Books, Arts & Manners: The Tong Wars

Michael Cimino may well be the epitome of whatever is wrong with Hollywood. He is certainly the David Begelman of movie directors, as those who could not deduce it from his spectacular rise and fall and rise can easily gather from Final Cut, Steven Bach’s book that tells how Cimino managed, with only the passively imbecile complicity of the company, to bankrupt United Artists virtually singlehanded. Heaven’s Gate, one of the most expensive self-destructing artifacts in the history of cinema, drove UA out of business; it was bought by MGM, which then became MGM/UA, and, having signed Cimino to a two-picture contract, might be well on its way to becoming alphabet soup.

Hollywood, which operates on the mysterious Begelman Principle, whereby the dirtier and uglier your failure—provided only that it be enormous enough—the more sure you are of reinstatement under usually even more favorable terms, has lifted Cimino right out of the doghouse into the director’s chair, and Year of the Dragon was made, in effect, for the same company he destroyed. The new film is, like everything he has done—including the Oscar-winning Deer Hunter— an abomination.

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John Simon

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Michael Cimino may well be the epitome of whatever is wrong with Hollywood. He is certainly the David Begelman of movie directors, as those who could not deduce it from his spectacular rise and fall and rise can easily gather from Final Cut, Steven Bach’s book that tells how Cimino managed, with only the passively imbecile complicity of the company, to bankrupt United Artists virtually singlehanded. Heaven’s Gate, one of the most expensive self-destructing artifacts in the history of cinema, drove UA out of business; it was bought by MGM, which then became MGM/UA, and, having signed Cimino to a two-picture contract, might be well on its way to becoming alphabet soup.

Hollywood, which operates on the mysterious Begelman Principle, whereby the dirtier and uglier your failure—provided only that it be enormous enough—the more sure you are of reinstatement under usually even more favorable terms, has lifted Cimino right out of the doghouse into the director’s chair, and Year of the Dragon was made, in effect, for the same company he destroyed. The new film is, like everything he has done—including the Oscar-winning Deer Hunter— an abomination.