Barry Lyndon is 45 y.o.
On December 11, 1975, Stanley Kubrick's historical drama "Barry Lyndon" premiered in London.
The film is based on the rogue novel by the classic of English literature William M. Thackeray "The Luck of Barry Lyndon", written in 1844.
The film absolutely faithfully depicts the life and customs of the 18th century aristocracy. The costumes are exactly in line with the fashion of the time. There is a widespread myth that the costumes used in this film were genuine antique clothing, but this is only partially true. Some of the costumes were indeed genuine antiques bought at auction by costume designer Milena Canonero, but most of the costumes were custom made specifically for this film and of course with the most faithful reproduction of the period clothing and costumes seen on old paintings. All this gave rise to Steven Spielberg jokingly remarking that seeing "Barry Lyndon" is like walking through the Prado Museum all day without lunch.
Even the light used in the film comes from candles, not light bulbs. To provide as much light as possible in candlelight scenes, Stanley Kubrick used custom-made candles. Each candle had three wicks instead of one and used a highly volatile wax. This caused the candles to burn out very quickly, which is why many of the candles seen in the film were so short. In addition, in order to avoid loss of image quality in low light, Stanley Kubrick borrowed from NASA ultra-fast cinema lenses specially designed for observing the stars.
Stanley Kubrick's perfectionism also manifested itself in the fact that filming almost every scene required twenty to fifty takes. As a result, the duration of filming exceeded the planned schedule, due to which the production of the picture was stopped twice and then resumed again. The total number of shooting days, not including the breaks, was more than three hundred, and the budget for the film was $ 11 million (the equivalent of the current $ 55 million), which by then standards was a very significant amount, even for costume films.
Shortly after its premiere, in early 1976, "Barry Lyndon" received two Golden Globe nominations in the most important categories: Best Motion Picture - Drama and Best Director. But Milos Forman's "One One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" stood in the way of Stanley Kubrick's film to victory in both nominations.
"Barry Lyndon" later received 7 Academy Award nominations and won 4 of them. But in the most important nominations again, preference was given to Milos Forman and his film "One One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest". And this circumstance is very often forgotten by film critics, especially Russian ones, who are often full of snobbery, singing to each other that the film "Barry Lyndon" has only technical merit. And the direction and acting, in their opinion, do not deserve serious praise - see, for example, here. What if the films of Kubrick and Forman had not coincided in time?
In the same 1976 "Barry Lyndon" received 5 nominations for the British BAFTA award and won 2 of them, including one of the most important - Best Director. Moreover, Stanley Kubrick's competitors were Martin Scorsese with the movie "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore", Sidney Lumet with the movie "Dog Day Afternoon" and Steven Spielberg with the movie "Jaws". But in the Best Film nomination of these 4 contenders, the preference was given to the film "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore". Perhaps it is these "contests" that have led to Martin Scorsese calling "Barry Lyndon" his favorite Stanley Kubrick film. Another great director confessed his love for this film - Lars von Trier.
A year later, in 1977, "Barry Lyndon" entered the competition for the French Academy Award Cesar for Best Foreign Film. But French film academics gave preference to their neighbors on the continent - the Italian film "C'eravamo tanto amati (We loved each other so much)" directed by Ettore Scola. The company of relative "losers" to Stanley Kubrick's film was made up of the film "One One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" and the Spanish film "CrĂa Cuervos (Raise Ravens)" directed by Carlos Saura.
The evaluation of the film by film critics immediately after its release was described by the Russian film critic Evgeny Nefyodov: “The awarding of four Oscars in “technical ”nominations (for Best Cinematography, Best Music, Scoring Original Song Score and/or Adaptation, as well as Best Costume Design and Best Art Direction-Set Decoration) also indirectly testified that the picture conquered with its formal perfection - but did not sounded topical. It did not touch the "nerve" of the era. It did not touch it emotionally. It was not perceived by the burningly topical reflection on the person and society in its current state, like the previous Kubrick masterpieces. It took time to appreciate the innovation."
Roger Ebert devoted two reviews to Stanley Kubrick's "Barry Lyndon". In the first of them, written in September 1975, that is, even before the release of the film on the wide screen, Ebert rated the film with three and a half stars out of 4 possible. Judging by the review, the main reason for the decrease in the score by half a point is the insufficiently expressive play of the actor in the lead role: "Kubrick has directed Ryan O’Neal in the title role as if he were a still life. It’s difficult to imagine such tumultuous events whirling around such a passive character." However, about the film as a whole, Ebert said as follows: "This must be one of the most beautiful films ever made".
But in his second review of the film, written 34 years later, in September 2009, Ebert rated the film with a maximum of 4 stars and included it in his list of "Great Movies". He began this review with words, as it were, an apology for not immediately understanding the director's intention: "Stanley Kubrick's "Barry Lyndon," received indifferently in 1975, has grown in stature in the years since and is now widely regarded as one of the master's best. It is certainly in every frame a Kubrick film: technically awesome, emotionally distant, remorseless in its doubt of human goodness." And then Ebert confesses what he did not understand in 1975, but realized 34 years later: "The casting choice of O'Neal is bold. Not a particularly charismatic actor, he is ideal for the role. ...O'Neal easily seems self-pitying, narcissistic, on the verge of tears. As one terrible event after another occurs to him, he projects an eerie calm. Nor do his triumphs — in gambling, con games, a fortunate marriage and even acquiring a title -— seem to bring him much joy. He is a man to whom things happen."
However, Roger Ebert showed some ignorance both in the first review and in the second. The fact is that the choice of Ryan O'Neill for the main role was forced. And the reason for this was that the Warner Brothers film company set a condition that it would finance this film only if Stanley Kubrick took on the lead role of an actor who was at that time in the top ten at the box office (according to the annual Quigley Poll of Top Money-Making Stars). Ryan O'Neill was the second highest grossing star in 1973, second only to Clint Eastwood. Ironically, Ryan O'Neill made it to the Top 10 that year for the first time (and, as it turned out later, the last) and only due to the fact that not long before that he received a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Actor in the film "Love Story". In addition to Eastwood and O'Neill, the top ten included: 3. Steve McQueen, 4. Burt Reynolds, 5. Robert Redford, 6. Barbra Streisand, 7. Paul Newman, 8. Charles Bronson, 9. John Wayne and 10. Marlon Brando. As such, the only gender and age appropriate actors that Kubrick could cast in order to get funding from Warner Brothers for his apparently non-profit project were O'Neill and Redford. Kubrick was apparently the first to offer the role to Redford, but he refused, and thus the decision in favor of O'Neill was predetermined.
The financial results of the film in the United States disappointed Warner Brothers and Stanley Kubrick himself. In America, the film grossed only $ 9.1 million. But in Europe, the film had a much more significant audience success. In total, the film grossed $ 31.5 million, nearly three times its production costs.
Modern moviegoers gave the movie Barry Lyndon a high rating: 70% of IMDB and Kinopoisk users gave the movie ratings from 8 to 10. Taking this into account and the above, the FilmGourmand's rating of Stanley Kubrick's movie "Barry Lyndon" was 8,883, making it ranks 188th in the Golden Thousand.
