Eli and the bridge explosion

From THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND ME In My Anecdotage

by Eli Wallach

As for me, I was not allowed to leave the new location because we had many Civil War scenes to film, the most important being the main battleground where the armies of the North and South were separated by a bridge. Leone's technical crew with labor supplied by the Spanish army had spent a month building that bridge, and a dam was constructed to deepen the little stream that ran underneath. Clint and I were to place dynamite at the base of the bridge, then blow it up so that the two armies would then cease fighting one another and move on, leaving us to wade across the river to where we were sure a large sum of money was buried beneath a soldier's grave bearing the name "Arch Stanton". The morning after Clint and I set the dynamite, we gathered around three or four cameras. Clint asked Leone, "Where do you want Eli and me to be when you blow up the bridge?"

Leone pointed to a small ditch about ten yards from the dam. "Over there," he said.

"And where will you be?" Clint asked.

"Well," Leone said, "I have one camera using long lenses up on top of the hill two hundred yards away. That's where I'll be."

After a long pause, Clint said, "I think Eli and I will be standing right at the top of the hill with you. We want to see the bridge blow up too."

"But, but," Leone stammered, "I want to pan down the hill past you and Eli lying in the ditch and then up to the bridge and then we blow it up."

Clint's reply was short and crisp. "No, Sergio," he said. "We will stand right up here by you. That's it."

The man who had planted the explosives for the scene was a captain in the Spanish army. The Italian special effects man was effusive with thanks for the captain's help - not only for the dynamite planning, but for building the bridge as well. "The honor for pressing the button to blow it up should be yours," the special effects man said.~"No, no," the captain said. "I don't want the honor. If we were at war, I would happily blow it up, but this is a movie."

"It's simple," said the Italian. "When I say vaya [go], you press the button. Please, please do it." The captain reluctantly agreed.

At the top of the hill, Leone stood, holding a blackened piece of glass, staring up at the cloudy sky. "Don't turn on the camera until that cloud moves away from the sun," he ordered. Clint was holding a golf putter and playing with it as I kept an eye on the bridge, waiting.

Down below, one of the crew members asked if he should turn the slow motion camera on. "Si, si," the special effects man said. "Vaya."

The captain heard the word vaya and pressed the button. Clint and I stared at the bridge. Leone stood still, his eyes glued to the blackened piece of glass as the sound of the explosive charge echoed down the valley. He let out a slow moan and then began screaming - "No cameras are shooting! No cameras! Half my bridge is gone! I'll kill that son of a bitch!" The special effects man jumped into his jeep and headed straight for the airport. Leone grabbed his megaphone and cursed in Italian - "May your seed dry up! May you drop dead! You're fired, you bastard! I'll kill you if I ever find you."

The Spanish captain walked over to Leone - his voice was low but firm. "It was my fault," he said. "I pressed the button at the wrong time. My soldiers and I will rebuild the broken part of the bridge in three days on one condition: You bring that man who drove away back here. You do not fire him, you understand?" Leone reluctantly agreed.

Three days later, as promised, the bridge was rebuilt and stood shining in the morning sun. Clint still fiddled with his golf putter. Leone was standing beside the camera. He stared at the special effects man and nodded. The Italian expert pressed the button and the bridge went up in flames.

Re-writing THE CASTILIAN

From: SO YOU WANT TO MAKE MOVIES My Life As An Independent Film Producer

by Sidney Pink

(Forced to sue American International Pictures inorder to get money owed for the theatrical release of ANGRY RED PLANET and REPTILICUS as well as to fight that company altering without permission the film JOURNEY TO THE SEVENTH PLANET, Sidney Pink took his family on a vacation to Mallorca.)

It took almost two months before I received the translated script from Madrid, and when I read it, I realized it would take a long time and herculean effort to turn that over-long, verbose, dull work into an acceptable international shooting script. Its characters were boring, the perfect example of the Spanish movie industry's inability to comprehend international tastes. Spanish writers believed a hundred words were better than one picture, and so they talked away about the battles that were going to be fought. The script included only one battle scene, and while that one could be spectacular, it took place at the very end, and no American movie patron would sit that long and wait for it to take place.

It was a formidable task, but I liked the story. It was, in essence, David and Goliath all over again, and its hero was potentially fascinating. It took place in the twelfth century when the Spanish peninsula was divided into small, hostile kingdoms. The Moors, the most civilized people of the world at that time, had begun their invasion of Spain and were subjugating the country village by village and province by province. Their fighting methods were fearsome, and they showed no mercy. Most of the kings of the provinces paid tribute to the Moors to keep them from raiding and pillaging their lands. Spain barely survived under that constant threat, and life in the northern provinces was a constant nightmare.

