” Kansas is all right for men and dogs, but it’s pretty hard on women and horses.”
Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland and Ronald Reagan in SANTA FE TRAIL (194) will be available on Blu-ray September 14th from Warner Archive
The story of Jeb Stuart, his romance with Kit Carson Holliday, friendship with George Custer and battles against John Brown in the days leading up to the outbreak of the American Civil War.
Special Features: Theatrical Trailer
So, who’s up for a movie history lesson? No, not about the history of cinema, but rather a look back at a time that often feels not that long ago, but with others, it may be “olden days”. Now don’t groan and whine about “homework” because this is a compelling look at an incident that was shrouded in mystery at its time. Plus the folks involved, from both sides of this conflict, are talking to one of our most celebrated and honored documentarians. You might recall a fleeting mention of this event in 2012’s Best Picture Oscar winner ARGO. Now with many articles declassified, we can learn the facts behind this mission from just over 40 years ago. Some called it Operation Eagle Claw, others dubbed it Operation Tabas, but it all rested on the spot in the sand, the landing and refueling site known as DESERT ONE.
Using newsreel and archival footage we got a brief backstory as the film begins. In 1953 Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, known by most as the Shah, took over Iran with the rumored help of United States undercover forces (particularly the CIA). Each new US president maintained close ties to the Shah despite reports of the brutality of his regime (mass graves of executed citizens). Finally, in 1979 he was overthrown by the Iranian Revolution led by religious leader Ayatollah Khomeini. The Shah fled to Egypt, and soon flew to the US for cancer treatment. Things came to a boiling point when the Muslim Student Followers of the Imam’s Line stormed the US embassy in Tehran taking fifty-two American citizens hostage on November 4, 1979. Their main demand was that the Shah be returned there to stand trial. Then-President James Carter attempted to end the stalemate through negotiations, but the occupying group, who had the full support of Khomeini, would not budge. As the week dragged into months, Carter was under pressure, particularly from the GOP nominee Ronald Reagan, to use military force to rescue the hostages. But the president was adamant about bringing them home alive and well. As the country seethed with frustration, Carter was secretly working with members of the Delta Force on a rescue plan, Operation Eagle Claw. They would drop in from the nearby stationed USS Nimitz via several RH53D helicopters along with C-130 transport aircraft for refueling. In the late afternoon of April 24, 1980, they initiated the mission. But things were not going there way almost from the start. Two of the eight choppers broke down, dust storms hindered their vision, and several vehicles, including a tourist-filled bus, suddenly appeared. But when the plans were scrapped, one of the copters, crashed into a C-130 causing a massive fire that claimed the lives of eight soldiers. The remainder quickly flew back to the Nimitz, leaving the bodies behind. When the wreckage was found near Tabas, Iranians celebrated as Carter accepted the blame for the failed mission on a televised address. He lost the election, and on the day of Reagan’s inauguration, Iran put the hostages on a plane bound for the US base in Germany before heading back to the states. After 444 days they were going home.
And just who is the award-winning filmmaker behind this? It’s two-time Oscar winner Barbara Koppel, who’s been making documentaries for the big and small screen for 44 years. She’s at the top of her game with this fascinating look at a real defining time for the late 20th century, especially in the area of foreign diplomacy. As mentioned there are many sequences culled from archival footage, from old newsreels to network video, but Kopple delves much deeper with some incredible new interviews. We talk to Iranians who were part of the siege (then, their biggest prime-time TV show was a program instructing viewers about using automatic weapons against a possible US invasion), some of the hostages (including Sgt. Kevin Hermening whose mother was allowed to visit him at the embassy), many of the special ops officers, and even President Carter and Vice-President Walter Mondale. And the newsman most associated with the crisis, Ted Koppel, whose weeknight updates became the still ongoing late evening news magazine “Nightline”. Plus there are clips of his contemporaries who signed off their newscasts with countdown/reminders (this is day 97). Of course, this fanned the flames of frustration which Reagan used to his advantage in many snippets. Carter was perceived as weak because he would not go in guns blazing, fatalities be damned. It’s evident that this part of his presidency still haunts him along with those would-be rescuers left behind (the Red Cross eventually brought the bodies home for burial). One of the film’s greatest assets is the release of the actual recorded phone calls between the Oval offices and the officers in communication with the Delta team (“Hold for the President…go ahead”). You can hear the tension in those audio pieces. But the most powerful scenes are those that visualize that fateful April night. Over the interviews of the soldiers, Kopple uses a form of limited animation (in advertising these were dubbed “animatics” which helped show a client what a finished TV spot would play), that feels like a gritty graphic novel brought to life. Figures move with camera pans, while motion is simulated via quick dissolves, as the audio effects drive home the chaos and carnage. This technique is also utilized as several hostages talk about the late-night “phony executions” which debunks the Iranians’ tales of “great treatment”. But the real “gut puncher” footage may be the footage of the Iranians putting the charred corpses on display for their TV news, leading to celebrations saying that God stepped in to stop the “evildoers”. After four decades it still stings as those there that night still see their fallen comrades screaming in agony as they close their eyes to fitful rest. And now the old copters are part of a playground, with tots climb down the blades. What stays longest may be the message one of the US team got from a British soldier, who scribbled on ragged cardboard that he still carries, “…thanks for trying”. DESERT ONE echoes this sentiment as one of this year’s best documentary features, informative and very moving.
