Well into production, I still hadn't decided where to shoot the chase scene I'd written for House of Bamboo. Shirley Yamaguchi and I took a walk one day along a busy Tokyo street. A child's ball landed near us. I looked up at a big department store, maybe twenty stories high. Shirley explained there was a playground on top of it. We went up there. On the roof terrace of the store, there was a free nursery where parents left their children while shopping. There were great views of the entire city. On a corner of the rooftop sat a steel contraption, a gyrating carousel that rotated at a dizzying angle.
This was it, the perfect location for my ending. We asked permission to use the space, but the store manager refused. The owner, Mr. Nikkatsu, wouldn't allow us to disrupt his nursery, not even for one minute. We offered more money. No way. The manager said it wasn't a question of money. After all, Mr. Nikkatsu was a prominent businessman, owner of stores, hotels, and even a movie studio. I asked for a meeting and went to see Mr. Nikkatsu, who was an elderly gentleman. I told him I didn't want to deprive children of their playground either. I needed them to be in my picture, playing in the background to make the scene look realistic. Mr. Nikkatsu and I hit it off. I filled him in on my yarn. Not only did he agree to let me use his rooftop playground, but he also asked to play an extra, a doting grandfather, in the scene. That way, he could oversee the situation.
The day of the shoot, Mr. Nikkatsu watched over our preparations like a bird of prey. We put three cameras on the rooftop. One of them was in that whirligig hanging over the edge of the building. I wanted Ryan and Stack to have their final confrontation on that crazy contraption. The scene was tricky to pull off. The gunfire didn't scare the children at all. It was part of a game and they loved playing. Mr. Nikkatsu got caught up in the action too, moving around like a spring chicken. The old fellow had such a great time that he waived all rental fees for the use of his rooftop.
The revolving contraption high above the city where we shot my finale for House of Bamboo
House of Bamboo was a financial and critical success for Fox. What made me proudest was that it broke race barriers implicit in American movies at that time. In the fifties, a white man still didn't fall in love with an Asian woman in Hollywood. In those rare films with interracial couples, the ending was usually tragic. I wasn't going to yield to that hypocrisy. My lovers got a happy ending. Besides, I insisted on casting a native for my lead, not an American actress made up to look Asian, like Lillian Gish in D. W. Griffith's Broken Blossoms (i9i9). Ridiculous as it may seem today, it was revolutionary to use ethnic actors at that time. I wouldn't have done it any other way. Two years after House of Bamboo, Robert Rossen's Island in the Sun (1957) told a love story with Joan Fontaine and Harry Belafonte. Hot love scenes? Passionate kisses? They don't even touch hands. Hell, some love story! In my picture, Eddie and Mariko are plainly hot for each other, and they don't end up regretting it, like the star-crossed lovers in Puccini's Madame Butterfly.
A couple of years after I finished House of Bamboo, director Joshua Logan came to see me before he left for Japan to scout locations for Sayonara (1957), adapted from Puccini's opera. Joshua congratulated me on the success of House of Bamboo. I shared all my research with him, saving him a helluva lot of time preparing his film. It was a professional courtesy common among directors back then. I sensed Logan was worried about Sayonara, also an interracial love story, except with a tragic ending, like the opera. Josh told me he'd considered making the picture's ending more upbeat. The white man, played by Marlon Brando, would show up just in time to prevent the suicide of his Japanese lover, played by Miiko Taka. Brisk competition among the studios pushed creative people to consider changing a story line, even that of a classic tragedy, to make a box-office hit. Thankfully, Logan ended up sticking to the original.
Making a movie in Japan is a grand experience. I consider my life richer for having done it. The light there is unique and wonderful. Colors come out looking postcard crisp. Even their blacks and whites are different, sharper and purer. Mount Fujiyama is velvety black, and its summit snow white. It's a remarkable sight that I'll keep in the back of my mind for the rest of my days.
Mato Grosso
31
With eight pictures under my belt, now established as a writer-director in Hollywood, I should have been sleeping peacefully under those silk sheets in my big house in Beverly Hills. Nothing could have been further from the truth. I tossed and turned all night long, racked by horrific nightmares. Terrible visions from the war buried in my brain rose up as soon as I dozed off. Heaps of dead bodies. A gaunt hand stretching skyward for help. Bombs exploding. Soldiers ripped apart.
