WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE MISSING MOVIES OF 1985?

A Columbia Pictures executive, trying to describe what was the trouble with “Big Trouble,” shrugged: “What can I say, it sounded great on paper.”

The film reunited “The In-Laws” crazies Peter Falk and Alan Arkin plus producers Michael Lobell and Andrew Bergman. This time, Arkin played a mild-mannered insurance salesman who wants to send his three kids to Yale and turns to a life of crime with a little help from swindler Falk.

Directed by John Cassavetes in the summer of 1984, “Big Trouble” was to be released last spring. Then summer. When it failed to show up on the fall schedule, a reporter was reassured, “It’s going to be released. It’s just that we’re not sure when. Probably before the end of the year.”

But aside from a disastrous test screening in San Diego that was marked by numerous walk-outs, “Big Trouble” never made it to the screen in 1985. Its current status is . . . shaky. On Monday it wasn’t on Columbia’s roster for the year--and on Wednesday the studio told us it would be released regionally.

Noted marketing vice president Bob Dingilian, “ We can barely keep track of some of these films. I’m glad I’m not doing the story. . . .”

When it went into production in August of 1984, “The Boy in Blue” was promoted with photos of a sweaty, stripped-to-the-waist Nicolas Cage. Asked to reflect now about that campaign, a spokesman for 20th Century Fox said simply, “That was the old ad game.”

The results of test screenings this weekend may determine the fate of the film. Originally planned for release last summer, it is the true story of a Canadian rowing champ of the 1870s. During the filming, one production executive called it “a cross between ‘Chariots of Fire’ and ‘Rocky.’ ”

Today, Fox calls it “a specialty film.” With a nod to the test screenings (in 12 cities), president of distribution Tom Sherak said, “It’s a picture no one’s really sure of. We’re going to see what’s best for it.”

Marketing president David Weitzner went directly to the point: “If the film doesn’t perform well at all (in the tests), we would certainly consider the wisdom of not releasing it nationally. We can’t ignore the fact that this is a business.”

We’re familiar with the romantic duo of Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas. But we’ve yet to discover the trio of Turner, Rutger Hauer and Powers Boothe.

They star in “A Breed Apart,” filmed in 1984, in which nature photographer-mountain climber Boothe is hired to retrieve some rare bird eggs from a wilderness island that is home to conservationist Hauer. Turner is the storekeeper who comes between the two men. It was directed by documentary maker Philippe Mora (“Swastika” and “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?”).

Originally committed to Orion Pictures, it moved to Fox Classics in the summer of 1984. When that folded, the film was put to roost on Fox’s shelves. Now it’s back with the original producer, Hemdale Film Corp., which will distribute it.

Hemdale chairman John Daly said that the film has been re-edited since it was screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 1984, where it garnered a disastrous trade review. (Daily Variety said that the visual splendor of North Carolina, the film’s locale, was the highlight.) Explained Daly: “It was rather naughtily premiered at Cannes before it had actually been completed.”

But, he said, “It was an orphan that found its parents” and predicted a release in the coming months. “And I assure you, my darling, it will see the light of Los Angeles.”

The aforementioned are among more than two dozen titles that didn’t make it out the 1985 starting gate as planned.

Some were held up for marketing reasons. Like the period romance “Lady Jane”--”We thought it would get lost in the Christmas shuffle,” said a Paramount Pictures spokeswoman. According to producer Marykay Powell, “Violets Are Blue,” starring Sissy Spacek and Kevin Kline, could have been out by year’s end (though it required some reshooting), “but there was another movie out starring Sissy (“Marie: A True Story”). We thought we’d have a better chance when Sissy wasn’t competing with Sissy.”

In some cases, pre-production lasted longer than anticipated. The Rodney Dangerfield film, “Back to School,” went through so many script revisions that production didn’t get under way until late fall. Post-production seemed to stretch out interminably for such titles as “Touch and Go” and “Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life Is Calling.”

Some films required reshooting. A new ending was filmed for “Blue City,” directed by Michelle Manning. A new beginning and a new ending were shot for “The Money Pit.”

Several films were beset by the old “creative differences” blues, notably “Where Are the Children?” and “Legend.”

“Saving Grace” was imperiled when it jumped studios. “Death of An Angel” was left seemingly without a prayer when Fox’s classics division folded.

It’s not easy finding out why some films don’t make it to the neighborhood theater. Like “Rashomon,” stories differ.

As one ruffled producer asked, “How will you know what’s truthful and what’s not?” Directors and studio executives, rumored to be battling over a final cut, suddenly turn into the best of chums when asked about their differences.

