Reds (film)

Reds
Reds movie poster
Directed by	Warren Beatty
Produced by	Warren Beatty
Written by	Warren Beatty Trevor Griffiths
Starring	Warren Beatty Diane Keaton Jack Nicholson Paul Sorvino Maureen Stapleton Gene Hackman Edward Herrmann
Music by	Stephen Sondheim Dave Grusin
Cinematography	Vittorio Storaro
Editing by	Dede Allen Craig McKay
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date(s)	December 4, 1981
Running time	194 min.
Country	United States
Language	English Russian German
Budget	$35,000,000 US (est.)

Reds is a 1981 film starring Warren Beatty and Diane Keaton. It centers on the life of John Reed, the Communist, journalist, and writer who chronicled the Russian Revolution in his book Ten Days that Shook the World.

Besides Beatty and Keaton, the movie stars Edward Herrmann, Jerzy Kosinski, Jack Nicholson, Paul Sorvino, Maureen Stapleton, Gene Hackman, Ramon Bieri, Nicolas Coster and M. Emmet Walsh. It was adapted by Warren Beatty, Peter S. Feibleman (uncredited), Trevor Griffiths, Elaine May (uncredited) and Jeremy Pikser from Reed's memoir. It was produced and directed by Beatty.

The film also features, as "witnesses," interviews with the celebrated radical educator and peace activist 98-year old Scott Nearing (1883-1983), author Dorothy Frooks (1896-1997), reporter and author George Seldes (1890-1995), and the American writer Henry Miller (1891-1980), among others. Warren Beatty was awarded the Oscar for Best Director for the film. It was also nominated for Best Picture, but lost to Chariots of Fire.

In June 2008, AFI revealed its "Ten top Ten"—the best ten films in ten "classic" American film genres—after polling over 1,500 people from the creative community. Reds was acknowledged as the ninth best film in the epic genre.^[1][2]

Cast

The Witnesses

Some are very well known, others less so.

• Jacob Bailin
• Roger Nash Baldwin - (founder of the ACLU)
• John Ballato
• Harry Carlisle
• Kenneth Chamberlain
• Andrew Dasburg
• Tess Davis
• Will Durant - (Philosopher, historian, and writer)
• Hamilton Fish III - (Congressman)
• Adele Gutman Nathan
• Blanche Hays Fagen
• Dorothy Frooks - (Author, publisher, military figure and actress)
• Hugo Gellert - (Illustrator and satirist)
• Emmanuel Herbert
• George Jessel - (Actor, singer, songwriter, and movie producer)
• Isaac Don Levine
• Arthur Mayer
• Henry Miller - (Writer)
• Scott Nearing - (Conservationist, peace activist, educator and writer)
• Adela Rogers St. Johns - (Journalist, novelist, and screenwriter)
• Dora Russell - (Feminist and progressive campaigner)
• George Seldes - (Investigative journalist and media critic)
• Art Shields
• Jessica Smith - (Editor and activist)
• Arne Swabeck - (American Communist leader)
• Bernadine Szold-Fritz
• Galina von Meck
• Heaton Vorse
• Will Weinstone
• Rebecca West - (Feminist and writer)
• Lucita Williams

Production

Warren Beatty came across the story of John Reed in the mid 1960s and film editor Dede Allen remembers Beatty mentioning making a film about Reed's life as far back as 1966. Later, in the 1970s Beatty would begin to write the first drafts of what would later become Reds, but the process stalled. In 1976, Beatty though would find a suitable collaborator in Trevor Griffiths who began work but was delayed when his wife died in a plane crash.^[3] The first draft of the script was finished in 1978 but Beatty had problems with it and the two spent four and a half months on fixing it and later Beatty's friend Elaine May would also collaborate on the script.

Beatty originally had no intention of acting in the film or even directing it because he had learned on various projects that producing a film alone is a difficult task. He considered John Lithgow for the part of John Reed because the two looked similar but eventually Beatty decided to act in the film and direct it himself. Jack Nicholson was cast as Eugene O'Neill over James Taylor and Sam Shepard.^[4]

When principal photography began in August 1979 the original intention was for a 15 to 16 week shoot but it would take one whole year to just shoot the film. The process was slow because it was shot in five different countries and at various points the crew had to wait for snow to fall in Helsinki (and other parts of Finland), which stood in for the Soviet Union, and for rain to stop in Spain. Beatty would also not stop the camera between takes and would have it continuously roll. He also insisted on a large amount of takes. Paul Sorvino said he did as many as 70 takes for one scene and actress Maureen Stapleton had to do 80 takes of one particular scene which caused her to quip to Beatty, "Are you out of your fucking mind?".^[5]

Diane Keaton and Beatty's romantic relationship also began to deteriorate during the filming as Peter Biskind writing about the making of Reds said, "Beatty’s relationship with Keaton barely survived the shoot. It is always a dicey proposition when an actress works with a star or director—both, in this case—with whom she has an offscreen relationship. ... Keaton appeared in more scenes than any other actor, save Beatty, and many of them were difficult ones, where she had to assay a wide range of feelings, from romantic passion to anger, and deliver several lengthy, complex, emotional speeches. George Plimpton once observed, “Diane almost got broken. I thought [Beatty] was trying to break her into what Louise Bryant had been like with John Reed.” Adds executive producer Simon Relph, “It must have been a strain on their relationship, because he was completely obsessive, relentless.”^[6]

The editing process began in spring of 1980 with as many as 65 people working on editing down and going over approximately two and a half million feet of film.^[7] Post-production ended in November of 1981 more than two years after the start of filming. Paramount stated that the final cost of the film was $33.5 million dollars, which would be the rough equivalent of around $80 million today.^[8]

Awards

The movie won Academy Awards for:

• Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Maureen Stapleton playing Emma Goldman)
• Best Cinematography (Vittorio Storaro)
• Best Director (Warren Beatty)

and was nominated for:

• Best Actor in a Leading Role (Warren Beatty)
• Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Jack Nicholson)
• Best Actress in a Leading Role (Diane Keaton)
• Best Art Direction-Set Decoration
• Best Costume Design
• Best Film Editing
• Best Picture
• Best Sound
• Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen^[9].

References

External links

• Reds at the Internet Movie Database

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