Music was my immediate remedy. I got up, went downstairs, and immersed myself in Beethoven, Bach, or Mozart. They soothed my spirit. I figured that the only way to free myself of my war memories was to make a film about them. The entire yarn was already in my head. I'd been carrying it around with me like a piece of heavy luggage. It would capture the reality of combat without any Hollywood crap-no heroes, just soldiers trying to survive. My take was deeply personal, yet the violence and insanity was universal. I began writing scenes and dialogue. A script would come together over many years and many rewrites. Maybe after I made that movie, I'd sleep better. In my wildest dreams, I never thought that it would take another twenty-five years before I got my chance to direct The Big Red One.
In those days, Zanuck organized weekend get-togethers at his place in Palm Springs. Martha and I went a few times. My wife enjoyed socializing with the studio executives and movie stars who came out there, so I put up with those affairs. The cigars and the vodka were okay, but I had better at home, and, besides, I could have been at my Royal writing scripts. Still, I ran into some interesting characters. I was fond of Darryl's wife, Virginia, a fine lady. Hedda Hopper, the Hollywood columnist, seemed to always be invited. I got along well with Hedda. She even asked me to do a movie about her life, but that was just cocktail gibble-gabble.
Howard Hughes showed up once. We talked for a while. He knew all about me from Jean Peters. Hughes was a strange guy, but we got along all right. He called me a couple times afterward to make a movie with him. Like so many projects, it just never materialized.
One weekend, Zanuck took me into the private study off the terrace of his Palm Springs place. He'd just gotten back from some big-game hunting on a ranch in the wild central region of Brazil called Mato Grosso. He gave me a book to read entitled Tigrero, by Sacha Siemel. The studio had acquired the rights. Zanuck explained that when a wild cat preys on livestock down there, the ranch owners hire a tigrero to track down and kill the culprit, usually a jaguar, though the predator could be one of a variety of cats. The best tigrero Zanuck heard about was an old Indian from the jungle who never used a gun or a rifle, only a spear, to hunt the cats. We talked about concocting a picture that would take place in the Mato Grosso. I read the book. There was some good background material. The best thing about it was the title.
Before I wrote a script, I told Zanuck I needed to see the Mato Grosso for myself. Darryl agreed. My appetite for making movies in faraway places had already been whetted by House of Bamboo. Maybe the Brazilian jungle would take my mind off those painful war memories. I packed up my typewriter and my i6-mm movie camera, said good-bye to my wife and my mother, and hopped on a plane down to Rio.
People I met in Rio said I was crazy to go into the Mato Grosso. Indian tribes in the interior were still renowned for cutting off and shrinking their enemies' heads. In a bar in Rio, I heard about an old Shavante Indian whose picture was on all the front pages of the Brazilian newspapers. His piercing eyes seemed to be staring at me. The man had gotten separated from his tribe by a big flood. He was found far from his tribal land, refusing all nourishment until he died like a starving animal. Now I really wanted to explore the jungle and see those Indians for myself.
From Rio, I flew down to Sao Paulo. There I hooked up with my guide, who knew a few of the many native dialects. I thought I also nee
ded some strong arms, just in case. A couple of ex-members of the Brazilian air force I met in a bar seemed to fit the bill. I offered to take them on as scouts. They thought I was some kind of Hemingway character on a big-game hunt. I told them I was scouting locations for a movie, not hunting wild animals. Instead of money, they wanted to be paid in jaguar skins. I told them to go to hell.
Fox had chartered a private plane to take me inland. It was a two-seater, the kind of aircraft that sprayed pesticides on crops and landed supplies at remote airstrips. Zanuck had the plane stocked with plenty of vodka and cigars. First, we flew to Rebeirao Preto, then changed to an even smaller plane for the flight to Goiania. We finally landed in the heart of the Mato Grosso, in a little place called Tesouro. The pilot said he'd be back in a few weeks to pick us up.
