Under the Volcano (1984 film)

Last updated
Under the Volcano
Under the volcano, film poster.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by John Huston
Screenplay byGuy Gallo
Based on Under the Volcano
1947 novel
by Malcolm Lowry
Produced by
  • Moritz Borman
  • Wieland Schulz-Keil
Starring
Cinematography Gabriel Figueroa
Edited byRoberto Silvi
Music by Alex North
Distributed by
Release dates
  • May 18, 1984 (1984-05-18)(Cannes)
  • June 12, 1984 (1984-06-12)(U.S.)
Running time
112 minutes
Countries
  • Mexico [1]
  • United States
LanguagesEnglish
Spanish
Box office$2,556,800 [2]

Under the Volcano is a 1984 drama film directed by John Huston and starring Albert Finney, Jacqueline Bisset, and Anthony Andrews, based on Malcolm Lowry's semi-autobiographical 1947 novel. The film follows the last 24 hours in the life of Geoffrey Firmin (Finney), an alcoholic British former consul in the small Mexican town of Quauhnahuac on the Day of the Dead in 1938.

Contents

The film premiered at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival, where it was nominated for the Palme d'Or. Under the Volcano received Oscar nominations for Best Actor in a Leading Role for Finney's performance and Best Original Score for Alex North’s score, along with Golden Globe nominations for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama (Finney) and Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture (Bisset). The film is an international co-production between Mexico and the United States.

Plot

On the Day of the Dead in 1938, Firmin, an alcoholic former British consul to Mexico, despondent from the yearlong absence of his wife Yvonne, wanders the streets of Quauhnahuac in a stupor, observing the festivities and crashing a Red Cross charity ball.

Cast

Production

Development

In the late 1950s, Under the Volcano author Malcolm Lowry adapted his novel into a screenplay and attempted to interest Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to produce it [3] after being hired to adapt F. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender Is the Night . [4] The studio passed and Lowry died in 1957. Actor Zachary Scott optioned the novel in 1962, but after he died his widow sold the rights to brothers Robert and Raymond Hakim.

Popocatepetl, the titular volcano. PopoAmeca2zoom.jpg
Popocatépetl, the titular volcano.

Guy Gallo, a novice playwright [5] who had written two academic papers on Malcolm Lowry at Yale University, began to write a screenplay. [6]

Casting

Albert Finney was cast in the lead role of Geoffrey Firmin, Jacqueline Bisset as his wife Yvonne, and Anthony Andrews as his half-brother Hugh. Firmin's friend Dr. Vigil was played by Ignacio López Tarso, an actor lesser known to English-speaking audiences but highly recognized by Mexican ones as one of the top stars of the Golden Age of Mexican cinema, winning the Ariel Award for Best Actor in 1973 for the Roberto Gavaldón film Rosa Blanca . The supporting cast includes several prominent Mexican filmmaking personalities, including director and occasional actor Emilio Fernández, cult film actor Hugo Stiglitz, and actress Katy Jurado.

Filming

Yautepec de Zaragoza. Arbol de la glorieta - panoramio.jpg
Yautepec de Zaragoza.

Principal photography began on August 8, 1983, in the village of Yautepec de Zaragoza, a short car ride from Cuernavaca. [7]

Reception

The film was entered into the 1984 Cannes Film Festival, where it was nominated for the Palme d'Or. [8]

Upon general release, it received generally positive reviews from critics. Reviewing in The New York Times , Janet Maslin especially praised Finney's performance. [9]

Awards and nominations

The film was enthusiastically received, and was nominated for several awards.

Academy Awards

Golden Globe Awards

Cannes Film Festival

Other awards

YearAssociationCategoryNomineeResult
1984 Los Angeles Film Critics Association Best Actor Albert FinneyWon
1984 New York Film Critics Circle Best Actor Nominated
1984 National Board of Review Top Ten Films of the Year Won
1985 London Film Critics Circle Best ActorAlbert FinneyWon

Huston's drama has sometimes been shown in tandem with an earlier documentary film: Volcano: An Inquiry Into the Life and Death of Malcolm Lowry (1976) is a National Film Board of Canada feature-length documentary produced by Donald Brittain and Robert A. Duncan and directed by Brittain and John Kramer. It opens with the inquest into Lowry's "death by misadventure," and then moves back in time to trace the writer's life. Selections from Lowry's novel are read by Richard Burton amid images shot in Mexico, the United States, Canada and England.

