After Stanley Kubrick....
August 19, 2010 12:46 PM   Subscribe

Christiane Kubrick is interviewed by Jon Ronson on the sad events of her life since her husbands death in 1999... After a triumplant screening of Paths of Glory in central London's Somerset House Christiane Kubrick speaks to Jon Ronson, the producer of the revelatory 'Stanley Kubrick's Boxes' documentary. Various Kubrick resources can be found on the web but one of the oldest, academicly themed resources can be found here. Previously on the blue here and here. If you are in or visiting London then the fantastic University Of The Arts archive is amazing. These developments make me sad but let's look forward.
posted by Mintyblonde (16 comments total) 11 users marked this as a favorite
 
I was just reading that. I had been wondering what happened to Vivian... that sucks.
posted by shakespeherian at 12:59 PM on August 19, 2010


Jesus, that interview is heart wrenching.
posted by shmegegge at 1:10 PM on August 19, 2010


I read this earlier today. The whole Vivian Kubrick thing is both sad and strange. There's nothing about her on the Internet post-Eyes Wide Shut except 2001 Space Odyssey celebration, from 2008.

"It's her new religion," Christiane shrugs. "It had absolutely nothing to do with Tom Cruise by the way. Absolutely not."

So she became a Scientologist around the time of Eyes Wide Shut, a huge movie with a huge Scientology persona, and it had nothing to do with said persona? Stranger still the interview seems to indicate they had a falling out prior to Eyes Wide Shut's completion, but there's pictures of her at the premiere.

Here's a somewhat obsessive page listing her Scientology accomplishments, or sacraments, or whatever you want to call them.

Something is clearly not adding up and whether this is family drama that's being blamed on Scientology or if there's seriously sketchy stuff here is not clear.
posted by geoff. at 1:16 PM on August 19, 2010


I loved Ronson's article on Kubrick and had no idea it'd been turned into a documentary. And yeah, I'd heard that Vivian had joined the cult & cut off contact with her family a long time ago.
posted by anazgnos at 1:23 PM on August 19, 2010


Also previously.
posted by Threeway Handshake at 1:27 PM on August 19, 2010


Just speculating: When she said "It had nothing to do with Tom Cruise," she may have meant that Cruise didn't actively recruit Vivian or sway her to join the Church.

Despite the fact that he always seems like an asshole to me, I've heard story after story about Cruise being wonderful, generous, funny and gentlemanly when he's working. It's possible that after her father's death and their falling out, Vivian just felt lost and ran towards Cruise -- I don't mean towards him literally. But towards what he represented to her.

This article made me very sad. I grew up "with" Kubrick and his family. I am the same generation as his daughters. Which one of them was in the video-phone scene in "2001"? Isn't that Vivian?
posted by grumblebee at 1:29 PM on August 19, 2010


let's look forward

I'm looking forward to Barry Lyndon on Blu-Ray. C'mon people, let's go! I'll buy two copies, if that 's what it takes.
posted by Faze at 1:30 PM on August 19, 2010 [3 favorites]


That was fascinating. Jon Ronson is someone who I find superficially irritating yet who frequently persuades me that he's a really good guy who does some really good stuff in both TV and writing.
posted by Decani at 1:31 PM on August 19, 2010


Yes. It was Vivian in "2001" (strange Ronson didn't mention that in the article.) Here she is on the screen.
posted by grumblebee at 1:32 PM on August 19, 2010


I'm looking forward to Barry Lyndon on Blu-Ray.

There's a good 1080p transfer that originally aired on Swedish (?) television. A really good transfer considering all the low-light scenes. I felt it was a little noisy, but beautiful none the less.
posted by geoff. at 1:36 PM on August 19, 2010


Oh, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE release "Barry Lyndon" on Blu-Ray. It's like a cruel joke that there are good transfers of all the Kubrick films except my favorite.
posted by grumblebee at 2:00 PM on August 19, 2010


She's an old soul. It's sad to hear about the Scientology cult getting its hooks in Kubrick's family; with this and hearing about her other daughter I would not have gotten the sense of this deep sadness in her, from the first interview I posted a little while back.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 2:02 PM on August 19, 2010


My theory: Stanley was editing Eyes Wide Shut and thought to himself: This is never going to work.
posted by ovvl at 2:06 PM on August 19, 2010 [1 favorite]


And yet it turned out to be his best film.
posted by shakespeherian at 3:24 PM on August 19, 2010


Not to keep going on about Vivian Kubrick, but -- the way Christiane described her as being accompanied by a minder to her father's funeral, and how she has barely spoken with her since she moved to California -- anybody who knows anything about the workings of that cult know that Vivian is probably a flight risk. She may have even written her mother one of the famous "disconnection letters," which I imagine would break any parent's heart. My guess is that she is in the Sea Org and is a "valuable property" since she has two things the Co$ loves: (1) a famous name, and (2) filmmaking experience. The way they have been bleeding people from all over the ranks lately, it doesn't surprise me in the least that they're keeping her on a very, very short leash.
posted by contessa at 4:59 PM on August 19, 2010


Mrs. Intermod and I just watched the Stanley Kubrick's Boxes documentary (Youtube on Tivo on TV).

JUST PERFECT.

Thank you Metafilter.
posted by intermod at 7:02 PM on August 22, 2010


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