Catching up with my Catalogue Entries!

Ridley Scott's Failure to Achieve Critical Acclaim

Focus Films


Item 1: Kingdom of Heaven: Director's Cut
(2005, Scott Free Productions)

Primary Source. Valuable because it is widely considered the peak of Ridley Scott's cinematography and direction, it was made (unlike previous films) under no restrictions from the studio whatsoever, leaving Scott to make exactly the movie he wanted to make. Of course, by the time it reached the cinemas the movie had been hacked to pieces by the studio, who had seen what Scott wanted to make - and found it a bit too much for them. Fortunately the original, 3-hour epic managed to make it's way to DVD and it is probably the finest example of Scott's directing abilities.

Item 2: Blade Runner: The Final Cut
(1982, Warner Bros.)

Primary Source. Incredibly useful, Ridley Scott's first high-budget feature film (it had nearly three times the budget of Alien), it features defining use of his technique to create a look that was previously unknown - a version of the future not clean and sophisticated, built from scratch, but a crumbling metropolis built on the ruins of the past. It also ties into the advertising side of his career - the film features a lot of advertising bought by companies who for some reason wanted to portray themselves in this dystopian future - leading to the infamous "Blade Runner Curse".


Item 3: Black Hawk Down
(2001, Jerry Bruckheimer Productions)


Useful because it is, in many ways, the defining war film of the last decade. Visceral and loud and nasty to look at, it suffered strong criticism for not seriously evaluating the US troops' reasons for being there. Of course, the fact it was based on a novel apparently flew over the heads of most people. Nevertheless it does not in any way glorify war - much like Saving Private Ryan a couple of years earlier you come out of the cinema thinking "owch".


Interviews and Insights:


Item 4: The Path to Redemption - The Making of Kingdom of Heaven
(2005, Scott Free Productions)

Useful because it features dozens of interviews with Scott about every aspect of the film-making process. It also features hours of footage of him at work, in pre-production, filming, and post production. It shows how he works at each stage and the way he sets out to build a world rather than just film sets. Hundreds of useful quotes both from him and the people who work with him.

Item 5: The Making of Gladiator


See above description, because basically it's the same reasons for it's inclusion.

Books:


Item 6: Ridley Scott: The Making of His Movies 
(2000, Orion)

Primary Source. Useful because, to quote Amazon; "beginning with the director's youth and his early success in television advertising, before moving on to a film-by-film analysis of Scott's work" it pretty much covers the exact topic I am myself researching. Unfortunately it stops with G.I.Jane, but covering Blade Runner, Aliens and Thelma & Louise, it manages to deal with three great examples of his cinematography. It also deals with the famous Hovis adverts from the 70's.

Websites:


Item 7: The Total Film Interview - Ridley Scott


(http://www.totalfilm.com/features/the-total-film-interview-ridley-scott) Covers his commercial success, his common criticisms and every film up to and including American Gangster, at that point unreleased. Useful because it provides a rare insight into his own views on his career - usually he does not do interviews and his director's commentary's, whilst very informative and insightful, tend to deal with the film in question specifically rather than providing an overall viewpoint.

Item 8: "I'm doing pretty good, if you think about it"


(http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/ridley-scott-im-doing-pretty-good-if-you-think-about-it-2068888.html) An article covering much of Ridley Scott's rise and his position as a completely self-made man. Interesting because it is very up to date, written as it was only last month.

Item 9: The Riddler Has His Day


(http://www.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/feature/84/) Article from Sight and Sound magazine, whilst nicely written it is actually very critical of the man, having been neither a box office record breaker (like James Cameron) or a critically-lauded failure (like Martin Scorcese). Comes with the wonderful caption "Movies Good Enough To Eat".

Discarded Items:


Item 10: Ridley Scott (Wikipedia)


Very useful in helping me find other sources to begin with, you just cannot use Wikipedia quotes in a real piece of work!


Item 11: G.I. Jane


Discarded because the film is so unimportant to Scott that he actually forgot he even made it (an interview with him had him list all of his films (and why he was proud of them) and he completely jumped over this one. Also it's a terrible, terrible film. So that's understandable.


Item 12: 1492: Conquest of Paradise

(1992, Paramount)

One of Ridley Scott's few cinematic failures, this movie was made to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's famous voyage. Mediocre reviews and a dismal box office taking made it his worst-grossing film to date. Discarded mainly because it was made "to order" so to speak, and in fact the only thing good about it is the soundtrack.