193 thoughts on “Marlon Brando Movies”

1. Robert Forster made his debut in 1967’s Reflections in a Golden Eye and I vividly remember that debut as he played a young soldier who became Brando’s romantic obsession; and in those far-off days pre-Brokeback Mountain a lot of fuss was made about a Hollywood mega star tackling such a role. As it was John Huston claimed that Marlon’s performance in that movie was the best that Huston had EVER obtained from an actor [though it must be added that John never got to direct Leach, Micklewhite or Willis!]

   Robert went on to generate a massive 186 IMDB credits including-
   (1) 109 big screen feature films and shorts. Those include 1997’s Jackie Brown [for which Robert got a supporting Oscar nom] the 1998 remake of Psycho and Bruce Willis’ 2006 Luck Number Slevin.

   (2) 65 television productions including in 1998 another Hitch remake: the TV movie of Rear Window starring Chris Reeve and Daryl Hannah in the original Stewart/Grace Kelly roles. In the TV remake 3rd billed Forster acted the detective friend of the hero, that friend having been played by Wendell Corey in the big screen version.

   Accordingly in my opinion [admittedly normally ‘B list’ status on this site] Robert is an excellent candidate for a Cogerson page given his prolific output spanning over half a century and including an Oscar nomination in a Tarantino film that included proven acting heavyweights Samuel L Jackson, Michael Keaton and the great DeNiro.

   Dan-like link: Robert Forster’s debut was as said above in a Brando film and DeNiro rose to top stardom playing the young Marlon/Don Corleone in 1974’s Godpop Part 2 [following DeNiro’s critical success the year before in Scorsese’s Mean Streets]. A Dan stretch: Marlon was in Forster’s FIRST film, and DeNiro was in Brando’s LAST film 2001’s The Score.

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2. Via Celebrity Net Worth and the Forbes Rich List I have become familiar with the supposed wealth of many celebrities at all levels of their professions [any other viewer who wishes can also very easily familiarise himself/herself with the information] and it seems clear that today even many people who are not major players in their particular fields of the entertainment/sporting industries are extremely wealthy.
   However here is the reported comparative wealth of 10 movie stars of yesteryear now deceased, adjusted for inflation to 2019 dollars:

   Liz Taylor $670 million
   Frank Sinatra $615 million
   Charles Chaplin $400 million
   Bing Crosby $210 million
   Bob Hope $205 million
   Doris Day $200 million [actual]
   John Wayne $180 million
   Mary Pickford $145 million
   Cary Grant $130 million
   Richard Burton $120 million

   Of course in previous decades there wasn’t the detailed information in the public domain that we are privileged to today [no wells of stats information like the Cogerson site for example!] but it was widely known in general terms that most of the big movie stars were paid huge sums and indeed some specific examples got considerable media coverage such as –

   1/William Holden arranged for Columbia Pictures to pay him his fees in instalments so that he could pay reduced taxes on them. That and his film Golden Boy caused him to be nicknamed “Golden Holden”.

   2/John Ford paid Duke Wayne and Holden not just a large fee each for 1959’s The Horse Soldiers but gave them a generous profit participation as well.

   3/Cary Grant was earning huge sums by getting profit participation deals for his movies.**

   4/Liz Taylor was paid huge amounts for Cleopatra and the Burtons’ lavish lifestyles, Liz’s hoard of mega-expensive jewellery etc were regularly reported in the press. Indeed Richard is supposed to have quipped to a friend “When I first got into bed with her I was broke: when I got out again I was worth a million dollars!”

   Accordingly all that I have said above, more than ever convinces me that Joel Hirschhorn’s singling out of Marlon Brando** for a personal attack over the money that Brando was earning, sadly demonstrates exceptional bias, for whatever reason, on the part of Joel. The latter was of course entitled -indeed had a duty – to criticise Brando performances that Joel though were lacking; but Hirsch becoming an outlier **i n effectively rubbishing Brando’s overall legacy and targeting him about his personal earnings in what after all is an openly acknowledged capitalist society suggests, as I say, exceptional personal bias.

   Within the context of that the wider scheme of things that I have outlined above, Joel’s attack on Brando’s earning capacity strikes me as being a bit like Claude Rains in Casablanca when Bogie asks him why he is closing down the latter’s gambling and Claude replies to Bogie “I’m shocked to find there is gambling going on!”

   **In 1995, more than 100 leading film directors were asked to reveal their favorite actor of all time in a Time Out poll, and Grant came second only to Marlon Brando. [Wikipedia]

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   1. Hey Bob…..thanks for sharing this information. Good stuff as always. As I have stated before….I do not blindly follow what Joel said. I think making nice money in movies is a nice perk. Brando could get the money…so all the power to him. I think Brando’s greatness made reporting his money earned a bigger story than was needed. For example…Adam Sandler reportedly made almost $80 million from The Longest Yard. Yep…it is rarely mentioned. Bruce had a huge payday for The Sixth Sense (he took a percentage versus his 20 million fee) and Jack Nicholson made almost 100 million for Batman. Good to see Cary Grant in second place on the director’s poll. Good comment.

