Original subtitles

Downloaded from YTS.MX

Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX

-At the age of 10,

I was the thinnest boy in tiberias.

People used to say,

"menahem, when he walks the streets, you don't see him."

So I started to become kind of the joke of the class.

To be funny, to tell stories.

I decided to take some photos

from the life hood of my mother

and I made the roll like a toilet paper.

I started to prepare exciting stories

that I invented base of this primitive cinema machine.

I put little ads in the school

that said that on Saturday morning at 10 o'clock

will be a showing of a movie created by menahem.

Nobody came.

So I thought what shall I do to bring them to see my movie?

And I then came up on an idea

and the idea is with me all my life,

you must pay the audience.

I put a new ad,

"anybody who would come to see my movie will get a penny."

And it was a full house.

Menahem, let me ask you,

how do you become a filmmaker?

- Don't do anything else.

If you love movies, you want to be a movie maker,

you have to give yourself to the movie.

You have to forget your other life.

You have to dream about the movie,

seal the money, kill your hunt,

take your money, make a movie.

One day I got the call from uncle shmuel, yoram's father.

"Menahem, can you help me with yoram?

"He doesn't want to go to school,

"he sits in the box office and sells tickets."

Yoram is my cousin, my first cousin.

So I said, "you know what?

"Send him to meet to Tel Aviv and I'll see what I can do."

- Okay.

We start again.

Yeah.

Actually he would like to start from the beginning.

- From the beginning?

Yeah, I wanna know

how it all started for you.

- In age of three, my father build a cinema

and that's probably was my fate.

And because since I remember myself,

I was going to hang posters

and in the age of six, seven I was already a cashier.

Every Friday, it used to be in the newspaper,

big boxes with the picture of every movie.

I used to cut it, divide it to companies and sell to myself.

I played with it like somebody playing monopoly.

I played selling movies.

And guess what?

Always I made money.

- When yoram arrived in Tel Aviv,

he started working with me at my company, Noah films.

Back then I was educing sallah shabati.

And I gave yoram the job of distributing it.

I felt that he will muster distribution by instinct.

To walk in somebodies that was your hobby.

- To get it as a job,

well, you cannot ask for better.

- Then menahem produced a picture called, "trunk to Cairo."

And he did a co production deal,

he knows america, for almost nothing, for $75,000,

and the picture costs, I think, over a million dollar,

and I said, "how we are going to recover it?"

The mistake was

that we shot the film in English.

Even the Israeli actors, instead of speaking Hebrew,

spoke English.

- Come on gabar, tomorrow is another day.

And you know take an Israel actor

who speaks English, he speaks benglish.

You know what is benglish.

- Grab them.

- This movie was a disaster, a flop.

- Amin. - Amin.

- For us it was the first movie that we lost money on.

Action.

- My wife,

I almost got a divorce, are you kidding.

I sold my house three times.

Once I sold my fridge it's true.

But if you ask me if need to sell my apartment

to do white flags, I will.

But I don't have an apartment anymore.

- I came to menahem and he was in trouble.

I took all my savings.

Since the bar mitzvah.

I crossed sign with him to the banks

and we became partners 5050.

- Then we started to do a series of mega hits.

Nothing but money.

- Escaped, an Israeli?

No one escapes from my prison.

- Is that a fact?

- That is a fact.

- Golan, was reliable at that time,

of course, he was the big dad and I was the child.

That for him it stayed forever.

He didn't accepted that I grew up.

- I love you hatsamea.

There is no accounting between us.

There has never been,

never been from the first day we've been together.

Never been.

It's more than brothers,

we forge each others signatures on checks.

Action.

- They were known for the industry.

You have to make it big, bigger than life.

The same way that you do it here.

They were the Israeli Hollywood.

- We used to go, boaz and me at 3 o'clock in the morning,

shouting and waking up people.

What a movie! What a movie!

And I would close.

I like the way,

used to look at boaz and me like we are crazy.

After we finished the film,

we went to the Milan film market

to try to sell it all over the world.

- The auditorials sold out.

And suddenly in the middle people started to walk out.

I wanted to cry, I said "how come!

"In Israeli it's such a success.

