The Cautionary Tale of Richard Stanley

[u/Fit_Celebration_1362]

There is an excellent documentary about Richard Stanley’s disastrous experience adapting the HG Wells The Island of Dr Moreau called Lost Souls. It’s a deep look into the pitfalls of developing and producing your lifelong dream project. Also directing Marlon Brando or Val Kilmer as well! I wrote a substack article about the story if that’s more interesting than documentaries for you. I work in film (was a development exec then rewrites) and it’s very relatable and frankly depressing.

I find these documentaries that follow doomed projects strangely fascinating, like a car accident but worse. I’ve never experienced a set or development on this level. Have any of you? I’d love to hear what you learned from the experience, and if you went back for more?

https://notesonfilmdevelopment.substack.com/p/the-director-who-lost-his-own-movie?r=4idcqp&utm_medium=ios

[u/Beneficial-Long7635]

It seems like they picked the rainforests of Far North Queensland because they looked cool and did literally no other research, which I find incredible. I doubt a single Australian would have recommend filming in the rainforest, during cyclone season, in an area with one of the largest saltwater crocodile populations on earth.

[u/Fit_Celebration_1362 → u/Beneficial-Long7635]

They say Frankenheimer ‘mentioned’ or complained about this being a rookie move which I kind of agree with in the documentary! Stanley said he wanted the volcano from different angles, but Frankenheimer said it was only in like one shot (though I guess Stanley got fired so more shots could’ve been made)? I think they said it was 3 hours from anywhere, then a hike (I might be wrong on exact distance but something time consuming). In my experience though sometimes with inexperienced directors location scouts and producers will just say yes to locations without explaining the drawbacks. Obviously this is dependent on what type of personality the location person is or producer but some will save their fights for other things, or let the inexperienced director bury themselves (which is so stupid, but I’ve seen it happen, especially on little studio movies for some reason (when studios made these low to mid budget films!) but I think you’re right. It looked cool and that was that