When Oscar-nominated director John Hancock made the film “Prancer” in the winter of 1988, he didn’t realize that his tale of a small-town girl (Rebecca Harrell) who believes that one of Santa’s magical reindeer has landed in her hardscrabble Indiana town would stand the test of time. He had made one outright classic with 1973’s “Bang the Drum Slowly,” in which he gave Robert DeNiro his first major starring role (the film also stars Big Hollywood’s own Michael Moriarty) and which Roger Ebert considers the best baseball film ever made, followed it up with the cult-favorite horror film “Let’s Scare Jessica to Death” and had an underrated gem with Nick Nolte called “Weeds” get lost in the shuffle of its distributor’s bankruptcy in 1987, but neither had broken through to become a television or video staple.
In fact, due to legal hassles, “Jessica” wasn’t available on video until many years later, and “Weeds” has never made it to DVD because the negatives suffered the rare indignity of being completely lost by its producer. Meanwhile, “Prancer” – in which John brought a healthy dose of reality rather than schmaltz in portraying the girl’s struggling parents – has held up so strongly that it was recently named #19 on BH Editor-in-Chief John Nolte’s list of the 25 greatest Christmas movies of all time, with Nolte calling it a “lovely, low-key, tender family film with a rich spiritual theme.”
Nolte notes:
Part of what makes the appeal of the original so enduring is presenting a rarity in the Christmas genre: characters who live in a part of the world known as Flyover Country — everyday rural, small town folks who are struggling to make ends meet. Most holiday films (and this isn’t a complaint) take place somewhere picture perfect. “Prancer” tells its story in the rural mud and cluttered homes most of us recognize and the people living in this very real place are dealing with the very real problems most of us have faced… There’s something to be said for being able to relate to a film’s characters and their problems.”
Ultimately, Nolte says its appeal lies in the fact that it “uses one of Santa’s reindeer as an effective metaphor for the power and value of something else Hollywood frequently demeans and stereotypes: Faith.”
Looking back 20 years after the release of “Prancer,” speaking from his Indiana home which is near the film’s main locations, Hancock takes evident pride in the film. While he appreciates Nolte’s praises, he said that the film’s humanity was a more important aspect of it than its sense of faith.
“Bang the Drum Slowly”
“I wouldn’t emphasize faith that much, but I rooted it in a real farm. This is my parents here, having trouble keeping the farm, pruning apples in the winter,” says Hancock. “I think the picture succeeded because the little girl is awfully good, and the father coming together with her in the end is very moving as a result. The crankiness of the father created an unusual tone – usually parents are not that cranky in kids’ pictures. I thought he pressed it to the edge.”
It wasn’t just the film’s tone that made it more realistic than most family-film fare, but the fact that the film was shot in genuine middle-America locations. Not only did the area around Hancock’s town of LaPorte give them realistic mountains that would have had to be created with effects if the shoot took place elsewhere, but the help offered by the area’s townspeople proved invaluable as well.
Director John Hancock
“During the making of it, they sold tickets at the Civic Auditorium which has 1500 seats to watch the cast eat onstage,” recalls Hancock. “We sat on stage and ate and they watched, it was like Louis XIV or something, and the Hispanic mayor sang ‘La Bamba’ that night. You can imagine how excited the townspeople got. Sam Elliott was very good with them, because would drink ’til all hours at the bar. He was a very nice guy. Even a couple years ago I heard rumors Sam might be moving back. He’s like a legendary figure in the hills with people awaiting his return. The librarian reports to me how many people rent ‘Prancer’ each week, and it still goes out a lot in the holidays.”
Perhaps the most gratifying moment for Hancock was a snow-filled night close to Christmas, when the film was in theaters nationally en route to a respectable gross of more than $18 million and a LaPorte movie theater hosted a benefit screening for local charities.
“It was sensational as everyone sees themselves in it onscreen,” says Hancock. “I had my mother and aunt there and the response was fantastic. The townspeople said how wonderful it was to see a movie about them.”
The modest yet enduring success of “Prancer” also helped inspire a major change in Hancock’s life. After two decades of the development and production rollercoaster, and the demise of a dream project with DeNiro after spending four years on it, he started thinking about leaving the Hollywood rat race and returning home to the lands that his grandfather had developed into a once-thriving apple orchard after coming to America decades before. When the Northridge earthquake and Malibu fires hit in the mid-’90s, he decided it was indeed time to pack up and clear out.
Yet the move revived his passion for filmmaking, as he launched his own state-of-the-art production facility called FilmAcres in LaPorte and directed two films written by his wife, Dorothy Tristan. Both films were again blessed by extensive local support, with the highly personal family drama “A Piece of Eden” coming out in 2000 and the wild thriller “Suspended Animation” released in 2002. His decision flew in the face of conventional Hollywood wisdom, like longtime studio exec Jeffrey Katzenberg’s proclamation that farm movies weren’t worth doing.
“I think Jeffrey Katzenberg said ‘No farm pictures, no dust’ – like it’s poison at the box office,” says Hancock. “I don’t think that’s true. I’m very interested in middle America. I do think it would be nice to have more pictures set in the heartland.”
“Eden” was about a Manhattan publicist who gets called home to an Indiana fruit farm when his father is on his deathbed, and learns the true value of his roots and family despite his initial desire to modernize and drastically change their way of life. The film showed Hancock returning to his roots with love and respect for the area and its people. He was so passionate about the production, which featured a supporting cast that included veteran actors Tyne Daly and Frederic Forrest, that he personally took it to theaters in 45 markets to help land theatrical bookings. But when Roger Ebert gave him a totally unexpected pan, the interest in the film took a dive theatrically – though it is still widely available for purchase and rental at Netflix, Wal-Mart, and Blockbuster.
“I think Ebert’s review hurt us. He missed it, really missed it,” Hancock recalls. “He thought it was a corrupt commercial venture, and he was wrong, it was so personal. I think he was offended by the father being cranky in the hospital, bitching and complaining and full of self-pity may have offended him and skewed his reaction to the picture.”
Hancock is currently energized by a project that even he never saw coming: the transformation of his literally lost film “Weeds” into a musical play that he’s aiming to take to Broadway, where he began his career as an award-winning theater director in the mid-’60s. “Weeds” told the true story of how hard-core inmates’ lives were changed at San Quentin prison by the development of a theater program, and Hancock and his investors believe that it’s even more relevant today under America’s exploding prison population than it was in at the time of the film’s late-’80s release.
“We found a fabulous composer named John Fournier, he’s really hitting it out of the park, and we went two weeks ago to New York and met with Paul Gemignani, a great musical director who’s a coup to get,” says Hancock. “The book is written, and the music is 90 percent finished. We’re raising money now, going and playing the music for investors, and I’ll direct it.
“I think ‘Weeds” strength is an underdog story like ‘Rocky’ about a guy who comes from way down to make something of himself. It’s an increasingly important issue, because we incarcerate so many people who come out more dangerous than they went in, and go right back. ‘Weeds’ offers an alternative to that.”
For those interested in learning more about the “Weeds” play and possibly assisting in financing, contact John Hancock at John@filmacres.com.