"Well, people don't like my movie?

"Was that crazy?"

The bottom line,

they walked away in the middle of the movie

to buy the movie.

That their competitor will not beat them.

- Hey nilly?

- Palasen.

- The success of this movie in many ways was the bridge,

to america.

- And now let's all get serious.

- We saw that we had reached the top.

And we are film makers so we wanted to elevate ourself

and to do something differently.

Then we decide to leave Israel to find our way in america.

- Hello.

Hello.

- Hello? - Micah how are you?

- Menahem? - Yes.

How are you?

- Good, very good.

I'm in las Angeles now.

-Ah, you are in las Angeles so I don't have to shout.

I keep my order from them.

- Okay, I trust you I trust you.

A handshake with us is like a contract.

The name of the picture, do you have a name?

- We have a name,

"screwing around."

- Eh? - "Screwing around."

Screwing.

- Screwing, screwing.

Do you know what is screwing?

Screwing?

- Screwing. S-like Sarah

c-r

R.

Yes.

W-i-n-g, screwing.

That is fucking, screwing means fucking.

- Micah?

Yes.

- It's yoram.

You bustard.

You are a big bustard.

- Where is my money?

You promise and promise and you are not paying.

If I don't keep my words

you don't speak to me again.

- Let's finish.

- At that time it was illegal to take money out of Israel.

So we flew to america.

With $500 in our pockets.

We shared a small apartment and lived like roommates.

We ate sausages every day

and we worked form a small office

in the worst neighborhood in Los Angeles.

It wasn't very glamorous,

but it was the time of our lives.

- It's all, all the time, keep it.

Suspense and action.

Sinister, voices.

You know, add to it low music here.

Here, hold it.

Again, gentlemen, we are going to get some action.

If there is a hell on earth,

it's inside this walls.

Meet the Israeli dual

menahem golan and yoram globus.

They have a dream of taking over Hollywood

with their company Cannon films.

And what kind of movies do they make?

Some critics call them schlock films,

but actually they're just playing low budget movies.

Do you know how to make a $30 million movie?

- Never.

I don't know what to do with 30 millions.

I can make 30 movies maybe.

But I don't know what to do with 30 millions.

I mean, I'll feel like I'm a criminal

spending this kind of money on doing one motion picture.

Not all what they wanted is done.

And I still have goals to achieve a motion picture

that will be a world hit.

When I did the successful motion picture in Israel,

I went to the theater full house

and people were fighting to get in

and I didn't get that yet here in america.

And I probably won't get it so soon.

I won't get it until I make

a real American movie that they could identify with.

And not being an American, that's not easy.

But I'll do it.

In 1994, the world is controlled by one power.

- "The apple" is a movie I directed,

about the hippies.

- When we started to do it,

we think that the music is very new.

And we loved it.

We loved the story, we liked the color of the movie,

and we saw that it will conquered the world.

J“ we don't have to hurry j“

- when we finished it,

it was chosen to Montreal festival

as an opener.

J“ there ain't no good j“

j“ there ain't no bad j“

j“ there ain't no happiness j“

j“ there ain't no chills j“

j“ there ain't no love j“

- in the opening night, in the middle of the movie,

people left the theater

and kind of booed the movie.

- This was our biggest fiasco.

J“ you got me with my back against the wall j“

and menahem said to me, "I'm going to the toilet."

After ten minutes menahem doesn't come,

I said to our people, "let's go and find him."

- I went up to the eighth floor,

and I stood in the balcony and wanted to kill myself.

Wanted to jump out.

And it was yoram who chased me.

Yoram held me and he said to me,

"menahem there will be other movies."

- So we said, we are going to do a movie

and we have to do it fast.

Because if we will not do it fast

somebody else will do it for us.

So how can you do it fast?

With Israelis.

The normal 16 week shooting schedule

for an average film was cut to an unheard of three weeks.

All the tensions and pressures

that come with making a motion picture were intensified.

Joel silberg, faced a rigorous shooting schedule.

- The picture is being edited right now,

in Los Angeles while I'm still shooting.

And by the time I get to los Angeles in a week's time,

the picture will be cut.

- This scene happened...

This is the new dance.

