M*A*S*H

M*A*S*H (1970)

Timing: 1:56 (116 min)

6.986/10
990

7.335/10
5847

7.4/10
75867

All about film

Video 4

Photo 27

Actors and characters

Release date

1970-02-18

Country

United States

Production

20th Century Fox, Aspen Productions (I), Ingo Preminger Productions, Aspen Productions

Genre

Comedy, Drama, War

Budget

$3 500 000

Revenue

$81 600 000

Website

Director

Robert Altman

Actors

Donald Sutherland, Elliott Gould, Tom Skerritt, Sally Kellerman, Robert Duvall, Roger Bowen, René Auberjonois, David Arkin, Jo Ann Pflug, Gary Burghoff
All actors and roles (10)

Scenario

Producer

Ingo Preminger, Leon Ericksen

Operator

Harold E. Stine

Composer

Johnny Mandel

Artist

Audition

Editing

Danford B. Greene
All team (16)

• The first attempt to film Sally Kellerman (1937-2022) in the shower was unsuccessful because she knew what to expect and lay down on the floor, out of camera view, before the tent flap was raised. To distract the actress, director Robert Altman (1925-2006) and actor Gary Burghoff instructed the camera to be turned on and filming to begin, then both went into the shower tent and simultaneously lowered their pants. At that moment, the tent flap was raised, and Kellerman stood there frozen, with wide-eyed surprise – because Burghoff, beside the camera and off-screen, was standing before her in all his glory.
• Tom Skerritt later recalled that 80% of the lines and dialogue in the film were improvised, as Robert Altman cast people in some roles who had never worked in film or television before.
• According to Robert Altman, Elliott Gould and Donald Sutherland jointly complained to studio executives that Altman was devoting too much time and attention to filming minor characters. The actors demanded that the director be replaced, but their request was denied. After the film was released and received critical and audience acclaim, Gould alone admitted this to the director. As a result, he continued to work with Altman, while Sutherland never appeared in another Altman film.
• When studio executives first saw the footage, they told director Robert Altman that his soldiers looked too dirty compared to the soldiers in, for example, war dramas like "Tora! Tora! Tora!" (1970) by Richard Fleischer (1916-2006), Kinji Fukasaku (1930-2003) and Toshio Masuda, and "Patton" (1970) by Franklin J. Schaffner (1920-1989). Altman himself fought on the front lines of World War II. He replied to the executives that it was war, and soldiers in war didn't actually look pristine. The next day, the studio instructed the producers of those two films to make their soldiers look a little dirtier.
• One of the innovations devised by Robert Altman was the layering of different dialogues: in some scenes, up to four conversations were heard simultaneously. At the time, this was considered unconventional and even revolutionary, but Altman proved to be right, and the audience agreed with the idea he was trying to convey—that war is "a mess where nothing is ever clear." This technique was subsequently used in some other films as well.
• At the request of 20th Century Fox, a message was added to the opening credits stating that the film takes place in Korea. The Korean War is also mentioned in announcements from loudspeakers and on the radio. And in one scene, it is explicitly stated that the film takes place in 1951—to prevent viewers from assuming that everything is happening during the Vietnam War, which was ongoing when the film was being shot and released.