Jacob's Ladder
Short description
Jacob Singer, a New York postal worker and Vietnam veteran, returns home haunted by memories of his dead son and of his military service. Hallucinations intrude on his daily life, turning ordinary moments into disturbing visions, and he finds himself unable to tell what is real. His girlfriend Jezzie and his ex-wife Sarah try to steady him, while his chiropractor and friend Louis is the one person he keeps turning to. When Jacob learns that other men from his unit are suffering similar experiences, he begins looking for an explanation.
Adrian Lyne directed the film, which came out in 1990 and sits between Fatal Attraction and Indecent Proposal in his filmography. Bruce Joel Rubin wrote the screenplay; he also produced it with Alan Marshall, and Carolco Pictures backed the production. Tim Robbins leads the cast as Jacob, with Elizabeth Peña, Danny Aiello, Matt Craven, Pruitt Taylor Vince and Jason Alexander in supporting roles, part of a large credited cast and crew.
Made for about 25 million dollars, the film took in roughly 26 million worldwide. On IMDb it holds 7.4 out of 10 from around two thousand votes, and its critics' rating stands at 6.9 out of 10 from 69 reviews, so audiences and critics landed fairly close together. It runs 113 minutes and mixes drama, horror and mystery.
What's left behind the scenes
- The gurney carrying Jacob was deliberately unbalanced by Adrian Lyne. He slightly lifted one wheel off the floor, causing it to rattle and spin.
- Before filming began, former US Marine Dale Dye took actors Tim Robbins, Pruitt Taylor Vince, Eric LaSalle, Wing Rames, Brian Tarantino, Brent Hinkley, and Anthony Alessandro to a five-day military training camp.
- According to director Adrian Lyne, the pharmacological aspect of the story was inspired by Martin A. Lee and Bruce Schlain’s book "Acid Dreams: The CIA, LSD, and the Sixties Rebellion" (1986).
- According to the director, most of the dialogue between the soldiers in the first scene was improvised.
- Adrian Lyne turned down an offer to direct "The Bonfire of the Vanities" (1990) to work on "Jacob's Ladder." His first choice for the role of Jacob Singer was Tom Hanks, but Hanks declined the role to star in "The Bonfire of the Vanities" (1990).
- The drug depicted in the film, 'Stairs,' has a real-life prototype – quinuclidin-3-benzylate (BZ), a psychochemical warfare agent that was actually used by the US Army from 1962 to 1989. The US stockpile of BZ is sufficient to induce psychosis in the entire world population 50 times over. BZ was also stockpiled by other countries, including the USSR and Yugoslavia. At the end of the film, a message appears stating that experiments with BZ were allegedly conducted on special forces soldiers during the Vietnam War in order to increase their aggression. However, this claim is unsupported by evidence.
- Scenes that were changed or removed by director Adrian Lyne: - during the dance scene, all the dancers transform into demons; - Jacob watches a priest on television ranting about the end of the world; - Jacob sees an image of a demon on the living room wall that turns into a portal to Hell; - a scene after the antidote is administered, in which the ceiling explodes and Jacob sees Heaven; - the finale, in which Jesse turns inside out and transforms into a huge demon that Jacob fights before ascending to Heaven.
- Don Johnson and Mickey Rourke turned down the lead role.
- Sidney Lumet, Michael Apted, and Ridley Scott attempted to get the project greenlit during the years its production was stalled.
- According to writer Bruce Joel Rubin, he drew inspiration from the "Tibetan Book of the Dead," the biblical story of Jacob's Ladder, and the Academy Award-winning short film "Owl Creek Bridge" (1962) by Robert Enrico while writing the screenplay.
- According to the original script, the subway station where Jacob arrived at the beginning of the film was supposed to be Nostrand Avenue, not Bergen Street.
- Actors Dustin Hoffman, Al Pacino, and Richard Gere were interested in the lead role. For the role of Jessie, director Adrian Lyne auditioned approximately 300 actresses, including Julia Roberts, Andie MacDowell, Demi Moore, Madonna, and Jennifer Lopez. The role ultimately went to the first actress who auditioned – Elizabeth Peña.
- The film was greenlit at Paramount Pictures, but after a change in studio leadership, the new executives were unsure about the film. They demanded that the ending be changed, but Lyne and Rubin refused, and Paramount dropped the film. It seemed the project would have to be abandoned entirely until Mario Kassar and Andrew J. Vajna of Carolco took over production. They also gave Lyne full creative control and final cut.
- The confrontation between Jacob and Giri initially takes place in the hallway of the courthouse. Line moved them to the stairs to minimize the height difference between Tim Robbins (6’5”) and Jason Alexander (5’5”).
- To give the monsters from Jacob's hallucinations repulsive images, director Adrian Lyne used a technique that became classic in the body horror genre. The actor playing the monster rhythmically shook his head, and these movements were filmed in slow motion. When the footage was played back at normal speed, it created the effect of convulsive, inhuman tremors resembling a seizure.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