This will grab the whole world.

J“ go and tell your peers j“

- We seem to have a problem here.

I'm very much afraid, they won't be able to dance for us.

- And why not?

- And we would knows

that we have to open it in america first.

So I said to zamyun, "you know something,

"I will guarantee the distribution.

"If you lose on distribution, I will pay."

He said, "ha ha, okay.

"But I said, but you take half of your percentages."

- Break dancing is breaking out

in some of the unlikely surroundings.

Shabadoo and boogaloo shrimp,

came all the way from america

to break dance for the folks in cannes.

- This is a film that Cannon did started only 12 weeks ago

and it's already in the theaters.

Movie fans have been highest definite

to the box office where breaking

has grossed 18 and a half million dollars

since it opened less than three weeks ago.

- You can all get rich in this business.

This year,

the big hit for golan and globus is "breakin."

It cost just over a million dollars to make it and so far,

taking in more than 56 million.

- The picture did in america

almost a hundred million dollar.

Which is crazy, the picture cost a million two.

J“ don't be mistaken, you got to see it breaking j“

This is the Hollywood that most people

know and loved, the fancy car,

the exclusive restaurants

and the lavish homes.

Golan and globus will have nothing to do with this.

They run their company like a factory.

A no frills operation where long hours

and low pay are the norm.

- We are not the kind of people of ma Maison or Jimmy's.,

you know, the fancy expensive restaurants.

We are not this kind.

Well, do you eat sandwiches here?

- We are eating sand witches here.

That's true, believe it or not.

We are eating sandwiches in our office, that's our lunch.

- I think you're gonna be surprised at how anxious

and networks would be to do business with you.

- The main thing is not to hesitate

and to go and be able to take chances.

- 99% of the budget of a picture is going to the script.

Not with all the limousine, schimousene, lunches, bunches,

we don't have time for this.

On this time menahem is spending few lunches,

he can do another picture.

- Let's go. - Are we getting lunch here?

- I was sitting with my wife in a French restaurant

and here comes one of the waiters

a handsome young man holding two plate of soup.

And he says to me in French.

I said, "yes I'm golan."

He picked up his foot, right foot

and he rubbed my head.

The soup, did not move.

- I kicked above his head.

And he gave me "my friend tomorrow come to my office.

"We talk you and I business."

And I go to his office

and I tried to provoke some sorts of dialogue.

And I took my shirt...

Myjacket and I show, "I've got muscle.

"I can do the split."

So I take a chair, I pull black for the vision I go,

"I'm in split position.

"I can be a fighter, karate everything for free."

He said, "I'm done."

"Maybe I gave too much."

"Sit down.

"Michael dudikoff is a star,

"what can I do with a split?

"The muscle?

"I need acting, sorry."

I go, "menahem,

"please,

I was like...

I break down.

And he look at me like...

With his big heart.

"Don't go, don't go next to me like this.

"Sit down, sit down, okay."

And he seen me,

"I'm so sorry, I'm sorry if I cried.

"Ilm so ♪♪♪' f |ng sorry."

And then he think and he think,

"galen, bring me blood sport."

And she come and he go,

"you want to be a movie star?

"I'm gonna make him a movie star."

Low budget highly commercial action films

are Cannon's talking trait.

Critics call them exploitation movies

pandering to the lowest cinematic taste.

- Cannon was my favorite film company as a kid.

When we saw that logo of those steel seas coming together

and we were like, "oh, it's a Cannon movie.

"It's going to be awesome."

You knew there was gonna be guns,

you knew there was gonna be chicks,

you knew there was nudity, there was violence.

Cannon was synonymous with awesome in the 80s.

There was no other film label that did that.

Cannon creates low budget exploitation movies

by the dozen.

With simplistic parts

and no doubt about who is good and who is bad.

- I think the audience goes into my movies

with a certain feeling of frustration.

Even though it's entertainment and it's fantasy.

When they leave that theater,

there's a certain release,

a certain feeling of something being done.

Even though it's done in a movie,

they can leave the theater feeling a little bit better

than when they went into the theater

because the good guy does come out on top.

- You can go to the movie theater and just watch the screen

and veg out and forget about the problems you had that day.