Some film makers are embarrassed and/or afraid to discuss long-delayed projects.

More than one film maker worried that their comments could affect already shaky relationships with studios. “Thing is,” said a producer, “I want my movie to be released. But if I pull a Terry Gilliam, my words might backfire on me”--a reference to the battle between director Gilliam and Universal over the re-editing of “Brazil.”

Then there was the director who noted, “Look, I’d like to discuss all this. And I’d like to be upfront. But the fact is, a 15-minute phone conversation with you could result in five years of bad vibrations for me.” When Calendar persisted, he relented--discussing, to some degree, the travails of his film. His apprehension returned at the conversation’s end: “Now that we’ve talked, can I ask--and you’ll probably think this is crazy--have I said anything to bend anyone out of shape?”

Some film makers have moved on to greener pastures. Currently at work on the screen version of “Extremities,” director Robert Young didn’t want to discuss “Saving Grace,” which stars Tom Conti as Pope Leo XIV. Co-scripted by David Ward (who won an Oscar for “The Sting” script), the story finds Conti traveling incognito through a poor country village, helping people rebuild their lives. (“At this point, what good would it do Bob, or the movie?” wondered a representative for Young.)

Filmed for Embassy and budgeted at $5 million to $7 million (said Daily Variety), “Saving Grace” is now at Columbia (owned by Coca-Cola, which purchased Embassy), where it’s keeping a low profile.

“It’s not one of ours,” said a Columbia executive on a Friday when asked about “Saving Grace.” On Monday he called back: “It’s ours, after all.” But there are no plans for distribution.

Money is most times at the root of all the nervousness--for example, that awesomely voracious evil called “interest.” It accrues on loans taken out to finance movies. Which means the longer films lay unreleased, the more they cost. When it is finally released in April, director Ridley Scott’s “Legend,” which reportedly cost $25.5 to $30 million, will be 11 months late. (Snapped Scott, “What difference does it make how much it cost? How much are you being paid to write this article?”) While not exactly the national debt, interest on a $30-million loan could inflate the budget by 10% to 15%.

Film makers argue that the end result--a film that will sell lots of tickets--is worth the extra bucks. “When you invest millions of dollars and you start arguing about $100,000 (interest), that’s not good business,” said producer Jerry Isenberg, whose “Clan of the Cave Bear” (delayed five months, it opens here Friday) is said to have cost $16 million.

Acting careers also can be affected--pro or con.

For example, a rep for Tom Cruise--whose last film was “All the Right Moves”--seemed relieved to report that her star’s next movie is not tied to the fate of “Legend.” She enthusiastically reported that Cruise is hard at work on “The Color of Money” (for director Martin Scorsese) after completing “Top Gun.” She boasted that “ ‘Top Gun’ is going to be such a big movie. And, it’s a Tom Cruise movie. So Tom doesn’t really have to worry about ‘Legend’ . . .”

“Clan of the Cave Bear’s” Daryl Hannah also is safely before the cameras, opposite Robert Redford and Debra Winger in “Legal Eagles.” So the success/failure of “Clan” (her first film since “Splash”) won’t immediately affect Hannah’s career.

On the other hand, the controversial thriller “Where Are the Children?” could revitalize the seemingly stalled career of Jill Clayburgh, last seen in 1983’s not successful “Hanna K,” directed by Costa-Gavras.

Sissy Spacek hasn’t been hurting for work, but the belated “Violets Are Blue,” directed by her husband Jack Fisk (“Raggedy Man”), could help her escape her down-on-the-farm image. In “Violets” she stars as a Yuppieish career woman who rekindles a romance with old flame Kevin Kline.

Michael Keaton’s career could take an invigorating turn toward the dramatic if audiences respond to “Touch and Go,” about a hockey player who becomes entranced with the mother of the kid who tried to mug him. Last seen in the 1984 Christmas bomb “Johnny Dangerously,” Keaton just wrapped the Ron Howard comedy, “Gung Ho.”

On occasion, the delay of a film boils down to a simple matter of semantics.

According to producer Isenberg and director Michael Chapman, what held up “Cave Bear” was deciding how to tell the story. With a nod to Jean M. Auel’s best-seller about the end of the Neanderthal race and the emergence of the Cro-Magnon (early modern man), Chapman said, “Here we had this book in which a major point is made that the people spoke mostly with sign language and a few sounds. We couldn’t radically alter that concept. That would have infuriated the book’s readers.”