Three and a Half Out of Four
DESERT ONE is playing at select theatres and screens exclusively in the St. Louis area at Landmark’s Plaza Frontenac Cinemas
Mark Weinberg will be speaking at this year’s St. Louis Jewish Book Festival Wednesday November 7th at 10:30am at The Jewish Community Center (2 Millstone Campus Drive). Ticket information can be found HERE
Mark Weinberg is a former speechwriter and advisor to President Ronald Reagan, who served on the 1980 Reagan campaign traveling staff, all eight years in the Reagan White House, and two years thereafter as Reagan’s spokesman in his post-presidency office in Los Angeles. He is an experienced executive communications consultant who has held senior management positions at Fortune 500 corporations and the federal government. Weinberg currently runs his own communications consultancy, Weinberg Communications. He lives in New Jersey with his wife and their two children. Movie Nights with the Reagans is his first book.
Mark Weinberg took the time to talk to We Are Movie Geeks about his book and his upcoming event in St. Louis
Tom Stockman: Tell me about the first time meeting Ronald Reagan.
Mark Weinberg: The first time I met him was in the 1980 campaign aboard the airplane that I was assigned to travel on as part of Reagan‘s press staff. I was introduced to him and he was very gracious and warm. This would’ve been the summer of 1980. He took off his jacket and came back and visited with the staff. He was just like everybody else, easy-going, welcoming and as pleasant as you can imagine.
TS: What was your position exactly at the White House?
MW: I was a special assistant to the President and assistant press secretary. I worked in the West Wing press office and primarily I was responsible for making sure that the President’s White House press corps were able to cover whatever the President was doing. That included everything from meetings in the Oval Office and Cabinet rooms to trips around the United States and around the world. I was responsible for coverage arrangements and access for the White House press corps.
TS: But your book is mostly about the movies that President and Mrs. Reagan watched with friends and staff. President Reagan watched a lot of movies at Camp David and also there at the White House.
MW: Yes, mostly at Camp David on the weekends and sometimes at the White House.
TS: What were the screening rooms like at these facilities?
MW: In the White House there’s a Family Theater which is in the East Wing, which looks like what you would probably expect a movie theater in the White House to look like. A number of comfortable chairs, a screen at the end of the room, projection booth at the back. It was a nice set up, a nice screening room. But at Camp David, where they watched the majority of the movies, they watched them in the living room of the home there. They called it Aspen Lodge. It was their one-story, ranch-style cabin. They just said on the couch and watched the movies right there.
TS: Was there someone in the White House who was the staff projectionist?
MW: Camp David was a Naval facility. There were some Naval personnel there who was trained how to use the projector. At the White House there was a projectionist, but he did other things as well, it wasn’t a full-time job.
TS: How did you get the honor of being able to attend so many of these movies?
MW: The Reagans took a small group of staff with them to Camp David every weekend. Usually a doctor, a military aid, a personal aid, and a press aide. That was my role, and we were all able to join them for the movies.
TS: Were you something of a movie buff before this part of your career?
MW: Not really, but I knew that it was something interesting to the Reagans because they had come from the movie business.
TS: In your book you say that they would often show new movies that had just opened in theaters a week or two earlier. What about when they showed an old Ronald Reagan movie, like BEDTIME FOR BONZO, did they have a 35mm print sent there, or did they just show it on VHS tape?
MW: All the movies we watched were on film, reel to reel on the projector.
TS: I guess that makes sense. If you go to show a movie to the leader of the free world you should be bother to track down a print of it. What was Ronald Reagan like when he was watching a movie? Did he talk during movies?
MW: Oh no. I describe in the book a scene in the living room. As soon as the lights would go down, President and Mrs. Reagan‘s eyes would be fixed on the screen and their eyes wouldn’t leave the screen until the end of the movie. They didn’t whisper to each other. They really studied and watched the movies. I think this is largely because they had been in the movies.
TS: You wrote that there would be something of a post-viewing discussion about the film. Did President Reagan lead these discussions?
MW: By default yes, but it wasn’t like he intended to lead. People would get up from their seats and walk over to the fireplace in the cabin there, and out of courtesy and respect, they would let the President talk first.
TS: Did President Reagan personally choose the movies, especially the new movies that were currently in theaters?
MW: I’d say Mrs. Reagan had the primary role in selecting the movies. They would get recommendations from friends and family. It wasn’t like they could just go to a theater down the street from the White House and walk in and see a movie. That was a physical impossibility, But they liked the movies, and they wanted to be in touch with the pop-culture of the country at the time. Mrs. Reagan would usually make the choice, but she would talk to her husband about it.
