The Way of the Wind is the “most important film” for Terrence Malick

As Terrence Malick and company now enter the sixth year of writing his biblical epic The way of the wind2025 could finally be the time it sees the light of day. Having once again placed it among our most anticipated films of the year, we have a few more details about the film, including a potential reason why it’s the longest post-production ever by Malick.

To celebrate his new book Magic Hours: The Films and the Hidden Life of Terrence Malickauthor John Bleasdale has released a fascinating new series on his Writers on Film podcast exploring Malick’s work, including a conversation with his longtime production designer, Jack Fisk. Although Fisk did not work on The way of the wind (Stefano Maria Ortolani, collaborator of Wes Anderson and, fittingly, The Nativity Story production designer, took up his duties), he carried out numerous locations for the film with Géza Röhrig in the role of Jesus, Matthias Schoenaerts in the role of Peter and Mark Rylance in the role of Satan alongside Ben Kingsley, Joseph Fiennes, Tawfeek Barhom, Douglas Booth and Aidan Turner.

“(For The way of the wind) for 14 years, we visited filming locations around the world for this film. We were in Morocco, Israel and Italy,” Fisk said, then revealing how close the project was to Malick, adding, “It’s simply the most important film for him.” Fisk also noted that the origins of the project were decades in the making, stating, “Most of the scripts he has, it seems like he’s had them since the days of Badlands. It’s crazy, the ideas.

“When we were working on it, it was always called The way of the wind. I just saw today that it’s called (The last planet). I think it’s going to be great. I ended up not doing it. I just didn’t want to stay out of the country for that long. It was a time…we were looking at things in the Middle East and it was an uncertain time. In the art department, you’re in first person and I have grandkids and all that. I hesitated. I just couldn’t do it,” Fisk added.

That didn’t stop Malick from contacting him during production, however. Fisk said, “I was on the roof of my daughter’s house in Austin, fixing the roof, and I got a call from Terry. He said, “Can you come to Italy?” I said, “No, why?” » He said, “I have this decorator here and he sits in his office all the time.” (Laughs) He’s so used to me because I’m the practical type. A lot of decorators sit in their office, but I grew up with Terry and I work completely differently. I kind of developed my style from Terry’s style. I worked (so) well with him that it became the way I want to work.

After speaking with many people connected to Malick for his book, Bleasdale also got some interesting details about the editing process. When speaking to an editor, they noted, “(Malick) never watches them all the way through. He’ll have different editors work on different pieces and he’ll look at footage or reels and watch it, watch it, watch it until he gets it right. He will only watch it at the end or once or twice during the whole process because he doesn’t want to get bored of it. He doesn’t want to get to the point where he has to watch the whole thing for the 10th or 20th time and not be able to see the movie.”

Bleasdale also asked Fisk if Malick, who turned 81 last November, might have another film in the works after The way of the wind. “I’m sure that’s the case,” Fisk said, adding, “I was just looking on IMDb and he’s involved in so many things where he helps young filmmakers. Executive producer here and there. I know people come to him. He recruits the best young filmmakers and wants to have his opinion in order to help generate a whole new generation of artists and filmmakers.

Malick is in the air elsewhere: Adrien Brody stopped by Marc Maron’s podcast to talk The Brutalist. They discussed his infamous filming experience The thin red line and discover that his role had been significantly reduced. However, if one listens to Bleasdale’s podcast, he calls Brody’s story “implausible” because the script (in which Brody didn’t have many lines) and the finished film are not “that different” . He notes: “The novel is a choral work. It’s a lot of different stories in the middle of a campaign. It’s about the mission, not the man. It’s about men. I think it was Adrien Brody’s publicist who, early in his career, solidified his role.

Listen to the conversations below and we highly recommend picking up Bleasdale’s book and listening to his podcast.