Stanley Kubrick Overview

Spartacus

Upon his return to the United States, Kubrick worked for six months on the Marlon Brando vehicle One-Eyed Jacks (1961). Brando eventually fired him and decided to direct the picture himself. The two had clashed over a number of casting decisions. Kubrick worked on a number of unproduced screenplays until Kirk Douglas asked him to take over Douglas' epic production Spartacus (1960) from Anthony Mann who had been fired by the studio two weeks into shooting. Based upon the true story of a doomed uprising of Roman slaves, Spartacus was a difficult production. Creative differences arose between Kubrick and Douglas, and the two reportedly had a stormy working relationship. Frustrated by his lack of creative control, Kubrick later largely disowned the film, which further angered Douglas. The friendship the two men had formed on Paths of Glory was destroyed by the experience of making the film. Years later, Douglas referred to Kubrick as "a talented shit." Despite the on-set troubles, Spartacus was a major critical and commercial success, and established Kubrick as a major director. However, its embattled production convinced Kubrick to find ways of working with Hollywood financing while remaining independent of its production system, which he called "film by fiat, film by frenzy." Spartacus is the only Stanley Kubrick film in which Kubrick had no hand in the screenplay, no final cut, no producing credit, nor any hand in the casting. It is largely Kirk Douglas' project.

The Killing

Alex Singer introduced Kubrick to a young producer named James B. Harris, and the two became close friends. Their business partnership, Harris-Kubrick Productions, would finance Kubrick's next three films. The two bought the rights to a Lionel White novel called Clean Break, which Kubrick and co-screenwriter Jim Thompson turned into a story about a race track robbery gone wrong. Starring Sterling Hayden, The Killing was Kubrick's first full-length feature film, shot with a professional cast and crew. The resulting film was unusual in 1950s American cinema in having a non-linear storyline and an unhappy ending. While it was not a financial success, it received good reviews. The widespread admiration for The Killing brought Harris-Kubrick Productions to the attention of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The studio offered them its massive collection of copyrighted stories from which to choose their next project. During this time Kubrick also collaborated with Calder Willingham on an adaptation of the Austrian novel The Burning Secret. Although Kubrick was enthusiastic about the project, it was eventually shelved.

Killer's Kiss

Kubrick's marriage to Toba Metz ended during the making of Fear and Desire. He met his second wife, Austrian-born dancer and theatrical designer Ruth Sobotka, in 1952. They lived together in the East Village from 1952–1955 until their marriage on January 15, 1955. They moved to Hollywood that summer. Sobotka, who made a cameo appearance in Kubrick's next film, Killer's Kiss (1954), also served as art director on The Killing (1956). Like Fear and Desire, Killer's Kiss is a short feature film, with a running time of slightly more than an hour, and met with limited commercial and critical success. The film is about a young, heavyweight boxer at the end of his career who is involved with organized crime. Both Fear and Desire and Killer's Kiss were privately funded by Kubrick's family and friends.

Fear and Desire

Kubrick moved to narrative feature films with Fear and Desire (1953), the story of a team of soldiers caught behind enemy lines in a fictional war. Kubrick and his then-wife Toba Metz were the only crew on the film, which was written by Kubrick's friend Howard Sackler, who later became a successful playwright. Fear and Desire garnered respectable reviews, but was a commercial failure. In later life, Kubrick was embarrassed by the film, which he dismissed as an amateur effort. He refused to allow Fear and Desire to be shown at retrospectives and public screenings, and did everything possible to keep it out of circulation. At least one copy remained in the hands of a private collector, and the film has subsequently surfaced on VHS and later on DVD.