Thomas Schatz > Quotes

“MGM produced an occasional nonstar feature, although these were rare and usually had some obvious hook to draw audiences. A good example of this type of feature was The Fire Brigade, a 1926 project scheduled for a twenty-eight-day shoot and budgeted at $249,556. The picture starred May McAvoy, a “featured player” at MGM, and was directed by William Nigh. The second-class status of the project was obvious from the budget, with only $60,000 going for director, cast, story, and continuity. But the attractions in The Fire Brigade were spectacle, special effects, and fiery destruction rather than star and director. The budget allowed $25,000 for photographic effects and another $66,000 for sets, a relatively high figure since many of the sets for the picture had to be not only built and “dressed” but destroyed as well.”
― Thomas Schatz, The Genius of the System: Hollywood Filmmaking in the Studio Era

“If you talk to God, you are praying. If God talks to you, you have Schizophrenia!”
― Thomas Schatz

“One of the more interesting memos written during his two-week trial period urged Rapf to secure a print of The Battleship Potemkin, a recent film by Soviet filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein. “It possesses a technique relatively new to the screen,” wrote Selznick, “and I therefore suggest that it might be advantageous to have the organization view it in the same way that a group of artists might view and study a Rubens or a Raphael.”
― Thomas Schatz, The Genius of the System: Hollywood Filmmaking in the Studio Era