The movie Bruce Dern would never repeat: “It’s the only film I made that I wouldn’t make again”
Throughout a prolific career that started in 1960, Bruce Dern has lent his name to classics, cult favourites, and abject disasters alike, but there’s only one movie among his filmography he’s adamant he’d never want to make again.
Although he’d kept himself plenty busy over the decades, it was a combination of Quentin Tarantino and Alexander Payne who helped spark a mini-resurgence for the veteran star, when a supporting part in the former’s Django Unchained was followed by an Academy Award-nominated performance in the latter’s Nebraska.
From there, Dern became a regular part of Tarantino’s repertory by playing Sanford Smithers in The Hateful Eight and George Spahn in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, making it equal parts fitting and ironic the only film from his back catalogue he’s adamant he’d never make again was referenced by the filmmaker before they’d even worked together.
Of course, Tarantino has been a fan of Dern’s since long before they ever crossed paths, and the sequence in Kill Bill: Volume 1 where Daryl Hannah’s Elle Driver mounts an unsuccessful assassination attempt on Uma Thurman’s Bride while disguised as a nurse was created in homage to John Frankenheimer’s 1977 action thriller Black Sunday.
Not only that, but the two-time Academy Award winner confirmed that the split-screen technique used to ramp up the tension during the scene in question was lifted directly from the trailer to Dern’s film, although it wasn’t used anywhere other than the promotional materials. A typically deep cut from Tarantino, then, but it’s not an experience the star would be in a rush to replicate.
Black Sunday was adapted from the novel of the same name by Hannibal Lecter creator Thomas Harris, which was itself inspired by the Munich massacre of the 1972 Olympics, which would go on to serve as the basis for Steven Spielberg’s 2005 historical drama.
Dern plays blimp pilot Michael Lander, who makes a concerted effort to end his own life having been driven mad by the post-traumatic stress of serving in Vietnam. To accomplish that goal, he partners up with a terrorist to orchestrate a plot to detonate a bomb in the middle of the Super Bowl by crashing his airborne mode of transport directly into the stands. To try and prevent the atrocity, Robert Shaw’s military officer gets into bed with the FBI to stop the threat.
It was a pure flight of fancy at the time, but as Dern explained to Esquire, what was formerly a far-flung genre flick isn’t too far outside the realms of plausible reality. “Black Sunday is not a bad movie,” he said, ensuring that he wasn’t tearing down its artistic and creative merits. “It’s the only film I made that I wouldn’t make again. Because you could do that; blow up the Super Bowl.”
It’s a sign of how the times have changed, with Dern convinced that the plot isn’t entirely removed from events that could happen, making it the only entry in his filmography he wouldn’t take a second shot at.
