Faith and Enthusiasm Move ‘Mountains’

Call Sheet No. 19 has an ominous instruction for the cast and crew of “Mountains of the Moon”:

“The lions are still wild animals and should be treated with respect.”

It also specifies that there should be a complete caravan train, 63 bearers, the two principal actors, plus vultures and “a carcass to attract the vultures”--not to mention three lions, specially flown in from Zimbabwe, to attack the actors as they march through the jungle.

Shooting in the bush is clearly no picnic. Consider the further instructions:

“Do not go near the lions or the lion cages at all and especially do not stick fingers through the wire.

“Do not touch the lions at all. Do not run or fool around.

“Do not sit down near the lions. If a lion approaches, stand up and stand still and if necessary say, ‘PUSH.’ DO NOT RUN.”

“Mountains of the Moon,”--if it survives the beasts and other hazards of nature and Hollywood--will tell the story of celebrated 19th-Century British explorers Richard Burton and John Hanning Speke, who spent years seeking, and finally discovering, the source of the Nile. Produced by Daniel Melnick’s IndieProd Co., it is directed by Bob Rafelson (“Five Easy Pieces,” “Black Widow”) and stars English stage actors Patrick Bergin as Burton and Iain Glen as Speke.

So far, the film has made it through its African jungle phase, having wrapped here last weekend. It’s now in Hollywood being edited for a probable November release.

Rafelson has wanted to film the story for seven years and Melnick (“All That Jazz,” “Roxanne”) has been associated with him for five of those. “It is not a story to make every studio in Hollywood sit up and say, ‘I must make that,’ ” said Melnick, who had headed production at both Columbia Pictures and MGM before becoming an independent producer.

Melnick and Rafelson first tried Warner Bros. But by the time the first script was ready, the studio had a disaster with “Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan” and African yarns weren’t terribly popular.

“We then went to Mario Kassar and Andrew Vajna of Carolco, who might seem to be the last name to think of but the last name is often the best place to start,” said Melnick.

“Bob and I told them the story--we were a good dog and pony act together--and I could see they had an appetite and what convinced them was less me than Bob’s enthusiasm and belief. They had learned to trust enthusiasm and in this business you have to.

“At the end of our lunch, they said, ‘We’ll do it,’ but they wanted us to deliver a big international star or stars. Now you get the delay. They had built their business with stars and the usual list of suspects came up: Robert Redford, of course, and Paul Hogan after ‘Crocodile Dundee.’ ”

They couldn’t come to terms on stars, so the project wandered to the English company EMI and finally to Cannon Films. “(Cannon) wanted to make it in South Africa where they had some frozen money and with Sean Penn, who is a New York street midget and totally unlike Richard Burton,” said Melnick.

Then Melnick and Rafelson came up with the idea of making a film called “Air America” about the secret CIA airline and Laos. It would have had a star cast. Carolco wanted it, but the writers’ strike got in the way. Carolco then said OK--do “Mountains of the Moon,” without the stars on an $18-million budget.

Why the sudden change?

Said Melnick: “It gets back to the least likely. I don’t represent the running, jumping or hitting pictures they are often associated with--that sounds like a law firm--but I think they wanted a picture like ‘Roxanne,’ which goes out and does $50 million. They realize they can’t be in a business where the only people you can do business with are Sly Stallone or Arnold Schwarzenegger.”

After the change of heart on “Mountains,” Melnick and Rafelson subsequently were able to get a “go” from Carolco on the making of “Air America” in Southeast Asia, starring Mel Gibson.

Rafelson was determined to do the Burton-Speke story because of his fascination with anthropology and history. He described explorer Burton as an outsider in his society, a soldier who wrote the British Army Manual on the use of the bayonet, a scholar who translated both the “Kama Sutra” and “The Perfumed Garden” (considered at the time to be works of porn).

“When I said I wanted to film the story of Richard Burton, people said, ‘Why do it about the actor?’ It was said so many times I was more crying than laughing,” Rafelson said. “And after seven years it became an obsession with me even more than a passion.

“I trekked through Africa from the Indian ocean to Uganda trying to simulate Burton’s journey and seek his experience and to see what that journey does to the human being.

“Since I left home at 14 and traveled through Europe at 16 and played the drums in a band in Mexico at 17, my life has had an aspect of adventure to it. So why not try to put that and my feeling about the relationship between Burton and Speke together in a film.

“Theirs is a classic story of friendship and betrayal because Speke tried to claim what Burton had discovered--or was persuaded back in England that he could. And I understand that because I have been accused to betraying friends of mine and vice-versa entirely through misunderstandings.

Rafelson and Melnick have chosen locations in Africa that have not before been shown on film. The Island of Lamu in the Indian Ocean for instance where road transport is banned and all the equipment had to be carried in temperatures of more than 100 degrees F.

That is where the two actors, Bergin and Glen, lost weight. The Victorians did not dress according to climate when they went exploring in Africa. They dressed as they would at home in tweed jackets, corduroy knee breeches and even waistcoats with lapels. “I lost three to four pounds every day that we marched through Lamu because of the intense heat,” Bergin said.

Even the tribesmen were more fully kitted out than would historically be the case. The Kenya government has a “watcher” on the set to ensure that the tribesmen do not appear too naked. “You cannot show the full naked body of a man although that would have been the case on Safari a century or more ago,” said associate producer Chris Curling.

Meanwhile, back with the lions. . . . “You rehearse it as play,” said trainer Viv Bristow, rolling over with Trade, the lead lion who has more than 70 movies to his credit.

Before the two actors went to work with the cats, Bristow gave them this advice: “Never look at a lion below its eye-line in any scene. The worst thing to do with any cat if you are afraid, is to turn round and run because then the cat thinks ‘there is a game on’ and he may attack.”

Melnick didn’t return to Hollywood unscathed from the trek. He was injured by a spear carried by one of the natives hired for the filming. The now-recovered producer, a veteran of the Hollywood jungles, can now claim to be a veteran of Africa’s.

He took a philosophical view of the film and journey here: “It is a story about friendship and betrayal, misunderstanding and manipulation,” said Melnick. “Everyone can understand that. It’s the story of Hollywood.”