" Avatar " without James Cameron . " E.T. " without Spielberg . “Citizen Kane"without Orson Welles . What would some of history ’s nifty films have been like without their fabled directors ? One could debate that these film may have turned out altogether other than if they were directed by someone else – if they were even made at all .
The theatre director is the creative driving force behind a motion picture . His problem is to turn lyric on a varlet into image on a concealment , to tell a history rich with imagination and to create films that will call down emotion and deeper thought .
All of this movie - making conjuring trick does n’t just start when the director cry , " action ! " It begins months , even yr before at the start of pre - product . Before the director countersink foot on a cinema set , he devotes tremendous time and Department of Energy to casting , storyboards , reconnoiter out locations and plan every shot to help bring his imaginativeness to life . Once output begins , the director ’s job gets even more intense , as many directors work around - the - clock to film and wrap a movie .
But what if a director dedicates his prison term and energy to a moving picture , only to be unceremoniously provoke before the film ever hits the screen ? Not only would he have a creative expiration but a financial one as well . Even worse , someone else would likely get citation for directing the film .
While directors once had relatively trivial protection against this sort of scenario , the Eastwood Rule , usher in in the 1970s , was designed to change that . Want to have it off how it helps protect a director ’s interests in a plastic film ? Keep scan to find out .
Ditching the Director? Think Again.
Like many in the entertainment industry , directorsare represented by a mating – the Directors Guild of America . The DGA keep a strict set of guideline aim at protecting the fiscal and creative rights of its members . One of these guidelines , casually referred to as the Eastwood Rule , is plan to prevent anyone from firing a director once he ’s been hired and begin work on a movie .
Specifically , the Eastwood Rule stipulates that no actor , manufacturer or other person engaged in a moving picture may open fire the flick ’s director and assume his duties and title . For example , a producer who disagrees with the director on the direction in which a plastic film is heading ca n’t simply dismiss the conductor from the undertaking and take on the job . Along the same vein , a virtuoso , no matter how well - known , ca n’t have the director of a film can and interchange with another penis of the crew [ seed : McGilligan ] .
The Eastwood Rule go into burden once any motion picture crew charter a film director who ’s a member of DGA and sign the organization ’s standard contract . Violations of the Eastwood Rule do with some pretty meaning penalties , include hefty mulct levied against the production and certain gang members . In some cases , the Directors Guild may even reverse the membership of whoever step in to replace a fire director , making it difficult or impossible for that person to find oeuvre in the mainstream movie business .
This rule beam a subject matter to moviemakers that a music director put plenty of employment into a picture , include significant resources before filming even begin . It insure directors will be paid for their piece of work and help supervise ego and forbid disagreements .
Now that you know how the Eastwood Rule works , countenance ’s take a looking at where it got its name and the event that instigate its creation .
Don’t Mess With Clint
As you may have guessed , the Eastwood Rule is name for legendary actor and film director Clint Eastwood . But the use of his name is n’t a protection – if anything , it ’s a dig at Eastwood and his refusal to let anything get in the way of his vision as he shoot a movie .
In 1976 , during the filming of " The Outlaw Josey Wales , " Eastwood grew increasingly frustrated with director Philip Kaufman ’s tiresome , methodical expressive style and unwavering desire to create the perfect shot , no matter how much meter it took . Shortly after filming began , Eastwood used his star power to have Kaufman kicked off of the project . After he convinced producers to post Kaufman backpacking , Eastwood took over the director ’s chairwoman for the remainder of the project .
The problem was that Kaufman – who went on to steer " Invasion of the Body Snatchers " and " The Unbearable Lightness of Being " – had not only put a great tidy sum of work into pre - production and motion-picture photography but also co - indite the handwriting for the picture . The Directors Guild fought hard for Kaufman ’s reinstatement , but Eastwood decline to budge . driven to forestall other directors from suffer a alike fate , the Guild beefed up penalties for letting go of a managing director once he ’d been hired , and the Eastwood Rule was born .
Ironically , Eastwood ’s action at law would make out back to spite him . When writer and director Richard Tuggle failed to foregather Eastwood ’s expectations during work on the movie " Tightrope " in 1984 , the Eastwood Rule prevented him from having Tuggle transfer from the project . Eastwood did take over many of the directing responsibility for the undertaking , but Tuggle still catch the claim and stayed involved with the movie till the bitter ending [ source : Denby ] .
