Doug Liman
Indie Work: After debuting with the entirely forgotten straight-to-video college comedy “Getting In” in 1994, Liman broke through thanks to his work on Jon Favreau’s comedy “Swingers,” a big hit in the mid 1990s, with his stylish helming of Favreau’s eminently quotable script certainly made the director one to watch. His follow-up “Go” (actually backed by Columbia, but it feels like an indie in most ways, including cost) hasn’t endured in the same way, but as a lightweight riff on Tarantino and co, it was entertaining within its own rights. The low-budget film was a minor box office hit, catapulting Liman to greater heights.
First Big Budget Film: Liman had been of a fan of Robert Ludlum’s “The Bourne Identity” since he was a teenager, and actively pursued the rights once “Swingers” made him a hot property. It took a while (and a flight right to Ludlum’s house in Montana), and went through a number of screenwriters, but Liman eventually set the property up at Universal, with Matt Damon starring. After a troubled production (see below) and a few release date delays, it hit theaters on June 14th, 2002, picking up excellent reviews and a worldwide gross of over $200 million. It’s spawned three sequels to date, with one more in the works.
Budgetary Leap: “Swingers” cost a mere $200,000 (much of which came from friends of Liman’s father), while “Go” jumped to $6 million or so. “The Bourne Identity” cost ten times as much, at $60 million.
Success Or Failure? If you asked a Universal executive during production, they would have said a failure: Liman is, or was, famously indecisive, and fell out with the studio in a big way, with screaming matches on set, four rounds of reshoots, and communications breaking down to the extent that Damon had to act as a go-between the director and suits. And yet the film felt like a breath of fresh air for the genre when it finally arrived, Liman’s mix of indie cred and blockbuster bravado creating a character-driven actioner that really connected with audiences. He might have caused them headaches, but Liman ended up giving Universal one of their most important franchises. The director kept his reputation on follow-ups “Mr. And Mrs. Smith” and “Jumper,” as each were similarly troubled (the former dropped entire sub-plots, the latter was recast entirely after a week or two of filming), with varying box office success (the movie with Pitt and Jolie was a hit, the other one, not so much). Fingers crossed that his next, the promising sci-fi “Edge Of Tomorrow,” marks a return to form.
David Lynch
Indie Work: David Lynch’s early feature career is fascinating because for a short time there, it seemed he was following an absolutely typical, if meteoric, path to Hollywood eminence. He got noticed when his no-budget, highly personal and idiosyncratic feature debut “Eraserhead” became a staple of the midnight cult horror circuit, tried to mount “Ronnie Rocket” (for the first of many times–it remains one of our 25 Greatest Movies Never Made), and instead was brought in as director-for-hire on “The Elephant Man.” The black-and-white story of famous “freak” Joseph Merrick, is certainly stylish, but it’s still a very classically told, “straight” story, which showed that Lynch could also court mainstream success. The obvious trajectory was for him to take a big-budget extravaganza next, and become Steven Spielberg, right?
First Big-Budget Movie: Indeed he was even offered the opportunity to direct “Return of the Jedi” by George Lucas, but turned that down in favor of taking up the mantle, much to Alejandro Jodorowsky’s dismay (you really should check out “Jodorowsky’s Dune” if you haven’t already), of adapting Frank Herbert’s epic “Dune” for producer Dino De Laurentiis.
Budgetary Leap: “The Elephant Man” was budgeted at a modest $5m, while “Dune” came in at $40-45m. (Adjusted for inflation that makes for figures of roughly $14m and $94m respectively)
Success Or Failure? Hoo boy. Well, “Dune” famously bombed at the box office, recouping less than its budget, and it tanked critically as well, so yeah, Failure. Later Lynch would say, on one of the rare occasions he’d even discuss the film, “[it] was a kind of studio film. I didn’t have final cut. And, little by little, I was subconsciously making compromises.” Now, full disclosure, Lynch’s “Dune” is probably “the worst film I love” for many, but even uncritical culty affection can’t deny that it’s a complete shambles. But it does kick off a fascinating what-if: what if it had been success? Would we ever have had the Lynch of “Blue Velvet,” “Mulholland Drive,” “Twin Peaks”? Would Lynch have been so feted as a studio director that he’d have swallowed his qualms at compromise and gone on to have a completely different career? As it is, “Dune” was a disaster, but in the wide view a constructive one, in that it can at least partially be thanked for kicking Lynch’s future filmography onto the wonderfully wonky parallel track it’s pursued ever since.
Bryan Singer
Indie Work: Singer’s first film “Public Access” (about a drifter who causes an uproar in a small town through its local cable station) didn’t get a distributor, but it did win the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance in 1993, and thus managed to grab Singer some attention. This led to “The Usual Suspects,” a twisty, beautifully acted noir that hit right at the peak of post-Tarantino mania, and became an immediate cult hit as a result. That brought Singer to the attention of studios, but before he went into tentpole territory, he helmed an adaptation of Stephen King’s short story “Apt Pupil,” about a young man who finds out his neighbor was a concentration camp guard, for mini-major Phoenix Pictures.
First Big-Budget Movie: Singer’s first true studio movie was “X-Men,” the long-awaited adaptation of some of Marvel Comics’ most beloved and long-running characters. Singer initially turned down the project before signing on in December 1996, and after a long road of development, the film, detailing superpowered mutants, was released in July 2000, to strong reviews and a healthy worldwide box office of just under $300 million.
Budgetary Leap: “The Usual Suspects” was about $6 million, “Apt Pupil” was about $14m. “X-Men” was nearly five times that, at $75 million
Success Or Failure? That depends if you’re talking short-term or long-term. “X-Men,” more than any other film, is responsible for the glut of superhero movies we now have — the film was the first in a long time to treat the source material with respect (after the 90s “Batman” movies and things like “The Phantom,” this proved important), and showed that they could work without A-list stars, with the property doing the heavy lifting. The first film was flawed and compromised, but a good start, and Singer nailed it with sequel “X2.” But he’s become a less and less interesting director as time’s gone on, culminating in last year’s dire “Jack The Giant Slayer,” and his return to the franchise for “X-Men: Days Of Future Past” doesn’t look that much better. If you’re not keen on superhero movies, this movie is the one to blame.
