MICHAEL CIMINO

Michael Cimino (pronouned "Cha-Mee-Noe"!) was born in New York City in 1939. He graduated from Yale University having studied architecture and drama and went on to get a Master's degree. He is very secretive about what he did afterward (at one point he claimed to have had experiences similar to De Niro's character in The Deer Hunter!), but at some point he decided he wanted to be a screenwriter, and he moved to California. In 1972 he wrote the fine screenplay for the intellectual science fiction (sci-fi) movie, Silent Running, and the following year he wrote the screenplay for Magnum Force, the sequel to Dirty Harry. That led to a relationship with star Clint Eastwood, who was so impressed by Cimino that he asked him to write the screenplay for his next movie, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, and as he was writing it he managed to convince Eastwood to let him direct it as well, and this quirky crime caper movie proved to be one of Eastwood's best. The success of this movie led to Cimino being signed to write and direct The Deer Hunter, and although it went way over budget and took years to complete, the movie was a massive success, both commercially and critically, and Cimino was in high demand. He signed with United Artists to make Heaven's Gate, and he was given "final cut", meaning he had complete control over the movie and its editing. He went massively over budget and essentially bankrupted United Artists, and forced its sale (the entire story is detailed in Steven Bach's fine book, "Final Cut"). The movie was only released in a heavily cut version, and was a massive bomb. That was a personal tragedy for Cimino, because he had been set to next film an adaptation of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead (one could see why this story of an architect who never compromised would appeal so strongly to Cimino, the former architecture student who became a filmmaker who refused to compromise!). But the massive failure of Heaven's Gate caused that project to be permanently shelved. The next few years were filled with projects Cimino started that were finished by others, and times where Cimino helped others finish their projects. Some of these included The King of Comedy, Footloose, a biography of mobster Frank Costello, The Rose, Mutiny on the Bounty, and more. One can only wonder what the "Cimino" versions of these movies might have looked like! He did manage to complete three movies in a five year span, Year of the Dragon, The Sicilian, and Desperate Hours, but none of these showed his earlier brilliance. In his final years he had mostly quit directing and screenwriting, and wrote two novels. Cimino was always rumored to be working on an epic movie of some sort, but he passed away in 2016 at the age of 77.