Not that the film makers didn’t try some tampering. They shot scenes with extensive dialogue (as per the John Sayles script), including some scenes that had the characters speaking in English. (They were abandoned, Chapman said, because they “sounded so silly.”) The film makers also pondered the use of subtitles, minimal “prehistoric” dialogue and even the use of voice-over narration. (A number of characters were considered for the part of the “storyteller.”)

“Until we knew how we were going to communicate with our audience, we couldn’t complete the editing,” Isenberg said. “There were lots of ways to go . . . all of them impacted the scenes, and the way we would cut the picture.”

By the time it was decided how the pelt-clad subjects would communicate (a combination of narration, subtitles and a little “cave-man” talk), it was too late for the anticipated August 1985 release.

Or as Chapman noted, “There are reasons why they’re not making too many cave man pictures these days.”

A story line about children in jeopardy, with undertones of child abuse, has kept “Where Are the Children?” on Columbia’s shelves. Sources allege that parent company Coca-Cola is not happy to be associated with a movie dealing, even on a peripheral level, with the topic.

Based on a Mary Collins Higgins best seller of the same title, it stars Jill Clayburgh as a woman who was once convicted of murdering the children of her first marriage. Now her two kids by a second marriage have been abducted by Frederic Forrest.

“Children,” a long bantered-about Hollywood property (in 1977, Daily Variety announced that Brian De Palma would direct the film version), was finally filmed in Cape Cod in late 1984. Bruce Malmuth (“Nighthawks”) directed for Rastar. By late spring of 1985 the $6-million film was reportedly ready for release by Columbia. Instead, it sat. And sat. Late last year, a studio spokeswoman said there were no plans for its release, “though it recently played in Fresno where it had a really good weekend.” (It was a test screening.)

Calendar later learned the film would be released regionally in 1986, “but probably not in Los Angeles,” said a studio rep. Several weeks later, Columbia said the film would play four weeks in San Diego beginning Friday. Box office will determine what happens next.

Further complications: Up until last week there was some discrepancy over which version of the movie would screen in San Diego. Along with Malmuth’s version, there was a revised version--done by Rastar, reportedly at Columbia’s request--that excluded scenes, said Malmuth, “of a sensitive nature.”

Malmuth said the studio-edited version wasn’t the film he set out to do: “It was so diluted. What had been a thriller became more of a mystery. Along the way, it lost its edge.”

Negotiations with the studio followed. So did a slightly compromised Malmuth version. The biggest difference was the deletion of a sequence in which a little girl bathes while Forrest plays with a rubber duck. The scene ends with “a strong implication,” said Malmuth, that Forrest gets in the tub with her.

Another snipped scene--or so Malmuth thought it had been snipped--had Forrest sneaking up on the sleeping children, brandishing a hypodermic syringe. (“It was tastefully done. You saw the needle, but you never saw it go into the kids,” insisted Malmuth.) But after he recently screened the film at Columbia, Malmuth called Calendar to report the scene was intact.

“I feel so optimistic about what I’ve just seen. It’s not a cowardly version. At least 97% of it is the movie I originally made.” (The bathtub scene is gone.) He added, “What a film maker lives for is to see his or her film find an audience.”

To see if performers feel the same way, Calendar called Clayburgh. She was polite but firm: “I will not get involved in this story in any way, shape or form.”

“Legend” has lived up to its name.

Director Scott maintains that the postponement of his epic fantasy is “really a non-event . . . Frankly, the film just needed a little more work. I didn’t think it was connecting. It’s simply being fixed.”

Speaking by phone from Florida, where he is directing a TV commercial, he added, “There have been no arguments. The changes were all made because of my decisions.” He referred to much-reported accounts that “Legend” was revised at the request of Sidney Sheinberg, president of MCA Inc. (Sheinberg recently tussled with Terry Gilliam over the final cut of “Brazil.” Arnon Milchan produced both films.)

When it is released in May, “Legend” will have been trimmed by about an hour to heighten the action-adventure sequences, according to Scott. A score by the German synthesizer-rock band Tangerine Dream will also replace the original symphonic score by Jerry Goldsmith. (The “long” version of “Legend,” complete with Goldsmith score, is in release in Europe.)

According to sources close to the Scott camp, the changes are the result of unsatisfactory test screenings. Teen-agers were said to be especially nonplussed--despite the casting of heartthrob Tom Cruise as the hermit Jack O’ the Green (whose involvement with an impetuous princess, played by Mia Sara, leads to a showdown with the devilish Darkness, played by Tim Curry).

