today’s young filmmakers?
WM: Yeah, I think it is. In general for most people
who are interested in this, it’s the best way to go. You learn
about all the different areas. You have to write, direct, edit,
record sound. Most importantly, you are forced to find where your
interests lie. Maybe you’ll find that film school isn’t
for you and you want to do something else. At least you’ll
be able to find that out.
A2P: Well, I went to art school and here I am interviewing
you. . .
WM: Exactly.
A2P: What was the genesis of THX 1138?
WM: It started as the student film. We were just
trying to figure out how to make something interesting out of nothing.
We had no money, and because of the rules, had to shoot it within
a half a mile of the film school. So we looked around at what was
there and came up with this idea for a sterile kind of science fiction
atmosphere and to have this guy trying to escape it. The joke was
when he emerged into the outside, there was nothing there. Some
kind of nuclear explosion has destroyed everything so everyone has
retreated underground. Basically, it was an opportunity to shoot
people running around. In 1969, when George [Lucas] and I started
to work on the feature-length version of the film, we wrote a back
story of the whole thing. Who is this person and why is he trying
to escape?
A2P: The reaction of critics, audiences and the
studio was far from being warm. Did this come as a surprise?
WM: In retrospect, sure it was a surprise. The
funny thing about it is they approved the script and we filmed that
same script. It’s like if you go into a restaurant knowing
what a hamburger is and order a hamburger. Then when the hamburger
is brought out in front of you, saying that this thing is not a
hamburger. We knew what we were making was strange but we thought
it would find an audience out there. We were just as surprised as
they were that they didn’t like it.
A2P: The sound work in THX 1138 is so
important, it could almost be called one of the characters in the
film. What were some of the ideas behind the creation of some of
these sounds?
WM: We were making a film about an imagined future,
so with not having much money, we thought we could create this future
through sound. The problem with every science fiction film up until
then was that everything was always new. This is where George really
came up with his concept of a used future. In terms of the production
design, everything was done with used and abused props and locations.
So we decided not to use any kind of electronic-based sounds. Everything
we used was a distorted or manipulated organic sound of some kind.
A2P: Lucas states that the film is how he saw the
world at the time of its release in 1971. How do you think the film
will translate for those watching it for the first time in 2004?
Do you think the film has aged well?
WM: I think it has. A good example of this is that
this is the first film ever to put lots of TV monitors in every
shot. Almost every scene is filled with some flashing static screens
in them. Now every single newscaster is surrounded by blinking television
sets. In 1970, nobody had seen anything like that before. The hologram
televisions used by the characters in the film have a violence channel,
a sex channel, a news channel. Now that’s the way it is. People
will find that more familiar today than they did in 1970.
A2P: One thing I took away is how all the characters are
dependent on pills to keep their lives normal. That didn’t
exist then at the level it does today.
WM: Yeah, everybody’s on Prozac these days.
In THX, it’s a society where everyone takes these
pills so they can work these lifeless office jobs. What happens
is two people decide to stop taking these pills and we find out
what happens. And that’s scary. People seeing the film today
will either think, “Well, so what?” or think that we
were very observant guys back then.
A2P: Have you seen the new version of the film?
WM: Yes, I have.
A2P: What do you think of some of the special effects added
and changes that have been made?
WM: When we shot the film, there was no money at
all. There was no money to shoot any kind of wide shot and show
any kind of size. We were not able to pay people for the amount
of extras we needed for a couple scenes. When George went back to
the film a couple years ago, he was able to do some of the things
we always meant to do and were not able to afford. I think it’s
great he was able to do that.
A2P:
In your book, In the Blink of an Eye, you talk
about a far-away future in which films can be made on a computer
by a single person featuring only digital actors. That future seems
closer than ever. How do you feel about this?
WM: I have mixed feelings. Digital technology is
a mixed blessing. I look at the technology as enabling things to
move in contrary directions. The whole thing is about looking more
and more realistic. Pixar, for example, has control over everything
in the frame. It’s all pixels. They can change whatever they
want at any time. George is doing the same thing with his Star
Wars films. That truly is the child of digital technology and
film. On the other hand, you have these “film in a day”
adventures. Films shot in digital video at 8 a.m., edited at 3 p.m.
and screened at 8 p.m. That’s something that’s completely
at the whim of whatever happens. At one hand is more control on
film and at the other there is little control and both have great
appeal.
A2P:
Film is just as important of an art form as painting and
classical music were a hundred years ago. Yet neither of those have
the same cultural impact they used to. Do you think film could suffer
the same fate? How do you think that could happen?
WM: It could happen through a fatal flaw within
itself, the hint being too much control being given to a single
person. Here the problems of digital filming come into play. If
you fall into the black hole of yourself and your vision becomes
too private, no one will understand it. That’s what happened
to painting and that’s what happened to opera, and that’s
what could happen to film. It won’t happen for a long time,
but it could happen
.
A2P: I’d hate to see that happen.
WM: I would too, but knowing history, it will.
Some form of video games and the Internet combined with movies will
probably start to show up, which we aren’t that far from now.
We can’t forget about how rich film’s past is. People
always talk about how great films were in the ’70s, and yeah,
lots were good, but lots were just terrible. Now we just watch the
ones that have lasted. A2P
THX 1138 opens September 10 at the State Theater. |
