Subject
Kubrick on LOLITA (fwd)
Date
Body
From: "Welch, Rodney" <RWelch@SCES.ORG>
The July 16 issue of the Guardian reprints an old interview with the late
Stanley Kubrick. the following should be of interest to Nabokovians.
Do you think that a movie of Lolita would have been possible for an American
film-maker 10 years ago? Well, a lot of people think it isn't possible now.
Would the audience have been prepared for it 10 years ago? And would a
producer have made it? Ten years ago there weren't many opportunities for
financing a film outside of the major studios. Today there's almost an
infinite number of possibilities for film financing, which allows almost
complete control to the film-maker, and this includes getting financing from
foreign countries. It also includes almost every major studio now, which
makes deals of the same kind as United Artists has for years. They simply
put up the money and distribute the film and allow you to make it by
yourself, off the lot and without any interference or supervision.
Do you think communities might censor Lolita or ban it out of fear that a
film from so controversial a book would provoke a large section of the
public? I think the sale of the novel has indicated that a much larger
audience than just the hardbook readers have found interest in the story and
have accepted it. It's already sold more than 3m paperbacks.
I think all these cries of pornography and obscenity about any project are
quite silly if the picture is playing. Because the police wouldn't let it
play if it was truly obscene or pornographic, although that would be up to
the courts to decide finally - whether it was or not.
What were the chief attractions for you in Lolita as a film subject? I think
the book is a rare and unique masterpiece; that is to say that it is a rare
masterpiece of understanding of characters and situation, and of life
itself.
To me, Lolita seemed a very sad and tender love story. I believe that Lionel
Trilling, in an article he wrote about the book, said that it was the first
great love story of the 20th century. He remarked that in all the great love
stories of the past, take what you like - Anna Karenina, The Red and the
Black, Romeo and Juliet - the lovers, by their love and through their love,
totally estranged themselves from society.
It seems to me one of the wonderful things about Lolita is that it shocks,
because of the relationship. You are prevented from making a premature and
overly sympathetic judgment of Humbert's position by the shock that's
created in your mind. And, finally, when you read your way through the book
and get to the last scene - the confrontation between Humbert and Lolita
when she's 16, pregnant and unattractive, by his own description, and
certainly no longer an infant - you realise, without any doubt, and with a
completely sweeping emotional effect that he selflessly and truly loves the
girl and that he is broken-hearted.
May we surmise that the average film audience will find the relationship of
a 39-year-old man and a child shocking, without the few startling erotic
scenes in the book? One of the wonderful things about the way the book is
written - and the way we intend to tell the story - is that it has a surface
of comedy, humour and vitality: only gradually, as the story progresses, do
you penetrate beneath this surface and begin to see the true nature of each
character and what the story is turning out to be.
In this respect, by the way, I think it is very much related to many things
by Arthur Schnitzler - this surface of gaiety and vitality, superficiality
and gloss, through which you penetrate for yourself to start getting your
bearings as to the true nature of people and situations.
You purchased the screen rights so early that I think we can exonerate you
from purely box-office motives. We bought it when it had not yet appeared on
the New York Times bestseller list. We never dreamed of the popularity that
the book would achieve. We thought it would be popular, but how could one
guess that it would become the number one bestseller in the world? I think
that Lolita is probably the greatest box-office attraction in the history of
movies.
The July 16 issue of the Guardian reprints an old interview with the late
Stanley Kubrick. the following should be of interest to Nabokovians.
Do you think that a movie of Lolita would have been possible for an American
film-maker 10 years ago? Well, a lot of people think it isn't possible now.
Would the audience have been prepared for it 10 years ago? And would a
producer have made it? Ten years ago there weren't many opportunities for
financing a film outside of the major studios. Today there's almost an
infinite number of possibilities for film financing, which allows almost
complete control to the film-maker, and this includes getting financing from
foreign countries. It also includes almost every major studio now, which
makes deals of the same kind as United Artists has for years. They simply
put up the money and distribute the film and allow you to make it by
yourself, off the lot and without any interference or supervision.
Do you think communities might censor Lolita or ban it out of fear that a
film from so controversial a book would provoke a large section of the
public? I think the sale of the novel has indicated that a much larger
audience than just the hardbook readers have found interest in the story and
have accepted it. It's already sold more than 3m paperbacks.
I think all these cries of pornography and obscenity about any project are
quite silly if the picture is playing. Because the police wouldn't let it
play if it was truly obscene or pornographic, although that would be up to
the courts to decide finally - whether it was or not.
What were the chief attractions for you in Lolita as a film subject? I think
the book is a rare and unique masterpiece; that is to say that it is a rare
masterpiece of understanding of characters and situation, and of life
itself.
To me, Lolita seemed a very sad and tender love story. I believe that Lionel
Trilling, in an article he wrote about the book, said that it was the first
great love story of the 20th century. He remarked that in all the great love
stories of the past, take what you like - Anna Karenina, The Red and the
Black, Romeo and Juliet - the lovers, by their love and through their love,
totally estranged themselves from society.
It seems to me one of the wonderful things about Lolita is that it shocks,
because of the relationship. You are prevented from making a premature and
overly sympathetic judgment of Humbert's position by the shock that's
created in your mind. And, finally, when you read your way through the book
and get to the last scene - the confrontation between Humbert and Lolita
when she's 16, pregnant and unattractive, by his own description, and
certainly no longer an infant - you realise, without any doubt, and with a
completely sweeping emotional effect that he selflessly and truly loves the
girl and that he is broken-hearted.
May we surmise that the average film audience will find the relationship of
a 39-year-old man and a child shocking, without the few startling erotic
scenes in the book? One of the wonderful things about the way the book is
written - and the way we intend to tell the story - is that it has a surface
of comedy, humour and vitality: only gradually, as the story progresses, do
you penetrate beneath this surface and begin to see the true nature of each
character and what the story is turning out to be.
In this respect, by the way, I think it is very much related to many things
by Arthur Schnitzler - this surface of gaiety and vitality, superficiality
and gloss, through which you penetrate for yourself to start getting your
bearings as to the true nature of people and situations.
You purchased the screen rights so early that I think we can exonerate you
from purely box-office motives. We bought it when it had not yet appeared on
the New York Times bestseller list. We never dreamed of the popularity that
the book would achieve. We thought it would be popular, but how could one
guess that it would become the number one bestseller in the world? I think
that Lolita is probably the greatest box-office attraction in the history of
movies.