One of the greats. One of the true outlaws. A huge figure in my pantheon. Dammit. RIP. https://twitter.com/Variety_Film/status/1384647712583258121

Monte Hellman was the truest American art/genre filmmaker of the 60s/70s. His films are unclassifiable. Nobody else made movies like THE SHOOTING or COCKFIGHTER or IGUANA or TWO LANE BLACKTOP. He made his own path.

This is a pretty great documentary about him. A lot of tequila gets inhaled in the course of it. I wish I could have had a drink with him.

Fuck it, looks like I’m getting my Criterion dvd of TWO LANE BLACKTOP out and opening a bottle of whiskey, it’s what he would have wanted.

Hellman saw de Niro, Pacino and James Caan for the leads in this movie but ended up casting non-actors James Taylor & Dennis Wilson. He knew what he wanted.

Taylor had his first hit, Fire And Rain, when they were in the middle of shooting the movie. He literally became a star while he was working on it.

Weird how Hellman being one of the exec producers of RESERVOIR DOGS is a footnote in his career. For anyone else it would be the headline.

On the commentary track Hellman says Nicholson was really worried about playing Randall P McMurphy in CUCKOO’S NEST because he’d seen Warren Oates do it onstage and couldn’t imagine improving on that performance.

“That line has become a motto. At least once a week I say ‘it feels good, I can take it all the way.’” Monte Hellman talking to Allison Anders about Taylor’s line in Two-Lane.

“What’s the deal with GTO, he just likes being out on the road?”
“Oh Allison, don’t ask me that, I’m not gonna analyse the movie!”
I love Hellman’s commitment to the movie being the movie.

“In a funny way GTO is my autobiography as well. In High School I liked to tell tall tales. Like Saroyan said, ‘he knew the truth but he wanted something better.” Monte Hellman

“It’s a complete denial of all the values.” Hellman on why the studio didn’t like the movie. He’s right.