Abderraman was the caliph at that time, headquartered in the south. The kingdom of Castile was the smallest of the northern provinces but also the most warlike. Fernan Gonzales was the youngest son of the king of Castile; he refused to accept the Moorish presence and was banished. This same Fernan Gonzales became a hero as the first man to stop the Moorish tide of conquest in Europe. Had it not been for him and his grandson, El Cid, Europe today would bear all the marks of a Moorish civilization. At Hazinas (Valley of the Swords), he stopped the Moors in a decisive battle from which they never recovered.

The story in our script came from ancient ballads recounting the exploits of this legend, steeped in mysticism and supersition. It made for great visual moviemaking. Fernan himself was a most colorful and interesting personage. I delved deeper into his history than the original author, who had been content to accept the original ballad of a jester of the age, Jerifan. We researched history as written in the museums and libraries. I discovered that the word guerrilla had been coined by this same Fernan who said, according to the manuscripts attributed to him, "We can not beat the Moors in a war, but we are quick and deceptive; we can beat them in a series of little wars." The Spanish word for small war is guerrilla, and so that modern word comes from Spanish antiquity. I was completely absorbed in the history of the period, and the script we completed showed it.

At this same time, I was taking Spanish lessons from a teacher in Mallorca. She was a brilliant woman, the widow of a college professor and forced to earn her living by teaching gringos the language. Carmen was an excellent teacher but I was a poor student. My head was too full of my AIP problems, which were not going well, and I was distracted by the chore of having to write what was essentially an entirely new script. Carmen's son, Luis de las Bayonas, lived in Madrid, and he later became my translator, teacher, right arm, and good friend through all my years of production in Spain.

Telly & Sally on the HORROR EXPRESS

From: HOLLYWOOD EXILE Or How I Learned to Love the Blacklist

by Bernard Gordon

We were deep into the film when it was time for Telly Savalas to report. Having already worked together, Telly and I were good friends. I had met the beautiful lady for whom he had acquired the London apartment. Sally was one of the loveliest women I have ever seen. She was Anglo-Indian, with burnished coppery hair and a glowing, golden complexion. She was a show-stopper in any country, but in any language she was also the most languid person I had ever met. She seemed to drift along in a dreamworld of her own, never really responding to anyone or any situation.

Shortly after their arrival in Madrid, I called Telly at his hotel. Sally answered.

"How are you, Sally?" I asked in my hartiest tone, genuinely pleased to talk with her.

"I don't know," she murmured.

"Are you glad to be back here?" I asked, trying to make friendly conversation.

"I don't know," she replied.

"Don't you ever say 'yes'?" I coaxed her. "To anything?"

A pause. "Try me," she replied.

Her tone didn't suggest she really meant that, but her tone never betrayed anything. I confess she was so attractive that for a fleeting moment, a stray thought ripped through my mind. After all, what did I know about what went on behind closed doors with these two? But if opportunity it was, I let it pass.

Eli and family in Almeria

From THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND ME In My Anecdotage
by Eli Wallach

I did little to no wandering around Almeria. Worn out after a week of shooting, I'd have my usual cocktail-hour drink with our English landlord, have a fish dinner, memorize some of the scene we would film the following week, then drift off into a deep sleep. After filming one Saturday night, Leone asked if I would like to join him, his wife Carla, and his young daughters for a Sunday at the beach. I happily agreed and spent the day playing games with his young children, eating tapas and sardine-and-egg sandwiches, and drinking good Spanish wine. Being with the Leone family, though, brought on a fierce longing for my own wife and children. My letters to Anne were filled with pleas to come join me in Spain and bring the children and fervent vows never to go off to these crazy locations again.
About ten days later, my hands shoot as I opened a special airmail letter from Anne. "You go off to all of these exotic locations; now the whole family will come join you," she wrote, and asked me to pick them up when they arrived in Almeria. The letter was signed, "Love, from your lonely wife and abandoned children."
"What had I done?" I wondered. I remembered Clint saying the he didn't trust Spanish airplanes, but thank god my family arrived safely. I rented a suite for us at a newly opened hotel near the beach. It was a joyous reunion with Anne, Peter, Roberta, and Katherine. Leone invited them all to the set. They would watch me do a scene, then have lunch, where they would open their little white boxes and be surprised by the size of the chicken sitting between two slices of bread; but they were pleased by the red wine. In the evening, we'd all take a swim in the hotel pool. Leone even gave me a day off so that the Wallach family could wander around and do some shopping in Almeria.
After a week of filming, the cast learned that we would be flying north to do some location shooting near Burgos - the land up there looked like the Virginias and would serve perfectly for the Civil War battle scenes. Leone had spent a year doing research on that war, studying Mathew Brady's book of photographs. Generalissimo Franco had agreed to lend a thousand of his regular army soldiers for the battle scenes. He also allowed Leone to borrow American Civil War cannons and guns from the Madrid army museum. Leone's costumers were able to reproduce the blue and gray uniforms for the soldiers so that they'd look authentic.
Anne, the children, and I flew up to Madrid and from there were driven to a little town called Covarrubias. Our hotel looked out over the town square. After we settled in, I stepped out onto the tiny balcony and about a million mosquitoes flew in. We slammed the French windows shut. Roberta said that the town looked like the shtetl in FIDDLER ON THE ROOF. Katherine suffered from stomach cramps. Anne took her to the drugstore only to find that all the bottled medicines were covered in dust. After three days, Anne decided that she and the children would return to Madrid. "I'll never call your locations exotic again," she said.