Scott didn’t like being asked about making his movie more accessible to teen-agers: “I think you’re trying to turn this interview into something negative. Look, I hope they’ll (teen-agers) like it. I hope the film’s audience will be very broad.

“I came out of advertising and marketing. So I believe that when you do something to communicate, you must aim for the widest audience possible. To ignore that audience is utterly foolhardy.”

Scott’s last film, “Blade Runner” (1982), didn’t play to the widest audience possible. A commercial disappointment, critics complained that its sumptuous visual look was delivered at the expense of characters and story.

An early review of “Legend” expressed similar worries. “The basic premise is alarmingly thin,” said Daily Variety. The film’s challenge was also summed up by Britain’s Screen International. Declaring “Legend” to be “a visual experience that is pure magic,” the publication guessed the target audience to be “children who have not had their imaginations deadened by too much bash and crash realism.”

Producer Dimitri Villard is the first to admit that the story line for “Death of an Angel” is pretty ambitious.

Bonnie Bedelia (in her follow-up to “Heart Like a Wheel”) is a newly ordained Episcopalian minister who journeys to a mission at the U.S.-Mexican border where her wheelchair-ridden daughter has joined a cult headed by charismatic Nick Mancuso. What follows is a collision of religious beliefs--and a love story.

Fox is handling the former Fox Classics title. Sort of. When asked about the film, a studio publicist didn’t recognize it--but called back later saying, “I found a secretary who remembers that one.”

Tom Sherak, president of distribution, denied that the film has “fallen through the cracks.” “I think about that particular film a lot,” Sherak said. “But it’s a cruel marketplace out there. It’s a marketplace that takes pictures and chews them up--especially pictures with little celebrity about them.

“So you try to find the best way to send the film out. Listen, you don’t send your child out in the cold without clothes on, do you? Well, we wouldn’t either. Hopefully, we will test the film sometime in 1986.”

Filmed for about $2 million, according to co-executive producer Villard, “Death of an Angel” was produced in association with Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute, where writer-director Petru Popescu attended seminars and the script was discussed in workshops.

“This movie was made with the hopes that it would find an audience and be successful,” Villard said. “But in order to determine if you have a commercial film, you have to release it.”

Mancuso--who has appeared in a spate of admired “little” pictures (“Ticket to Heaven,” “Heartbreakers”)--agreed. “You do these things in the hopes that they will be seen. Your career is what people see of it.”

Producer Stephen Friedman couldn’t understand a reporter’s interest in the reasons for the yearlong delay of Michael Keaton’s “Touch and Go.”

“Look, some pictures are rushed through post-production. Others aren’t. They take a while,” said Friedman. “People who don’t work in this business really shouldn’t be trying to analyze it. If you were writing about real estate, I’d suggest you become a realtor. To write about this business, I think you’ve got to have worked in it. Trust me, it’s so complex.”

In the case of “Touch and Go,” the variables have included a change of studios (from Universal to Tri-Star), a change of music scores (from Georges Delerue to Sylvester Levay) and a decision to change an ad campaign. According to Robert Mandel, trailers for “Touch and Go” made the film--which gives Keaton some dramatic moments--look like a sequel to “Mr. Mom.”

Mandel knows all about such struggles. His first feature, “Independence Day” (1983), played briefly in New York, then made its way to cable TV. Mandel readily admitted that the drama, starring David Keith and Kathleen Quinlan, posed marketing dilemmas for the releasing studio (Warner Bros.). “It wasn’t a high-concept movie, it didn’t have big stars, it had a very dark theme.”

He’s philosophical about his high-concept, big-star “Touch and Go”: “It’s kind of strange. When you’re making a movie, you’re very much in charge and it’s a wonderful time. Then you begin showing the movie and a lot of people associated with it begin to offer opinions. . . “

He offered his own opinion: “You’re doing the wrong story--you’re writing about the wrong subject. I’ve got something happening that’s so unique in Hollywood. . . .”

He laughed, adding, “How about a story about a movie that was filmed, cut, had its PR campaign done and will actually get released on time? It happened just like a machine!”

He was referring to the thriller “F/X,” officially his third film--but the first to be released. (It opens in February.)

“What do you think,” quipped Mandel, “is that a story--or what?”

LATE HARVEST

Every year some movies don’t make it to market on time, but 1985 was a bumper crop for films that didn’t make their original release dates.

How/why did it happen?

Well, there were marketing headaches, controversial subject matter to fix, music that didn’t rock, endings that didn’t work . . . or the movie just didn’t get done in time.