Original subtitles

One of the big reasons we chose to go to Yugoslavia

and do a lot of our work there

was they had made a number of pictures over there...

...had a good number of people that could crew for us...

...and were willing to make great money deals with us.

lt was very inexpensive to shoot in Yugoslavia.

And it also offered us many opportunities to shoot.

We could shoot ltaly in Yugoslavia.

We could shoot Berlin. We could shoot Moscow.

Any number of places that we were able to shoot in Yugoslavia.

We got cheap help. They had a great lab in Zagreb.

The food was terrific.

And it was a wonderful country.

So we shot as much as we could possibly shoot there.

We shot there in winter, we shot there in summer.

Roll it!

Three-one-three-zed. Take two.

Action.

Cut.

Next.

Very good. Break for lunch, one hour, please!

Our base of operations was Zagreb,

which, as a former capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire,

even though it is remote in today's Europe, or was then,

it had all the grand interiors and exteriors that we needed,

and could stand in for a lot of the capitals of the period.

Zagreb, at that time, was relatively untouched.

The reign of Marshal Tito was just ending.

lt was a communist country.

lt had not been transformed by commercialism,

so there was very little tourist activity.

Things were pretty much as they had been.

Also, it was relatively untouched by the war,

so a lot of things remained.

A lot of atmosphere remained that didn't exist in the rest of...

ln the advanced western side of Europe.

Let's do it.

- Go with it. - Action!

l was the unit publicist on The Winds of War for all of the European shoot,

which was most of the year.

The publicist is there to write about the actors,

to work with the photographer,

and to bring guests in, visiting press,

to do their interviews with the actors, although, in the case of Mitchum,

it made it easy, because Mitchum had it in his contract

that he would do no interviews while he was shooting.

Mitchum hated being interviewed.

You have a complaint?

We are a party of Americans. Military attach�s.

We didn't rise for your anthem. We are neutrals.

This waiter chose to take offense. He's been clumsy, rude and dirty.

He's jostled the ladies. His conduct has been swinish.

You tell him to behave himself, and we need a clean cloth for our dessert.

You will be served properly. My apologies.

Well done. Beautifully done.

Oh, Pug does have a way about him.

OK, Dad.

We hadn't had our dessert.

Nobody had ever written a book, at that time,

about the making of a miniseries like this.

And the people who were the head of my department said:

''Do that. Go and stay with them,

''and just write about what you see.''

They just said, ''Do it.''

And l wound up writing it as a journal,

simply because that seemed to work.

- OK. Cin cin. - Cin cin.

This is not gonna be slugged down immediately,

and you'll see why.

lt's great.

Take nine!

This is strong stuff.

lt's very good.

l learned more about what moviemaking life is like

on Winds of War than l had in the 20 years

of working on film sets before that.

That happens when you work... When you're on location,

it becomes a different world.

Action!

All four special action groups will jump off today.

They will begin actions immediately in the border towns.

Himmler will be sending in daily figures.

OK, cut.

All right.

You can't... lf you're gonna say your line...

Now you're playing it much faster, which is good, l like that. All right.

You're doing it right, but you're gonna have to start much later.

- Right. - OK?

You're playing it fine. l want you to play it that way. Before, it was too slow.

All right, now hold on for a second.

You can't kneel down until...

You kneel down and you rub the dog's head,

then you say, ''So begins the fulfillment of a dream.''

- All right. - Go again.

When you find yourself working this hard and these killer hours,

which they are, you become a family.

And it's a clich� you've heard a lot,

but it becomes a family and an adventure.

lt's the best part of making a movie, as far as l'm concerned,

is what goes on with the 1 6 or 20 people

that are really making it happen.

And so here we all are and we all have one language,

which is ''make this movie''.

And everybody on this crew is the best.

So it's wonderful. l just love it.

Whenever she had a day off, we would take Ali into town,

into the middle of town, just with a photographer,

just to shoot.

Ali even had managed to learn enough

simple courtesies in Croatian

so that she could sort of talk to people in the open markets,

or at least attempt to.

Yeah, it's gonna come up.

Magic.

And the people of Zagreb

were so delighted that this incredibly beautiful American star

was at least trying to learn a little of their language,

that they would swarm around her.

She was great with kids.

There was one moment there with pigeons and bread crumbs,

and a little girl who just attached herself to Ali

and wouldn't go away.

All the actors really enjoyed themselves in Yugoslavia.

We used to eat in the restaurant up on top of the hotel,

up on the 1 7th floor.

A big gang of us would sit around a table up there.

l remember the night that l met Topol there,

Topol, who was playing Berel Jastrow.

lt was a great experience.

We were all sitting at a table, and l had never met him before.

He was cast on the telephone.

l cast him after seeing him in FiddIer on the Roof.

Somebody taps me on the shoulder,

l turn around and l look and there's this young guy smiling at me.

l have no idea who it is.

And he says, ''Don't get scared.'' He says, ''Chaim Topol.''

And l look at him and l can't believe it.

He says, ''l know, l look very young, but don't worry,

''tomorrow l'll look very old.''

He was a young guy, a young, vibrant guy

and he made up great, so he was beautiful.

Everybody loved it in Yugoslavia, they toured all over the country.

Ali used to love the flower markets

and the food markets.

lt was just... They had a great time.

- Who am l? - Who are you anyway?

- You forgot. - You forgot?

