9. The Thin Red Line
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCmlOhsIwBk Most of the films on this list changed early in or during production, which makes sense. You might be able to tweak the tone to some extent, but how on earth can you make substantial changes to a film's entire plot after shooting has wrapped? Enter director Terence Malick to provide an answer. Terence Malick is one of cinema's great post-production auteurs. His approach is simple shoot now, work out what the film is later. The latter half of this takes place in the editing room. Often, it is aided by the addition of a voice over to glue disparate pieces of footage together. Far from the comforting world of screenplays, shot lists and storyboards, Malick's process might seem haphazard and scary (especially to investors). It doesn't seem to matter, though why worry about the smooth operation of the conveyor belt when the end product is so tasty? The most famous example of Malick's process at work is 1998's The Thin Red Line, his first film since Days of Heaven in 1978. It's a great piece of work, and unique in that the list of actors who didn't appear in the finished film is equally as impressive as those who did. A lot might have changed in those twenty years, but Malick's affinity for the editing room was not one of them. Little has been released about the original plot of The Thin Red Line, but we do know that it was going to focus on a young soldier played by Adrien Brody. We know this because Brody
turned up at the film's premiere thinking that he was about to watch himself in a big, breakthrough role. Imagine his surprise when he saw that his role had been trimmed down to just a line or two of dialogue. If that's not awkward enough for you, imagine the after party.