Reddit reviews Spielberg, Truffaut & Me: An Actor's Diary

Okay! MONUMENTS MEN was really fun. And really different. I loved living in Europe with a bunch of non-pretentious actors having a great time, eating some really good food, and doing a movie that we all cared deeply about. George sets a great example. He makes everything look easy, he never sweats, he's incredibly prepared, and he wants shooting to be fun. What more could you ask for?

I have so many memories of that move, I actually wrote a book about it! It's called "Spielberg, Truffaut and Me" and I think you can get it on Amazon.

One story: Truffaut said one of the reasons he did the movie was to experience firsthand being an actor working for another director, because he'd never done that. He came to me - we had most of our scenes together, since i played his interpreter - one day he came to me and said he was really worried about a scene that he had to do next month, where he had to utter the phrase "Einstein was right." He told me he was afraid he couldn't pronounce it properly, and that people would laugh at him when he said it. He spent all month worrying about it, dreading the day when it was going to come. And then I saw him right after he finished shooting the scene and asked him how it went. He said "I think I finally understand what it means to be an actor."

I said "What do you mean?"

He said "When they got to my line, 'Einstein was right', Steven gave it to another actor, and all I could think of was... how could he do that?!"

And he was depressed for the rest of the day. He said "Now I understand what it is really like to be an actor.

spoilers

Has anyone seen the first Special Edition of this, where we see inside the mothership? I'm curious if it was any good -- I think it's out of print today. As I understand it, the studio pressured Spielberg to get the movie out before the end of '77 (incidentally, how crazy is it that this came out like six months after Star Wars? I think 1977 has got to be one of the best Hollywood years ever [Annie Hall, too!]), and so he was forced to cut parts that he didn't have time to finish. When it was released, it became (I think) the most successful movie ever at that time (surpassing Spielberg's previous movie, Jaws) -- so the studio was very happy to give him some more money to finish filming the parts that didn't make it. They didn't feel like a "director's cut" alone was enough to give the movie another theatrical run, so they insisted he have the camera follow the people into the mothership at the end. He agreed, and this was released to theaters in 1980 (1981?) as the 'Special Edition'. Spielberg was happy with everything but the inside of the mothership -- he felt that actually getting to look inside the ship was antithetical to the movie's philosophy: the wonder of the unknown. So anyway, I think he got the inside-the-mothership bit cut for the DVD release. All I really know is that the version I've seen is the one director's cut without the inside of the spaceship.

OOF. That was long. If you want more, in nicer prose, in the form of the diary of an actor who is in the movie, buy this wonderful book by Bob Balaban (who, coincidentally, is my neighbor).

You are not alone. I've visited most of the shooting locations, except Devil's Tower. Someday.

You will want to read Bob Balaban's Book.