TS: I got the impression from your book that neither President nor Mrs. Reagan liked movies with a lot of vulgar language, sexuality or excessive violence.
MW: Right, the ones that they that they liked best were ones that truly entertained and told stories, but did not have gratuitous sex or violence or drug use. They did not like that or think that it was necessary. Nor did they think it was particularly entertaining. They thought the audience’s imagination was more involved when things were suggested, but not blatantly shown.
TS: Ronald Reagan’s final movie as an actor, THE KILLERS, was the only film in which he played a villain. Did he ever screen that film there?
MW: I don’t believe he did. That’s the one where he slaps Angie Dickinson. I know he always regretted doing that. What I was researching this book I read some of his private, hand-written diaries, and he wrote about his regrets making that film. I wrote that it appeals to an actor’s ego to play a role that he has not played before, but his role in THE KILLERS just didn’t work for him.
TS: Yes, you even quote him in your book is saying that as an actor, it was more fun to play the good guy, which is not typical. Usually when you read interviews with actors, they’ll say it’s much more fun to play the villain.
MW: Right, Ronald Reagan did not enjoy playing the villain because he was a genuinely nice guy. He liked playing the likable fellow.
TS: Yes, THE KILLERS is an unusual film in his filmography. Not only is it his only a villain roll, but is the only part he looks older, sort of like he did when he was president. I wonder if he made the decision to stop making movies because that was an unpleasant experience for him.
MW: Good point, but also when Reagan went onto star as the host of GE Theatre on television, the movie industry didn’t think too highly of that. Back then you could not go as comfortably between the small screen and the big screen. Going to television was considered going over to the other side, and he was bothered by that. And of course he met his wife Nancy on the set of HELLCATS OF THE NAVY,
TS: Were there any movies that you watched at the White House or at Camp David that the President and Mrs. Reagan clearly disliked?
MW: Neither of them liked KISS OF SPIDER WOMAN. They liked 9 TO 5, but they were bothered by the fact that there was drug use depicted in that film, the women smoking marijuana. That made him angry. He even noted that in his diary. He thought it was unnecessary and glamorized illegal behavior.
TS: And of course “Just Say No“ to drugs was a big platform for Nancy Reagan.
MW: Yes, in speeches is she made around the country she even cited 9 TO 5 as an example of what Hollywood was doing to contribute to the drug culture.
TS: I really enjoyed the chapter in your book about the Reagans watching ON GOLDEN POND. The dynamics between the father and daughter in that film, played by Henry and Jane Fonda, was an interesting mirror of both Reagan‘s relationship with his own daughter Patti and also between Reagan‘s friend Henry Fonda and his daughter Jane. You write that members of Reagan‘s staff strongly disliked Jane Fonda because of her activism, but Reagan himself never said a bad word about her.
MW: Yes, he really just never mentioned her, like she didn’t exist. Jane Fonda would do interviews and say negative things about Ronald Reagan, but Reagan would never mention her name. Then there’s the movie BACK TO THE FUTURE where there’s a scene where Michael J. Fox has landed in the future and when he finds out the president is Ronald Reagan, he asks “the movie actor? My gosh, is Jane Fonda first lady?“ We all just held her breath when we watched that scene with the President because Mrs. Reagan was sitting right there. Another actress who was just never mentioned in the White House was Jane Wyman, President Reagan’s first wife. But she and Nancy Reagan did speak at Maureen‘s funeral. Maureen was the daughter of Ronald Reagan and Jane Wyman. But back to Jane Fonda. Her politics could not have been more different then Ronald Reagan’s, particularly in regard to the Vietnam war, and nobody could have blamed Reagan if he had banned screening one of her movies at one of his movie nights, Many of the military personnel at Camp David certainly weren’t fond of Jane Fonda, but Reagan never did that. He didn’t pick or watch movies on the basis of political agenda. He and Mrs. Reagan watched movies to be entertained and to see what the popular culture was, and to take nostalgic walks to the memories of their own movies.
TS: Reagan was able to separate art from politics.
MW: Very much so.
TS: You’ll be speaking November 7th at the Jewish book festival here in St. Louis. What will your presentation be like?
MW: I’ll likely talk about how I ended up in the position that I did, and what prompted me to write the book, and to share some stories from it, and maybe also some stories that are not in it. Then I will take as many questions as I can. What I’ve found is that most people have always wanted to know more about the Reagans. I just want to help people understand them a little bit better and how the movies were important to them.
TS: Is this your first book?
MW: It is.
TS: How has it been received so far?
MW: The reviews have been good and I’ve received good feedback. Sales have been good and people seem to be pleased by it. It’s not a book that’s mean-spirited or kiss-and-tell or reveals dark unpleasant secrets. It’s a fun, pleasant read and there seems to be a real hunger for the nostalgia of the Reagans.