The jungle was a wild and uncompromising place. We traveled by horseback and canoe. The first Indians we found were the Jivaros. They weren't at all happy to see us, so we moved on. I started shooting footage of the terrain with my camera. On the banks of the Araguaia River, we came across members of the Karaja tribe. They immediately invited us to visit their isolated village. On the other side of the Araguaia, which the Karaja called the "River of the Dead," lived the Shavante tribe. I remembered the newspaper story of the Shavante who starved himself rather than be separated from his tribe. Here I was, a stone's throw from the homeland he died for.
Being small in stature, I didn't pose any threat to the Karaja. Right away, I hit it off with their chiefs, who invited me and my guide to stay with them for as long as I wished. The Karaja had three chiefs. One was a hunter, one, a priest, and one, a warrior. The warrior chief had the least influence, because the tribe never fought any wars. What I discovered in that remote corner of Mato Grosso was a society far more peaceful and caring than ours. Little by little, I began to feel like the savage and see the Karaja as the civilized ones.
The Karaja were descended from the Incas, and their language sounded like Japanese. My interpreter couldn't figure it out. But language was never a problem. The Karaja spoke with their eyes, and I understood them. Physically, they were a beautiful people, with dark skin, high cheekbones, and ebony hair. Spiritually, they were beautiful too, joyful, hospitable, generous human beings. They didn't have laws, judges, or police, nor did they need any. There was no crime, jealousy, or greed.
I thought I might be able to use these two Brazilians on my trip into the Mato Grosso, in rg56. I was wrong, so I gave them a couple of good cigars and sent them packing.
From dawn to dusk, they were constantly busy, taking care of their children, repairing their huts, fishing in the Araguaia. The abundance of fish guaranteed plenty of food for everyone. Money was useless. When they needed rice and medicines, they traded fish for supplies from the whites downstream. Their huts were simple and well kept. Mangoes were growing all over the place. Kids were sucking on them like lollipops from morning to night.
The Karaja had their gods for the rain, sun, and trees. Certain fish and birds were sacred. Before each hunting or fishing expedition, the Karaja prayed with their chiefs. The tropical climate imposed a natural limit on how much food they brought back to the village, because leftovers would spoil. They knew exactly what they needed to survive and never abused the jungle's abundance. The men inserted little sticks under their lower lips to emphasize their masculinity, and also painted their bodies with black and white circles.
Back in the fifties, the only way through the Mato Grosso was on horseback, with mules to carry supplies.
Though they didn't have any musical instruments, the Karaja loved to dance and sing. Their fertility dance was a special appeal to the God of fruitfulness for his good will. The women put beautiful flowers behind their ears and started moving their feet to the beat, rubbing their bellies. The rest of the tribe chanted and clapped their hands. The men wrapped their heads in twigs and circled round the women.
Karaja couples were monogamous, though they walked around naked except for a loincloth tied to their waists. I wore a pair of shorts all the time and got very tanned, except for my ass. When I was washing myself in the river, the whiteness back there surprised everybody. They'd take berries they used for tattoos and rub them on me, trying to "cure" my pale skin.
Among the Karaja customs I got on film, one of the most dramatic was a boy's puberty rites. Every thirteen-year-old boy had to submit to it in order to become a man. First, they pierced his penis with a wooden needle. The boy couldn't move a muscle during the ritual. Then they took a piranha tooth and scratched the boy's legs until blood appeared. Still, he couldn't move. If he did, they stopped the ceremony and started the ritual all over again. Teenage girls had their own rites of womanhood, too. It took place inside a hut, away from the men. I didn't even consider asking to film it, because I already felt like an intruder. At night, if I had to take a pee, the whole village woke up to make sure I wasn't attacked by a wild animal when I walked out of the hut. They were very tolerant with me. I managed to receive the ultimate gesture of acceptance by being invited to sleep in the chief priest's tent. He was a revered man, blind and gentle. It was one of the greatest honors I'd ever receive.
