Making "The Misfits"

Superlative Documentary On A Legendary Film
The opening shot of "Making The Misfits" is charged with evocative nostalgia for a lost era in film history and stars of legendary status that haunt our collective memory. It's a simple yet telling shot of a nearly empty drive-in theater just after sunset. On it's battered shabby screen "The Misfits" is running.
The making of John Huston's misunderstood classic is presented here with artistry and integrity. It weaves present day interviews with surviving cast, crew, and photographers with shots from the film. Some of the interviews were filmed on the old set locations or in areas very near them. Through these interviews, film clips, and the wonderful photographs of such Magnum artists as Eve Arnold the story of one of the most unusual "Hollywood" film productions unfolds. For film buffs and fans of any of the principal players this is pure gold.
"Making The Misfits" is one of the best documentaries on Hollywood and how films get made. It was wonderful to see Arthur...

Making "The Misfits" DVD review
Making The Misfits is an insightful look at the ups and downs that the actors and film crew went through while making this much-anticipated movie that just didn't make it as a big screen event. On paper, it had everything to make it shine bright--huge stars like Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable, Montgomery Cliff and a young Eli Wallach. Arthur Miller had molded the script for his then-wife Marilyn and with John Huston on board as director everything seemed rosy at first. Unfortunately, we learn that there was anything but roses on the set and there was considerable heartache in the personal lives of the people working on the movie.

I don't want to give away too much, but as we know Marilyn Monroe was not feeling her best at that time and her usual tardiness resulted in hours of delays and quick scrambles to determine which scenes would be shot that day or postponed for another day. It seemed as if everything that could go wrong did go wrong: even though they were out in the...

Mixed messages
The documentary is worth seeing, but I was nonplussed by the dismissive comments by the crew members who were interviewed.

Listening to them, you'd have no idea that all the actors did a great job, the movie had both good and bad reviews, it made its costs back, and it's widely considered a minor classic today.

In general, the documentary doesn't provide enough context for the discussions of Monroe, although I can well imagine that she strained everyone's patience.

During the filming, Monroe was suffering from exhaustion, endometriosis, colitis and gallstones, apart from emotional issues related to rejection by Yves Montand and the failure of her marriage to Arthur Miller.

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