 Starring: Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton, Julia Ormond, Taraji P. Henson
Director: David Fincher
Year Of Release: 2008
Plot: Born on the day World War I ended, as a newborn Benjamin Button is old and wrinkled and his horrified father Thomas Button leaves him on the doorstep of a retirement home. Benjamin soon realises that he is growing younger, not older, however. Early on, he meets the love of his life, Daisy, a beautiful red-haired, green-eyed child who grows ever older while Benjamin becomes younger and younger. Their lives take many different turns and while they seem made for each other, their temporal problems make it incredibly difficult for them to ever make a life together. |
It often takes quite a long time to get from someone having the initial idea for a film to it actually getting onto the big screen, and while four or five years isn’t unusual, more than three decades is a very long time, but that’s how long it was for Benjamin Button. The main reason for this is that the idea of a man aging backwards has fascinated numerous directors as it conjures up wonderful visual images, however actually being able to convincingly create those images on screen – as well as create a story to go around the concept – was a much tougher prospect. It ended up being a case of having to wait for the technology to catch up before they could actually make it.
The film rights to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short story were first purchased in the late 70s by producer Ray Stark, with Jack Nicolson attached to star as Benjamin. However the logistics of showing someone aging backwards defeated them, as it would have cost too much and they were also worried that the make-up would look fake and that as a result the whole thing would seem ridiculous rather than magical.
Stark didn’t give up though, and by the mid-80s he was trying to set up a new version, this time with Frank Oz attached to direct and Martin Short as Benjamin. The tone was deliberately made more comedic, which could have been a way to get past the shortcomings of the special effects at the time, but even so, Oz couldn’t find a way to make the story work.
Steven Spielberg, Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy then bought the rights in 1991 under the Amblin banner, with Spielberg planning to direct and Tom Cruise attached to star, but the same effects and story problems remained and so Spielberg went off to make Jurassic Park and Schindler’s List instead. Then, in 1994, Kennedy and Marshall took the rights with them when they set up their own production company. They were determined to make the film as they loved the idea of someone again backwards, and at various times they attached the likes of Patrick Read Johnson and Agnieszka Holland to direct it.
However there were still problems, firstly CGI wasn’t at a stage where it was really up to the demands of making someone convincingly age backwards, and secondly there were still difficulties with the script.
Fitzgerald’s story is fairly short and it was felt than on its own there wasn’t enough to make a film out of it (having read it, I’d have to disagree, as it has plenty of interesting ideas, but the ending is far bleaker than it is in the final movie). As a result it went through numerous writers and script revisions, but they couldn’t find a version that they felt was strong or interesting enough to warrant spending huge amounts of money to make it.
By 1998, the project seemed like it was moving forwards and might actually get made, with Ron Howard directing, John Travolta in the lead role, a script by Robin Swicord and Paramount keen to fund it. However it didn’t work out and so both Howard and Travolta left.
Then, in 2000, Jim Taylor was hired to write a brand new screenplay based on Fitzgerald’s short story. At that point Spike Jonze expressed an interest in directing, which led to Charlie Kaufman submitting a draft of the script. Again, things fell apart, largely due to concerns over the story and the escalating budget.
Still unwilling to give up, in June 2003 Gary Ross (Seabiscuit) was hired to direct from a brand new script by Eric Roth. It’s almost surprising they hadn’t gone to Roth before, as he adapted Forrest Gump for the screen, and it was that tone the producers and Paramount had been struggling to achieve. While Ross dropped out a year later, they stuck with Roth’s script, especially when in June 2003 David Fincher’s read the screenplay and said he was interested in directing (he’d since said he never read Fitzgerald’s story, with Roth’s script all he needed to get him interested). It took a long time to pin Fincher down though, as he didn’t actually sign on to make the film for a full year, eventually negotiating a deal to make Zodiac and Benjamin Button back-to-back.
Of course with Zodiac coming first, that added even more time onto the ridiculously long period the movie had been in development. However at least this time it was actually going to happen, with Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett coming on board in May 2005, and filming beginning in November 2006. Just to add a bit more time before it could hit cinemas, it was an incredibly complicated shoot. Principal photography was scheduled to last an incredibly long 150 days. With all the effects shots needed on top of the main filming, they didn’t get everything in the can until September 2007, and then had to spend months finishing the CGI.
Finally, the release was pushed back six months from May 2008 to December, to put it into strong Oscar contention, but I suppose when a film has taken 30 years from the initial idea to the final release, a few more months really doesn’t make much different.
It always fascinates me these stories about films with ridiculously long production times, simply because when you look at all the directors, writers and actors who’ve been involved at various points, it makes you wonder what the film might have been in different hands, and in different eras. What would a Steven Spielberg directed version with Tom Cruise in the lead role have been like? And what the hell would we have got with Frank Oz and Martin Short? Of course, we’ll never know, but it’s interesting to wonder what could have been.
For another tale of a film that took a ridiculously long to get to the screen, take a look at the Movie-A-Day article on The Bodyguard, which nearly got made in the 1970s with Steve McQueen and Diana Ross in the lead roles.
TIM ISAAC
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