During my stay with the Karaja, I wrote a treatment for Tigrero. My story started in a prison in Rio. A woman helps her husband escape by killing a prison guard. Then she hires a tigrero to take them across the Mato Grosso. The tigrero lives in an isolated world, but one rich in colors, sights, and sounds. He finds poetry in the trees, in the calls of exotic birds, in the animal tracks on the jungle floor. He gets the couple across a mighty river to an island that is shrinking in the aftermath of the great rains. As the waters rise, the woman suddenly slips and falls in. Her husband can try to save her from drowning, but he just looks on while saving his own skin. The woman survives, but her great love for her husband is transformed into hatred. My yarn was not about cowardice or selfishness. The idea was that you can't hate someone for saving himself. The husband in my yarn loves his wife but loves himself a little more.
It was time to go home. I'd been living with the Karaja for several weeks. I left reluctantly, half-tempted to postpone my return, but I had a wife and a mother to take care of and a script to write. It was damned hard to leave a place where I'd experienced so much peace and happiness. I knew I wanted to return and shoot my movie in the jungles of the Mato Grosso. I thanked the Karaja from the bottom of my heart and promised I'd be back.
Zanuck loved my yarn and the home movies I'd shot during my stay in Brazil. He could see for himself that my vivid descriptions were taken from reality, and he shared my enthusiasm for making the picture on location in the jungle. He lined up John Wayne to play the tigrero, Ava Gardner as the wife, and Tyrone Power as her husband.
I'd imagined a great opening for the picture and shot some of it with my i6-mm camera and anamorphic lens. An alligator attacks a bird in the Araguaia. A second alligator shows up, bigger than the first, and snatches the booty. They fight over the prey, twisting and thrashing in the water. The big alligator kills the small one, turning the water red. A school of piranha shows up, attacking the victorious alligator. Finally a condor swoops down and flies off with the prey. There was the goddamned cycle of life: survival. At the end of the sequence, one gigantic word would come up on the screen: TIGRERO. It was going to be a pisscutter of a movie!
The Karajd allowed me to film many of their rituals, like their fertility dance.
Everything for the production was on track until the insurance companies raised a red flag. It was risky for big stars to shoot a film in the wilds of Brazil, so premiums were sky high: $6 million for Wayne, $6 million for Gardner, and $3 million for Power. Darryl got very angry. He showed the insurance executives my location footage around the Karaja's village. Clearly, the whole area was safe. There'd be more danger shooting the film on Fox's back lot. But those insurance guys in the gray suits and bow ties wouldn't budge. After all, the Brazilian jungle was full of savages and maneating animals. The studio decided to she
lve the project. Unproduced films are as much a part of this business as those that get produced.
I was terribly disappointed about the fate of Tigrero. Yet I came to see that the time I'd spent with the Karaja had given me a new vision of life, renewing my faith in the entire human race. Against the backdrop of their untamed land and the cruelties of Mother Nature, the Karaja had created a society full of kindness and happiness. Laughter was an essential element of their culture. Most of the time, I didn't know what they were laughing about. Their laughter was contagious, so I laughed with them. An important piece of my wounded soul had been healed during my time in the Mato Grosso. I relearned the difference between joy and pleasure. Pleasure was transient. Writing, listening to music, sharing, and real friendship gave me joy.
Immersing myself in writing and research, I quickly completed another script, called Run of the Arrow. I stopped going to Zanuck's shindigs, preferring to hang out with more nourishing people, like my musician friends Max Steiner, Victor Young, and Harry and Gretchen Sukman, or my writer friends, like Richard Brooks and Dalton Trumbo. I cherished those people because they knew the value of life, friendship, and integrity. Their enormous creativity fueled me, and their affection helped me cope with my violent war memories. The Karaja had shown me that life was a delicate balance between violence and nonviolence.
I've never met a gentler group of people. The most boisterous I ever saw them was when they were playfully wrestling with each other. They were always careful not to hurt anyone or anything. However, if a member of another tribe invaded their territory and took away one of their children, they'd hunt down the trespasser and kill him. Their children were their future, so the thief was victimizing the entire tribe. It happened once while I was there. They cut off the head of the child stealer and brought it back to the village. They hung the head outside the parents' hut and made a fire underneath it with special wood and herbs to shrink it. The process lasted several days and nights. They believed the thief was not all evil. What little good was in the bastard would pass on to the bereaved parents, thus creating some retribution for the lost child.
A Third Face: My Tale of Writing, Fighting and Filmmaking Page 34