'Cause this is a...

Just gonna be a lot of fun to watch.

And you're gonna wanna go for the good guy.

And hope the bad guy gets what he gets.

And he normally did.

He normally did.

And then you walk out and you say,

"I love that guy, don't you?

"Yeah, Bronson's cool."

- Watching Chuck Norris go through a shopping mall,

run over a carpet glass and shot people with Uzis,

it was the most exciting, thrilling thing as a kid.

The Russians were invading, there were ninjas everywhere.

There were so much fun that as a12,13,14 year old,

it's pure cinematic ecstasy watching these movies.

- So you are ready to play chicken?

- It's interesting this Israeli guys came in

and really took over American pop culture with these movies.

Back then movies were the only source for pop culture,

there was no Internet, there was no Facebook,

there was no YouTube.

You couldn't get stuff from anywhere.

People would watch these movies over and over and over

and imitate them because that was our only source

of getting new culture.

They brought us ninjas, Chuck Norris, Charles Bronson,

and break dancing.

-All right, now I got you.

- I think that a lot of the Cannon movies

got dismissed as garbage or crap.

And as a kid that always offended me

as an adult it offends me.

I went over to Tarantino's house, he's like,

"I got a 35 millimeter print

of ninja three "the domination,"

and we watch it on 35 in his theater.

And this is like the best director in the world

still appreciating this movie.

This is kahn,

home of the prestigious film festival

which is held every year.

You know about the glamor, the riviera, the stars

but there's another side,

a business side you don't see

- producers from around the world

come here to set up shop and sell their product

to motion picture distributors from around the world.

That's where the golan and globus

brainstorm came in.

They've been so successful at it

that all they have to do is announce plans for a movie

and then wait in their hotel room

for the money to come in.

- They were experts at

financing it, selling it and then making it.

They were selling before and then making after.

And it worked.

It really did work.

- Tell me the Stallone deal is it set?

I know, but is it completely signed?

And you owned the rest of the rights?

- Yes, we did.

- So there is a possible ground to talk.

- I will bring cassavetes and gene rowlands to Tokyo

- I cannot allow dialogue scene

that will last more than a page.

Naked face and always Roger Moore.

It's a fantastic film for

Fantastic.

- I'm yoram globus.

- We sold a lot of pictures to India.

- Oh, you have?

- You used to go to Khan with a finished movie,

you showed it, then they bought it or didn't buy it.

While I started to pre-licensing movies

without them reading the script,

without them knowing even what they're going to buy.

- When we signed the stars,

we to took a session of photography to create a poster.

The poster was more important than the movie.

It came to a point that,

the distributor trusted us so much,

that they used to sell them for year to come.

10 or 15 movies, without tittles even.

- We all laughed at menahem

when he first came here from Israel, six or seven years ago,

but he's become a big power.

Cannon pictures make more films, have more influence,

have more distributors, spend more money

and I must say speaking personally and selfishly,

he spends more money...

My paper, than anybody's rushes in every day and says,

"I want $10,000, I want...

"And see

"He's mad, he spends fortunes and he gets it back.

"So he must be doing something right."

There seemed to be no length

to which Cannon will not go for publicity.

The biggest publicity broadside

of the entire festival so far

was the arrival of this full scale pirate galleon.

Which for the last year has been used for the filming

of Roman polanski's new movie, "pirates"

_ pretty soon, after two years,

people weren't calling it cannes film festival,

they were calling it "the Cannon film festival."

Cannon is menahem golan and yoram globus.

Globus with the beard raises the cash golan spends it.

Seven years ago,

they paid half a million dollars for Cannon.

Today it's worth a thousand million dollars

and is a worldwide force in every aspect

of the film industry.

- It's very very good to get reviews on movies,

but it's also important that the public

will come to see our movies.

Because if they come

they will support you to do the next movie.

- We must make a press conference now.

Sit down.

One sentence in French,

Gene siskel and Roger ebert

of TV's "at the movies" say golan and globus

are not even true filmmakers, just shrewd salesman.

- They're deal makers.

To date, they have not made

what I would say is a really fine film.

After the new release by Cannon,

the press has been pretty hostile.