Are you really Mr. Right?

Or might you be Mr. Wrong?

l'm ready anytime you are.

- l am right. - l am always right.

- Excuse me in the background. - You are not wrong.

OK, as soon as it's serious, l can do it.

All right, it's really tragic now, pay attention.

Everybody's great.

Every little part, all the way through has been unbelievable,

how they've blend and fit.

l love it. lt's a great, great, fun group.

And it's so interesting the way everybody approaches it.

And then, of course, as we've worked...

l mean, l started in January and we're in May now.

We all sort of know each other and speak languages

and it's been a great, great time.

Being on location, l think most filmmakers would agree,

that while there are physical discomforts

and lonelinesses,

loneliness and that sort of aura of unreality

that you have to deal with when you go back to your real life,

there is a much closer feeling

amongst the people working on the film.

And there is a much greater concentration if you are on location,

because you don't have the distractions of your everyday life.

You do tend to think about what you're doing 24 hours a day.

Everyone becomes mono-minded.

And the project benefits.

lf l'm asked, ''What do you remember about Winds of War?''

l remember my life.

l remember... l don't mean my life in America,

l remember days, breakfasts,

odd tableaus that l saw for the first time when l arrived on the set.

Pictures like that plane crashed in the square in Yugoslavia, just smoldering.

And the miracle of Dan Curtis' art department,

which l think was the most astonishing work l've ever seen.

We did maybe 60 setups a day, sometimes.

Let's get a lot of it up in the air, let's go.

Can we shoot it?

You guys ready here?

- Somebody at least talk to me! - We are ready.

Clearly we are not behind the German lines.

Look, we are perfectly go...

Cut, do a pickup.

One more try, let's try it again.

Roll it.

He's like a ringmaster of a circus,

and the more chaos and the more difficult and the more demanding...

And he's a frustrated general, actually, Dan.

He really, you know... He really should have been Patton,

because he needs these troops around him

and he feeds off this energy,

and his intelligence feeds off this energy.

lt's the perfect material for him because it's so...

lt's so operatic,

it's so powerful, it's so profound.

lt's World War ll, it's what turned the world around on its axis.

l mean, it doesn't get better than that.

l read the call sheet, l think it's hilarious.

l've got to read you what's on call besides us.

Where is it? lt's here somewhere.

lt's just, it makes me laugh.

This is just one day, wherein, ''60 Polish guns for soldiers,

''four cows, four pigs, eight horses for cannons,

''one cannon in the car vicinity, one dog,

''a Swedish ambassador, four army trucks, six horse-drawn cannons.''

l've never been in a movie like this,

where the call sheet had a page and a half

of what's gonna go on in back of you.

And it's fun. l mean, logistically,

it's a nightmare for them.

We shot in rain and snow

and sleet and hail, and we went through all the seasons.

And we just worked, we didn't care what it was.

l can remember one time we were rigging the lights on a car

for doing a running shot,

and it started raining. And l'm out there working

and pretty soon l notice all the extras are kind of walking away.

And l look around and l'm standing out there by myself.

Everybody found out that the Yugoslav extras,

the farmers, wouldn't allow their animals to work in the weather.

They didn't care if we did, but they wouldn't let the animals work.

And so they took all the animals home and left.

So we wrapped for the day.

The thing l liked most about Yugoslavia was the innocence.

The people were wonderful in Yugoslavia.

lt was still a communist country,

and it was very impoverished,

but it had this tremendous innocence.

And wherever you went, people were very happy to see you.

lt had a tremendous amount of charm,

these quaint villages, that wonderful little village that we shot in,

and did the Jewish wedding,

where Berel Jastrow's son was getting married.

Oh, what a beautiful little place. And we actually used the rabbi.

The real rabbi and a real cantor.

lt was amazing to go out into the country in Yugoslavia at that time.

l mean, you were literally going back in time, the people were very simple.

They lived the same way

that the previous ten generations had lived.

l'm afraid that a lot of that is gone now, and it's a great tragedy.

l loved every single solitary minute of making Winds of War.

l can't say that about everything l've ever done.

l felt l was part of something really important,

really honorable, really larger than life,

that would touch millions of people,

and that had an authenticity and a quality to it

that very few actors ever get to sign on for the 1 2 months of work

that it represented for me.

So l have no bad memories.

l have only huge pride that l was asked to be part of it.

l went to... With my mother to Auschwitz.

And l spent there two years, two and a half years, and then l came back.

Actually, before l went to Bergen-Belsen,

where l met my mother again after two and a half years.

And we came back to Yugoslavia

and my father was killed during this time...in Yugoslavia.

And then, in '66, l started making movies.

And from then until today,

l'm always dedicated to movies talking about the Holocaust.

Gentlemen, we are finished here.

Move everything out from here.

We will put the car now on the trailer.

And we'll make first from there to that side the trailer. Thank you.

Branko, let's get a rehearsal with the car while we're waiting for that.

Branko, where do we prepare it?

- Down there? - Yes, on the crossing.

l think that the importance for me of Winds of War...

Actually, it's very much to do with what l mentioned, that an old Yugoslavian

said to me about why they make war movies.

''So that our children will know

''that the life we have wasn't just given to us.''

l just got goose bumps going through some of this stuff,

walking on these locations.

And l never got tired of it.

lt was the toughest thing l ever had to do,

yet l never got tired.

l could have kept shooting forever.

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