There are two documentaries about the making of the Huston film: Gary Conklin's 56-minute Notes from Under the Volcano and the 82-minute Observations Under the Volcano, directed by Christian Blackwood.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Albert Finney</span> English actor (1936–2019)

Albert Finney was an English actor. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and worked in the theatre before attaining fame for movie acting during the early 1960s, debuting with The Entertainer (1960), directed by Tony Richardson, who had previously directed him in theatre. He maintained a successful career in theatre, movies and television.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Huston</span> American filmmaker (1906–1987)

John Marcellus Huston was an American film director, screenwriter and actor. He wrote the screenplays for most of the 37 feature films he directed, many of which are today considered classics. He received numerous accolades including two Academy Awards and three Golden Globe Awards. He also received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1960 and the BAFTA Fellowship in 1980.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Katy Jurado</span> Mexican actress (1924–2002)

María Cristina Estela Marcela Jurado García, known professionally as Katy Jurado, was a Mexican actress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jacqueline Bisset</span> British actress

Winifred Jacqueline Fraser BissetLdH is a British actress. She began her film career in 1965 and first came to prominence in 1968 with roles in The Detective, Bullitt, and The Sweet Ride, for which she received a Golden Globe nomination as Most Promising Newcomer. In the 1970s, she starred in Airport (1970), The Mephisto Waltz (1971), Day for Night (1973), which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Le Magnifique (1973), Murder on the Orient Express (1974), St. Ives (1976), The Deep (1977), The Greek Tycoon (1978) and Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? (1978), which earned her a Golden Globe nomination as Best Actress – Motion Picture Comedy or Musical.

<i>Under the Volcano</i> Novel by Malcolm Lowry

Under the Volcano is a novel by English writer Malcolm Lowry (1909–1957) published in 1947. The novel tells the story of Geoffrey Firmin, an alcoholic British consul in the Mexican city of Quauhnahuac, on the Day of the Dead in November 1938. The book takes its name from the two volcanoes, Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl, that overshadow Quauhnahuac and the characters. Under the Volcano was Lowry's second and last complete novel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elpidia Carrillo</span> Mexican actress (born 1961)

Elpidia Carrillo is a Mexican actress and director. Her career includes roles in both Latin American and US film and television. She is best known in the United States for her supporting role in the action films Predator, Bread and Roses,Nine Lives, and Blue Beetle.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edward Albert</span> American actor (1951–2006)

Edward Laurence Albert was an American actor. The son of actor Eddie Albert and Mexican actress Margo, he starred opposite Goldie Hawn in Butterflies Are Free (1972), a role for which he won a Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year. He was nominated for Best Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy. Albert starred in more than 130 films and television series, including Midway, The Greek Tycoon, Galaxy of Terror, The House Where Evil Dwells, The Yellow Rose, Falcon Crest and Power Rangers Time Force.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Daniel Mann</span> American stage, film and television director

Daniel Chugerman, known professionally as Daniel Mann, was an American stage, film and television director.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Albert Lamorisse</span> French filmmaker, film producer, and writer (1922–1970)

Albert Lamorisse was a French filmmaker, film producer, and writer of short films which he began making in the late 1940s. He also invented the strategic board game Risk in 1957.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Im Sang-soo</span> South Korean film director

Im Sang-soo is a South Korean film director and screenwriter. He has twice been invited to compete for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, with The Housemaid in 2010 and The Taste of Money in 2012.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jacques Audiard</span> French film director and screenwriter

Jacques Audiard is a French film director, producer, and screenwriter. He is the son of Michel Audiard, also a film director and screenwriter.

