Catch-22 was considered to be an artistic failure at the time of its release, but I think it’s one of your best. Mike Nichols: It was in some ways a failure. I ran it for Stanley Kubrick and he was very nice about it. I don’t remember the good things he said, but he did say that people might have some narrative problems with it: where are we, what’s happening, and because it was all circular, you weren’t really sure when a given scene was taking place. Which I don’t mind, but it did bother some people. I think I made some mistakes. I should have scored it, because I think it would have helped. It was sort of arrogant not to score it. And it should have been funnier. The strange thing for me about that movie is it kicks in about the middle, in the dark part, in Rome. And then it gets pretty good. I didn’t really find a completely successful way of translating the surrealism of the novel. It came and went. It was like one of those Von Stroheim follies. If I could do it again, I would like to think it could be funnier and have more Heart. It was very cold, too. What I like very much about it are its ambitions.
Posted on: Sat, 15 Nov 2014 08:22:41 +0000