Making Movies 101

Marty Katz loves movies. And he loves making them.

His latest big screen opus is The Great Raid, shown at special previews last week, way ahead of its August playdate in U.S. cinemas, these showings a special concession for the commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the daring rescue undertaken by U.S. soldiers and Filipino guerillas to free 513 Allied prisoners of war from a Japanese camp in Pangatian, just outside Cabanatuan in Nueva Ecija that is the subject of the movie, as well as a bestselling book, Ghost Soldiers, by Hampton Sides (see story on page four) and another book, The Great Raid, by Bill Breuer. (There is a third book on the raid, Hour of Redemption by Forrest Johnson.) The previews, as well as the visit to Manila of author Sides, were sponsored by the U.S. Embassy at the instigation of Ambassador Francis Ricciardone, who has been tirelessly active in the past weeks’ commemoration activities.

Marty and his wife Campbell flew in last Sunday, bringing with them the film for the preview–which, we were told, went straight from the airport to the US Embassy vault for safekeeping until the showings the following day. There was a dinner that evening tendered by Ernest Escaler, whose talent management agency handled the participation in the movie of the key Filipino actors like Cesar Montano, Ebong Joson and the late RJ Leyran, and although we did not–ahem!–get discovered for a new career as a movie star in Hollywood, we did get most interesting cocktail and dinner table conversation, and a crash course on the workings of the wonderful world of Hollywood.

Some people would rather not know the behind-the-scenes about a movie; it’s like sausage, my dinner seatmate says–you don’t want to know how it’s made and what goes into it, just buy a ticket and watch the movie. That could work most of the time, when you can easily ignore feature and promo articles, even reviews. But this movie is different; for one thing, it’s very close to home, thus impossible to regard as just another war movie. And for the past two weeks, remembrances of the war have been ever present, starting from anniversary rites in Nueva Ecija two weeks ago and followed by other 60th year commemorations like the liberation of the UST camp the other Thursday and the Memorare remembrance of the "liberation" of Manila yesterday.

The $53 million movie was previewed before ten focus groups all over the U.S., more than double what is usually done, with the various reactions and inputs taken into consideration as the film went through its final stages of post-production. One thing the filmmakers discovered was that the film’s interest went way beyond the usual blow ’em up/for the boys kind of war-adventure movie; in one showing before 400 people, 98 percent of women over age 25 gave the movie a rating of excellent. While it is a great adventure movie with vivid battle scenes sure to thrill the most avid action junkie, The Great Raid offers more, particularly for us Filipinos. At one preview with the few surviving participants of the rescue mission, there was literally not a dry eye in the room, and at the end of the screening one of them whispered, "That was the way it was."

Great effort was taken to recreate the correct look and feel of the Nueva Ecija countryside in Australia (I’m probably nitpicking here, but our jungles don’t have trees as straight as those in the movie, especially not in typhoon lashed Nueva Ecija), where a large part of the movie was filmed (for a variety of reasons which even the most rabidly nationalistic among us had to concede, like insurability and the availability of filmmaking facilities; the Manila scenes were, in turn, filmed in Shanghai, for the same reasons). For example, Filipinos were brought in to oversee the proper construction of nipa huts and rice paddies (it seems we plant rice differently, and try as they might, the Australians could not get the paddies to look right).

To avoid a uniformly tinny sound of gunfire, Marty, a Vietnam veteran, insisted on recording the actual sounds made by the different types of guns used by American and Japanese troops and Filipino guerillas. So one day, the guns were disassembled and loaded onto one truck, the firing pins onto another and the ammunition onto a third truck, and the convoy drove under armed guard far out into the Australian Outback, where the guns were re-assembled and fired, and the sounds recorded.

The "prisoners of war" underwent a strict regiment of fasting to appear like they had been incarcerated under the most awful conditions for three years. At mealtimes on the set, these actors (led by Joseph Fiennes who, says Campbell, "took his fasting very seriously") sat at a separate table under the watchful eye of a nutritionist, who monitored all their food intake. Some of the extras in the prison camp came from a nearby hospital, the patients more than eager to be in the movie.

The filming drew some curious onlookers: kangaroos resident in the area were generally well-behaved spectators, hopping across the movie set to their water holes regularly at dawn and dusk but generally keeping to the sidelines. There were some instances though when "Cut!" rang out across the set because a ’roo had hopped into the middle of a battle scene.

Marty and Campbell Katz’s commitment to and passion for this movie somehow infuses it with a gripping realism that–notwithstanding our obvious bias–is deeply moving Marty has been making movies since the 1970s, first with New World Pictures and then with ABC Circle Films (under Barry Diller and Michael Eisner, now Disney top man) where he supervised production for over 50 television movies (including Eleanor and Franklin and Love Among the Ruins) which garnered 25 Emmy awards. In 1985 he joined Disney as Senior Vice President (later Executive Vice President in 1988) for Motion Picture and Television Production.

In 1992 he struck out on his own and founded Marty Katz Productions, still based in Disney with an overall exclusive arrangement, and produced movies like Man of the House starring Chevy Chase. In 1996 the company started operating independently, with offices in Santa Monica. In 1997 Marty was supervising producer on the mega-hit Titanic, which to date has made $1.8 billion (on a $210 million budget).

This despite the proliferation of pirated discs, which independent producers like Marty and big studios like Miramax and Disney exert much effort and expense to curb, to the extent of fielding agents with infrared glasses inside movie houses to scan the audience for hidden cameras. But Marty admits–with the whole-hearted agreement of Tita Midz Siguion Reyna–that there are many, many ways–the pirates are certainly resourceful in this respect–pirates get hold of new movies, oftentimes even before they open in theaters.

We promised to let him know if–or when–The Great Raid finds its way to the dvd havens around town, and if it’s sooner rather than later then it could mean that somebody in that august audience at the preview–the audience included President Ramos, a couple of Cabinet secretaries and senators, diplomats galore, the Zobel family, and a spattering of hoi polloi like us–was secretly taping the film!