<i>The Knack ...and How to Get It</i> 1965 film by Richard Lester

The Knack …and How to Get It is a 1965 British comedy film directed by Richard Lester and starring Rita Tushingham, Ray Brooks, Michael Crawford, and Donal Donnelly. The screenplay by Charles Wood is based on a play of the same name by Ann Jellicoe. The film is considered emblematic of the Swinging London cultural phenomenon. It was the first movie appearance of Jane Birkin and Charlotte Rampling.

<i>The Eighth Day</i> (1996 film) 1996 Franco-Belgian film

The Eighth Day is a 1996 Franco-Belgian comedy-drama film that tells the story of the friendship that develops between two men who meet by chance. Harry, a divorced businessman who feels alienated from his children, meets Georges, an institutionalised man with Down syndrome, after Georges has escaped from his mental institution and is nearly run over by Harry. The film was selected as the Belgian entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 69th Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dardenne brothers</span> Belgian film directors, screenwriters and film producers

Brothers Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne, collectively referred to as the Dardenne brothers, are a Belgian filmmaking duo. They write, produce, and direct their films together. They also own the production company Les Films du Fleuve.

<i>The Ballad of Narayama</i> (1983 film) 1983 film directed by Shōhei Imamura

The Ballad of Narayama is a 1983 Japanese film by director Shōhei Imamura. It stars Sumiko Sakamoto as Orin, Ken Ogata, and Shoichi Ozawa. It is an adaptation of the book Narayama bushikō by Shichirō Fukazawa and slightly inspired by the 1958 film directed by Keisuke Kinoshita. Both films explore the legendary practice of ubasute, in which elderly people were carried to a mountain and abandoned to die. Imamura's film won the Palme d'Or at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival.

The 18th Academy Awards were held on March 7, 1946, at Grauman's Chinese Theatre to honor the films of 1945. Being the first Oscars after the end of World War II, the ceremony returned to the glamour of the prewar years; notably, the plaster statuettes that had been used during the war were replaced by bronze statuettes with gold plating and an elevated base.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rachid Bouchareb</span> French film director and producer

Rachid Bouchareb is a French film director and producer. His films are based on the complex history of France and its relationship with its former colony, Algeria. His films also examine racial discrimination and conflicts in other countries, using historical dramas and contemporary settings to show his message.

Lawrence "Larry" Peerce is an American film and TV director whose work includes the theatrical feature Goodbye, Columbus (1969), the early rock and roll concert film The Big T.N.T. Show (1965), One Potato, Two Potato (1964), The Other Side of the Mountain (1975) and Two-Minute Warning (1976).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1981 Cannes Film Festival</span>

The 34th Cannes Film Festival was held from 13 to 27 May 1981. The Palme d'Or went to the Człowiek z żelaza by Andrzej Wajda. The festival opened with Three Brothers by Francesco Rosi and closed with Honeysuckle Rose, directed by Jerry Schatzberg.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1984 Cannes Film Festival</span>

The 37th Cannes Film Festival was held from 11 to 23 May 1984. The Palme d'Or went to the Paris, Texas by Wim Wenders.

References

  1. "Under the Volcano (1984)". American Film Institute . Retrieved June 6, 2019.
  2. Under the Volcano at Box Office Mojo
  3. Strobel, Nancy; Tiessen, Paul (2011). The Letters of Malcolm Lowry and Gerald Noxon, 1940-1952. Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada: UBC Press. ISBN   978-0-7748-4479-6.
  4. Phillips, Gene D. (1986). Fiction, Film, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Chicago, Illinois: Loyola University Press. ISBN   978-0-8294-0500-2.
  5. Gold, Herbert (December 11, 1983). "HUSTON FILMS A CULT CLASSIC". The New York Times . ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved July 16, 2023.
  6. "AFI|Catalog". catalog.afi.com. Retrieved 2023-07-16.
  7. Harmetz, Aljean (August 23, 1983). "HUSTON FILMING 'UNDER THE VOLCANO' BESIDE MIST-SHROUDED POPOCATEPETL". The New York Times . ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved July 16, 2023.
  8. "Festival de Cannes: Under the Volcano". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved 2009-06-23.
  9. Maslin, Janet (13 June 1984). "Film: Huston's 'Under the Volcano'". The New York Times .