William Friedkin (1935 - 2023)

[Aunt Peg]

Friedkin's autobiography 'The Friedkin Connection: A Memoir' is a must read. It is one of the most entertaining autobiographies I've ever read and one of the best.

Can anyone elaborate on what the issues are that is keeping Rampage from a Blu Ray release?

[thirtyframesasecond]

Friedkin also directed a weird-as-hell music video for Laura Branigan's 'Self Control' (she only really had two songs, but what great songs).

[flyonthewall2983]

Blue Chips is a favorite of mine. The pace is maybe too fast but the subject matter was handled as delicately as possible but it’s arguable he had a bit of more free reign at Paramount for obvious reasons at the time, but for at least this one he made the most of it.

Nick Nolte’s impromptu sermon at the Black church is one of the most unhinged moments from any of his films. Simultaneously very uncomfortable and entertaining.

Can’t help but feel given his career at the time Friedkin maybe felt for the character of a coach coming off a terrible season. Conversely this is the last movie Nolte made before I Love Trouble came out (and was released nearly the same time as I’ll Do Anything
), and he was still kind of riding high from the acclaim of particularly The Prince of Tides so it’s interesting from a career point of view they met at this time. It’s really a better meditation on holding things together in middle age when all is against you. A really good film.

[hearthesilence]

William Friedkin talks about how he works with actors, specifically Tommy Lee Jones and Benicio del Toro in "The Hunted" and Nick Nolte in "Blue Chips."

[hearthesilence]

Highlights from Friedkin's 2014 talk at the Harvard Film Archive.

The best part:

I’ve been listening to Clarence Carter for years, and I was always hoping to be able to use “Strokin’” in a movie. “Strokin’” is one of the great American songs. To me, he was the Mozart of Southern music. You can almost never hear “Strokin’” on the radio, not in this politically correct world. So I thought I should give this to the audience — it has nothing to do with the picture.

There’s a disc jockey in all of us, and I just wanted to share “Strokin’” with all of you. Why not? Where are you gonna go and hear “Strokin’” in this day and age? Where? Nowhere! Here, that’s it!

I mean, if I were doing a movie about the life of Beethoven, I would use “Strokin’” on the end credits. Or Shakespeare! You know, if I was doing Hamlet, imagine ending it after Hamlet’s death, and the funeral oration by Horatio or Fortinbras, then you hear “Strokin’.” And that sends you right out of your chair – YES! It’s not about a guy who got killed in a duel, and killed his uncle because his father’s ghost told him that his uncle was sleeping with his mother and he had to kill his uncle… what a stupid plotline that is.

Now if you end it with “Strokin’” you have a whole other kettle of fish. The audience goes out bopping. Strokin’.

[beamish14]

Amusing reminiscence from editor Darrin Navarro on Friedkin’s first viewing of Bug

[flyonthewall2983]

His interview with Marc Maron is maybe one of the best episodes of WTF ever

[therewillbeblus]

Amusing reminiscence from editor Darrin Navarro on Friedkin’s first viewing of Bug

Is there any way to easily copy and paste the quoted story for those of us without Twitter accounts? It won’t let me read past the second sentence without one

[diamonds]

Try this.

[therewillbeblus]

Try this.

Thanks!

[tolbs1010]

Highlights from Friedkin's 2014 talk at the Harvard Film Archive.

The best part:

I’ve been listening to Clarence Carter for years, and I was always hoping to be able to use “Strokin’” in a movie. “Strokin’” is one of the great American songs. To me, he was the Mozart of Southern music. You can almost never hear “Strokin’” on the radio, not in this politically correct world. So I thought I should give this to the audience — it has nothing to do with the picture.

There’s a disc jockey in all of us, and I just wanted to share “Strokin’” with all of you. Why not? Where are you gonna go and hear “Strokin’” in this day and age? Where? Nowhere! Here, that’s it!

I mean, if I were doing a movie about the life of Beethoven, I would use “Strokin’” on the end credits. Or Shakespeare! You know, if I was doing Hamlet, imagine ending it after Hamlet’s death, and the funeral oration by Horatio or Fortinbras, then you hear “Strokin’.” And that sends you right out of your chair – YES! It’s not about a guy who got killed in a duel, and killed his uncle because his father’s ghost told him that his uncle was sleeping with his mother and he had to kill his uncle… what a stupid plotline that is.

Now if you end it with “Strokin’” you have a whole other kettle of fish. The audience goes out bopping. Strokin’.

Full-on belly laughing at this. It's right up there with the "Two Donkeys Fucking" story that brundlefly shared on the Friedkin page on the Filmmakers thread.

He's right, though. "Strokin" is a distinctly American classic. And Hamlet is stupid.

[sabbath]

Now I'm really looking forward to the end credits of The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial.

[domino harvey]

The smash cut to “Strokin” remains one of the biggest laugh out loud moments I’ve ever seen in a film. Just could not possibly be a better way to end that movie!

[diamonds]

James Gray's moving remembrance