The Stunt Man

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Richard Rush directs. Mario Tosi behind the camera. Dominic Frontiere scores. Caroline Biggerstaff cuts. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

• 146 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.
• 2Directed by Richard Rush, shot by Mario Tosi. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
• 3Original score by Dominic Frontiere. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
• 4Editor Caroline Biggerstaff shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
• 5Peter O'Toole and Steve Railsback and Barbara Hershey carry the top of the cast.
• 6Marketing tagline: "If God could do the tricks that we can do, he'd be a happy man...".
• 7IMDB entry: tt0081568 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

The technical file

Cinematography

Mario Tosi

Original score

Dominic Frontiere

Editing

Caroline Biggerstaff

Costume design

Rosanna Norton

Makeup / hair

Ken Chase

Sound

Les Fresholtz

Stunt coordinator

Gray Johnson

Runtime

131 min · 2h 11m

Status

Released

Original language

EN

Certification (US)

R

IMDB

The Stunt Man (1980) ↗

Also by

Richard Rush

• 
  The Sinister Saga of Making The Stunt Man

  2000 · ★ 7.8
• 
  A Man Called Dagger

  1968 · ★ 6.5
• 
  The Fickle Finger of Fate

  1967 · ★ 6.5
• 
  Getting Straight

  1970 · ★ 6.3
• 
  Freebie and the Bean

  1974 · ★ 6.1
• 
  Of Love and Desire

  1963 · ★ 6.0

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

• 

  ▶
  Transmission Trailer

  Trailer · Official
• 

  ▶
  The Stunt Man (1980) ORIGINAL TRAILER [HD 1080p]

  Trailer

Community reviews

What people are saying

• CaptNemo2021-04-05
  ★ 8/10

  This incredible movie took me by surprise in the fall of 1980. The Stunt Man replaced The Empire Strikes Back at the theater where I worked. I was prepared to hate this film. To my complete surprise, it became my favorite film from the 1980s. If you haven't seen it, strap yourself in and go for the ride. It's worth every second. Peter O'Toole has Never been better as Cross, the demented and brilliant director. Is he out to kill Cameron just to get a good scene or two from him? Or is he actually a caring person who would never hurt a fly? You won't know until the film is just about over. Basically, Cameron is on the run from the Law. He stumbles into a film set and (perhaps) causes the death of the film's stunt man. Ely Cross, the director, offers Cameron a place to hide from the Law if he'll replace the stunt man until the film is done shooting. Cameron agrees. From that point, nothing is what it seems. The film blends the real with the surreal world of filmmaking that will have you smiling throughout. High Points are the Soundtrack and Barbara Hershey. Barbara has never been more beautiful here, and she gives the performance of a lifetime. Location filming was at the Del Coronado Hotel in San Diego. The same hotel was used for Some Like It Hot.

  Read full review ↓
• Professor-Hosquith2024-12-16
  ★ 8/10

  I'd like to embellish the previous review... CaptNemo did a good job summing up the movie, but there are a few other interesting things that can be said about it. My short summary is that this is probably the best "meta" movie, or movie about making movies you'll find. I discovered the film on cable TV, and immediately fell in love with it. A short time later I came across the Brodeur novel in a used bookstore, and bought and read it immediately. The novel is quite dark, and has a number of plot issues. In several ways the movie is more fun and better than the book. But it's a quite different story. One area I disagree with CaptNemo is where he said that you find out everything at the end of the movie... I don't find the end of the movie completely illuminating -- some things are fairly clear, but there is much that's still open to interpretation... which is one of the things that makes it so fun to watch again! I only owned the laser disc edition of this movie for many years. I only recently acquired the DVD to have it in a more modern format to show to friends. And so then I discovered the commentary, and only as a result of that commentary I found out about the documentary film about the movie, "The Sinister Saga of Making The Stunt Man." If you're a fan of this movie, the documentary is a must-have! Regarding the movie-within-a-movie, it's difficult to say if it would have been a good movie or not. Is Eli Cross a good director? We don't really know. We're only offered tantalizing glimpses of his work. It would have been nice if the DVD special features included the screenplay of the movie-within-a-movie, or maybe even stitched some of the scenes together, like was done for the DVD of the movie-within-the-movie in Joe Dante's "Matinee."

  Read full review ↓

Production companies

Who made it

• ME

  Melvin Simon Productions

  US

Key crew

• AdaptationRichard Rush
• StuntsKenny Endoso
• NovelPaul Brodeur
• StuntsDeanna Dae Coleman
• StuntsErik Cord
• StuntsWhitey Hughes
• Stunt CoordinatorGray Johnson
• StuntsPhil Adams
• StuntsA.J. Bakunas
• StuntsGray Johnson
• StuntsMike Johnson
• StuntsGary Baxley
• StuntsAl Jones
• StuntsNorman Blankenship
• StuntsTom Morga
• StuntsHank Calia
• StuntsRegis Parton
• StuntsDon Pulford
• StuntsWalter Robles
• StuntsTed Duncan
• StuntsDick Warlock
• StuntsLarry Dunn
• StuntsJames Winburn
• Unit Production ManagerFrank Beetson

Themes & keywords

What it's about, really

• stuntman
• movie set
• film director

Release history · US

When it landed

• Premiere1980-05-31· Seattle International Film Festival
• Theatrical1980-11-03R
• Physical2011-06-07R

Also known as

International titles

• Der StuntmanDE
• The Stunt Man - Der lange Tod des Stuntmans CameronDE