Proposing THE CASTILIAN

From: SO YOU WANT TO MAKE MOVIES My Life As An Independent Film Producer

by Sidney Pink

We had drinks first, and I observed the only real drinking was done by Espartaco. While the rest of us drank wine, Espartaco drank his whiskey. To those of you who may not know, in Spain the only true whiskey is Scotch. Julio had no tiem for drinking since he was too busy translating the rapid-fire Espartaco-Pink question and answer period. I was full of questions about Spain, Spanish production facilities, and the script for EL VALLE. Espartaco, on the other hand, was eager to find out the strength of my connections and power to get him his heart's desire, a release deal with a major company. He had no interest in his wife's career - his sole concern was for the film career he envisioned for himself. It was clear to me that Espartaco, although a professed Catholic, gave not even lip service to that religion. He would blow Maruja off the minute his need for her was over. Although many of the beautiful women we worked with fell for this miserable excuse for a man, he never fooled me or my associates.

The worse thing was he had no talent to back up his ambition. It became obvious that Julio Pena was merely a mouthpiece and Emiliano was in over his head. Espartaco (clearly in charge) dominated the conversation, and as I listened, I made a mental note I had to speak and read Spanish if I intended to do business with him. I was almost positive I was not getting a real translation of what Espartaco was saying.

During dinner, we agreed to meet again the following morning at the MD offices. After talking to Maruja herself, we would go look at the studio, lab, and postproduction facilities in Madrid. Considering the needs of the Bronston program, I knew the facilities would have to be at least the equal of the rest of Europe, and now Spain was the focus of the ever-shifting search for another Hollywood, they would soon be the equivalent of our U.S. counterparts.

When I requested an English version of the script, I was told none existed, but if I would agree to write the English script and dialogue, they would have Julio Pena go to work immediately in preparing a translation. I had no choice but to accept, but with the added proviso that if, in my sole discretion, the subject matter and story proved of no interest to an international audience, I would have no obligation to continue with the project.

I arrived at their MD offices as scheduled and met Maruja Diaz in person. She can only be discribed as a Spanish version of Lucille Ball. She wore that animated and impish Lucy look and was a born clown. She was in her late thirties, a trifle too plump for American tastes, but she was delightful. She spoke no English either, but she was easy to understand by her expressiveness and animation. She was incapable of fraud and wore her heart on her sleeve for all to see. She was desperately in love with Espartaco, who treated her like dirt.

I came to love Maruja and I hated seeing her treated like that. She was a wonderfully talented woman who rose from an uneducated but warm and loveing Spanish family. It was her depth and warmth coming from the screen and engulfing audiences that made her a star. I think she knew I liked her and she responded in kind. We spent a great deal of time together trying to make PELUSA an international picture, but it just didn't work: it ws just too darned much like a local joke. When Espartaco turned on her, she lost so much of herself that she never again made a hit picture.

Our tour of the Madrid, ChaMartin, and Roma studios convinced me Spain had everything necessary for becoming an international film production center. MD agreed to send the translated script within the next four weeks, and I flew back to Copenhagen, leaving Luis Sanchis to draw up whatever documents were needed to record and protect our agreement.

Shooting trains for HORROR EXPRESS

From: HOLLYWOOD EXILE Or How I Learned to Love the Blacklist
by Bernard Gordon

One of the first sequences I had planned for filming with both of them was at the abandonded Delicias railroad station in central Madrid. Aging and decrepit, the station was no longer in active use by the Spanish rail system except to store obsolete locomotives and carriages, but it was a magnificent structure of wrought-iron arches and columns supporting a glass roof, originally designed and built by Alexandre-Gustave Eiffel, the genius with wrought-iron who built the Eiffel Tower in Paris. It was perfect for our period film set in the year 1906. More than that, we had the use of full-size period trains and locomotives, so we could see our characters climbing in and out of real trains, then see a real locomotive billowing great clouds of steam as it chugged from the station with our characters aboard. Since almost the entire action of our film was on the train, we needed many exterior shots of our minature traversing the snowy wasteland of Siberia. I decided we should establish an authentic, full-size train at the very beginning to convince the audience that all subsequent train shots were just as real. The initial sequence in the station worked out beautifully and gave the film a very handsome and substantial start. The strategy worked - no one complained that our miniatures looked fake.

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