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   2. HI BRUCE: Good reply. My own further thoughts are-

      1/I agree with you about the “bigger story” aspect and in fact one of the Salkind Bros who produced Superman 1978 said in an interview that I saw, when asked about Mr Mumbles’ excessive fee “(1) he’s a SUPER superstar and you don’t get many of those and therefore (2) we knew that the enormity of the amount would attract loads of ‘free’ publicity.” In short: other Joel-types at that time were playing the SALKINDS’ game!

      2/Apparently Stallone wouldn’t sign up Mr Gimme More for Expendables 3 because Brucie was demanding too much money. Mr G M had been in Expendables 2 of course.

      3/As somebody once quipped “Even too much is not enough for some of those guys!” I suppose that it has always been the case that performers who can command a good price will try to suck a bit more [no pun intended!]out of the pot.

      4/Way back in 1961 Spencer Tracy the star of Judgement at Nuremberg complained that Burt Lancaster in a supporting role in that movie was given equal billing to Tracy and was being paid $500,000 [a big sum for a movie role in those days and worth over $4 million today]. The reporter to whom Spence said that, was visiting him on the set of the film and apparently as Tracy spoke he glared and growled in the direction of Burt, who was sitting a short distance away!

      5/One of the most sensible people seems to be Shirley MacLaine. When she was at her peak, she claims she had a flat asking price that she didn’t deviate from and it was none of her business what others were being paid and she didn’t care therefore. On the set of 1970’s Two Mules for Sister Myrna she told a visitor who was enquiring about salaries. “I’m getting my $800,000 and Clint’s getting what he gets and I don’t know what that is.” Oh if only The Master had taken a leaf from her book!

      6/I knew that 100 of the World’s greatest directors in the mid-1990s choosing Archie as their 2nd fave would please you if you saw my post. There is so little difference in stature between the true perceived Greats that I wouldn’t get too hung up about the precise pecking order but I think you and I would agree that any, say ,Top 10 that didn’t include Al Leach is suspect.

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3. HI BRUCE For years I tried to find out what happened to Big Bug Man but without success. As I say there’s maybe a massive gross out there just waiting to blow the Cogerson site apart at the seams and send all that over-hyped stuff about The Thin Woman’s box office grosses off into a parallel world somewhere in which the only person that I’ve ever heard of who will hereafter read the latter is Charlie Bill Stuart in some new guise.

   However here is a reproduction of a current article from an internet site called “Lost Media.”. The original article is accompanied by many tweets from irate Brando fans protesting about not being able to see their idol’s last act of genius. I am sure that if Hirsch were still around, he would be leading the protests!

   There are posters for the movie in the public domain but my own artistic skills are not up to reproducing them so maybe STEVE could help us in that respect?

   “Big Bug Man is an unreleased animated superhero television movie that was Written by Simpson’s Writer Bob Bendetson (Who was also co-director) along with Family Guy director Peter Shin and starred the voices of Brendan Fraser and Marlon Brando. It was noteworthy for being Brando’s last film (his last performance would be for The Godfather Game, or at least most of it if not all of it). The film starred Fraser as Howard Kind, an employee of a candy factory that is bitten by bugs and becomes the superhero Big Bug Man. However, he soon becomes corrupted by the business world.
   Marlon Brando had initially been approached to play the part of evil businessman, Nicholas Dunderbeck, but Brando, who had always wanted to play a woman, decided to play the small role of the elderly candy company founder, Mrs. Sour, instead. When the directors arrived at his home to record him, they found that Brando had even dressed up in a wig, dress, gloves and makeup to get into character. Brando was frail and required oxygen throughout the recording, but he remarked it was the most fun he had since acting in Julius Caesar. He died the very next month on July 1, 2004.
   The film was scheduled to be released in 2006, then 2007, then in 2008. However, nothing has been heard regarding the project’s release since, and its future is uncertain. Storyboard sequences have been since found online.”

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4. HI BRUCE

   No longer a problem as both parts of. the post concerned are now on this page.

   As I keep copies of my comments for a while after posting them [though they are worth keeping forever!] no post of mine can be permanently lost unless you edit it out altogether.

   Thanks for your attention to this matter.

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5. HI WH

   See my 10.18 am post about Brando. Gem though it is on its own it will not make much sense without reading Part One – which I’m told has disappeared somewhere because of suspected spamming What gives – some descendant of the Master obstructing Brando posts ?

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