 Starring: Kevin Costner, Whitney Houston, Gary Kemp, Bill Cobbs
Director: Mick Jackson
Year Of Release: 1992
Plot: Rachel Marron is a superstar singer and actress whose latest movie role may win her an Oscar. However she’s also been getting death threats and a man has broken into her house, and so ace bodyguard Frank Farmer is hired to look after her. However diva Rachel isn’t impressed with Frank trying to restrict her movements and keep tabs on her, but as they work together and the danger to her life grows, they gradually fall for one another. |
Remember when Whitney Houston was a multi-million selling singer with a movie career, and not just a sort of sideshow attraction that gets wheeled out every so often when we need to be reminded of the downside of fame? The soundtrack for The Bodyguard alone sold more than 42 million copies, making it the biggest selling soundtrack of all time, while Whitney herself has sold over 170 million albums. Despite that, now she’s largely seen as a slightly loopy crack addict.
However the bizarre thing about The Bodyguard is that it should actually have been made nearly 20 years before it finally made it to the screen in 1992. Lawrence Kasdan originally wrote the script in the mid 70s and it was initially set up as a star vehicle for Steve McQueen and Diana Ross. However it never got off the ground as the interracial love story was deemed controversial and the stars, who were both obsessed with their status, each refused to take second billing and so the whole thing fell apart.
Then, in 1979, they tried to mount it again, still with Diana Ross, but this time with Ryan O’Neal in the male lead role. This time it collapsed because of irreconcilable differences between the two actors, who had been dating but broke up.
Normally that would have been it, but Hollywood still didn’t give up and Lawrence Kasdan, who’d already written endless versions of the script (which apparently got increasingly violent), kept working on it, until by the mid-80s all hope was lost. Luckily for Kasdan, while The Bodyguard never made it to the screen at that point, the screenplay, which was the first thing he ever sold in Hollywood, had opened a lot of door.
Because of it, he got the job to write the script for The Empire Strikes Back and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Then, in 1981, he wrote and directed Body Heat, following it up with The Big Chill and Silverado. On both those last two films he worked with an unknown actor called Kevin Costner (although Costner’s scenes were all cut from The Big Chill). Kasdan showed the actor the script for The Bodyguard, and it stuck with Costner, who was particularly enamoured with the idea of taking a role that was originally written for Steve McQueen.
At the time Costner didn’t have any Hollywood clout, but by 1992, following the triple whammy of Dances With Wolves, Robin Hood and JFK, he had plenty of muscle, and decided he wanted to make The Bodyguard. The odd thing is that is that while Kasdan had written endless versions of the screenplay, because in the 70s they could never find a version that satisfied everyone (the protracted experience had made the writer so paranoid, that even by the time the film went into production in 1991, he still wasn’t sure if it was a good script or not), the version that Costner eventually went with was pretty much the original one Kasdan had written in the early 70s.
A few details were changed by necessity so that, for example, the bodyguard character was involved with the Reagan shooting rather than the Kennedy assassination, but other than that, it was almost the movie we would have had with Diana Ross and Steve McQueen in 1976.
It’s certainly unusual, as while studios buy huge amounts of scripts, only a few of which ever make it to the screen, most of the time after the initial interest has subsided, the screenplay is put into the vaults, never to be seen again. However making a movie after that amount of time has passed isn’t unprecedented. In fact there’s a rather extreme example coming to cinemas soon. The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond is based on a never before produced screenplay by Tennessee Williams, which was discovered amongst his papers when he died in 1983.
Although I couldn’t find out exactly when he wrote it (and I’m not entirely sure anyone actually knows), when the film, starring Bryce Dallas Howard, Chris Evans and Ellen Burstyn, is released, it’ll be the first new Tennessee Williams material seen for over 40 years, and that really is a long wait between writing a screenplay and getting the movie made.
There’s also the DC Comics character Sgt. Rock, which producer Joel Silver has been trying to get off the ground for over two decades. Endless writers have worked on it, and at various points both Arnie and Bruce Willis have been attached to star. However so far they still haven’t managed to get something that works and which a studio would stump up the budget for. The latest news is that last month Constantine and I Am Legend director Francis Lawrence attached himself to the film, and Chad St. John has joined the long list of writers who’ve worked on the project. This time they’re moving the characters from World War II into space, in the hope that’ll ignite more interest in Hollywood and finally get the film made.
Oh and while I’m on the subject of The Bodyguard, may I just register my protest at the Whitney Houston version of the song, I Will Always Love You. I don’t dislike it because it’s noisy and was played everywhere you turned for most of the 1990s, but because it actually screws up what is a beautiful song. Even in the film they talk about how it has sad, depressing lyrics, but when Whitney starts belting it, she sings it as a full on, hopeful love song.
Despite the title, it’s about the end of a relationship and a woman who is pretty much giving up on the love of her life, not because she no longer cares for him, but because she doesn’t think she’s good enough. She’s resigned herself to misery, because she’d prefer her love to be happy, even if that means he’s not with her.
When Dolly Parton sings it (as you probably know, Dolly also wrote the song), it’s tragic and melancholic, whereas when Whitney sings it, it’s bombastic and quite jolly. It’s particularly annoying in the context of the film, because the song fits the story, but the way Whitney sings it, doesn’t. The lyrics are utterly lost in the bid to create a massive power ballad that would shift records and promote the film. Despite my misgivings, turning I Will Always Love You into something far more hopeful than it was ever designed to be certainly worked, as the single sold 12-million copies, but it bloody annoys me. However, perhaps I should shut up now, before people catch on that I like Dolly Parton and all my street cred disappears.
TIM ISAAC
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