Such an odd story. I feel bad for him.
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There’s no fair reason for what Kubrick did to her on The Shining (among other people). She will be missed and she deserved a better career.
I don’t know about THE SHINING, but if you’ve seen Malcom McDowell being drowned in CLOCKWORK ORANGE you begin to suspect workplace safety wasn’t a huge concern for Kubrick…
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When I rewatched it I wondered exactly about that scene, hoping for Kubrick to have built an elaborate apparatus which helped McDowell breathe - but I guess it was just as much „method“ as turning actors hysterical by doing hundreds of takes, with the poor Shelley Duvall having to repeat her desperation and terror until she really was close to losing her mind.
It is strange to me to ask actors to rather be in that state than just act it. Can we see the difference? I would say no. Maybe with bad actors. But accomplished ones like Duvall surely can deliver at least after a few takes. I fear Kubrick just did these many takes because he wanted to live inside that production bubble for as long as possible.
Do we know for sure whether the films show the later take or the earlier? Of course not. The biggest cruel joke would be if the films actually only include the early takes.
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I also ask myself watching that scene how would I do that scene, because it looks real to me, but isn’t that impossible without some clever editing?
If I remember correctly there is no cut. McDowell‘s head is underwater for a Tom Cruise-like time.
You’re right you can’t see a cut, but it’s almost impossible how long his head is underwater.
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Did someone say…
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To quote Anthony Hopkins in M.I.2:
“That’s why it’s not called Mission Difficult, but Mission Impossible!”
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Oh my, 53…
R.I.P.
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According to IMDb:
It has been written in the past that Malcolm McDowell nearly drowned in the trough scene, where his former droogs, Georgie and Dim, dunk him into an animal trough filled with dirty water and beat him with a nightstick for nearly a minute of screen time. The rumour was that McDowell’s breathing apparatus failed. This isn’t true. In the Warner Brothers DVD, McDowell does a commentary track and talks about how he used an oxygen tank while he was under the water. He never mentions that it failed or that he almost drowned. Also on one of the documentaries on the DVD, the commentator mentions that McDowell did 28 takes of that scene, so the tank must have been working.
What is true is that the water was colored brown with a special food additive derived from beef production and that McDowell found it really noxious to work in.
Even if the breathing apparatus worked every time, it still had to be an awful experience to do 28 takes of that scene.
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Such sad news. He’s still making me laugh on his Big Bang Theory guest appearances.
One of the greatest series finales ever:
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Bob Newhart was wonderful and sounds like he was a very nice man too. Here is one of his lines that always stuck with me: "“I don’t like country music, but I don’t mean to denigrate those who do. And for the people who like country music, denigrate means ‘put down’.” (BTW, I do like some country music).
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Most fans outside Germany will never have heard of him. But Rainer Brandt made The Persuaders a roaring success in Germany - and no doubt helped Roger Moore when he took over in LIVE AND LET DIE, despite not being involved in that dubbing. But Brandt was also behind the Bud Spencer/Terence Hill dubbings and many French films of the 60s/70s.
R.I.P.
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