"The language is filthy,

"the film is simple minded

"and Bronson's characters is despicable.

"Gore and violence, exploiting hatred

"fear and matter results to every bit as revolting

"as in the original 1974 jackpot fantasy."

- Let's have a look just for a change

at some of the real stinkers of the year.

Faced with one film at least,

the critics Rose up as one critic

and lure communal raspberry, and that was bolero.

"Virgin on the ridiculous," the guardian called it.

Warmed up softcore porn it was,

in which Mr. Derek spent most of the time

revealing what we must now come to think of

as a public parks.

- Can I speak to Altman and tell him we...

- You know, what's happening with the godard?

John-Luc godard?

Despite their reputation as deal makers,

golan and globus are also trying to make

some so-called prestige films, like

John cassavetes's "loved streams."

- I'm very proud of it.

And I'm proud of you too because no one else stood with me.

You're laughing.

We could have been swallowed by Hollywood

and became like anybody else.

We didn't want that.

We brought New York with us to Hollywood.

- Who the fuck are you?

- And then, when Taiwan

wanted to buy our "death wish three,"

we said to the local distributor.

"Sorry man, you have to take John cassavetes first

"or you don't get Charles Bronson."

And now you know that in Taiwan

they have to see an Altman movie,

they have to see the ziffirelli,

they will see an opera otello,

because otherwise they're not going to get Charlie Bronson.

- And action.

I came to america being regarded a

quite well known director in era and and Russia.

And for three years of unemployment,

slowly I understood that basically, no one knew me.

I think pollock introduced me

in the bar to menahem, he said,

"this is a young man and maybe you should talk to him."

And menahem said, "come tomorrow morning to my room."

So I came to his room

and he was in his underpants shaving himself.

He say, "okay tell me the story."

I start to tell the story.

I was kind of heart dancing

and because it was a Russian story

I placed it in yugoslavia somewhere.

Then he interrupted me,

"put all story in American and we're going to do it.

"Think about, come back."

Before I get my coffee, I already knew that I'm going to do

whatever they wantjust to make a film.

- You do what you have to do and I'll do what I have to do.

Whatever happens happens.

- Menahem, big voice you'd hear him before you got there.

"John?" he says.

He says, "this picture has everything.

"It is has great script, it is has great cast,

"its action, it's unbelievable piece.

"You have to be schmucks not to make this picture."

He would say.

- When a man walked in at the end of the day

and he comes to see how you've done,

you're ain't gonna look at his eyes.

You're going to look at the floor.

Because you don't want to see that fear in his eyes

when you jump up and grab his face

and slam him to the floor.

- The nominees for best performance by an actor

and the motion picture drama are,

Harrison Ford in "witness."

- Gene huckman in "twice in a life time."

- William hurt in "kiss of the spider woman."

John voight in "runaway train."

- The winner is

John voight.

"Runaway train" by the Russian director

konchalovsky, is one of three Cannon films

chosen for the prestigious cannes festival competition.

The others are Sam Shepard's, "fool for love"

and zeffirelli's film, "otello."

There are even plans for John Luc godard

to direct "king Lia."

It's your name here on the napkin?

- Yes. It's me. - What is it?

- It's a contract that I've signed

the day before yesterday afternoon in the bar.

We didn't have paper and this was on the table of the bar.

And this is Mr. John Luc godard.

We met, I said, "hello Mr. Godard."

My first sentence was,

"what do you want to do with Cannon?"

And he second question,

"what do you want to do is godard?"

And I said, "let's do a film."

- Some guy would come to him and say, "I have an idea."

"Oh, that's a great idea."

They'd sign it on on a napkin.

And that was the deal they call me

and I said, "we got to do more than the napkin,"

menahem, "no, no, no napkin is good enough.

"I trust them."

- And it was a little bit like a throwback

to the original.

Immigrant fellows who started this business

the moguls,

he was a little like that.

- What kind of satisfaction is there

for the two of you

to talk to some of the people who may be

would not return the phone call many years ago?

- We don't carry any grudge to Hollywood.

I mean, definitely not.

And we will talk to anybody who didn't talk to us before.

- You got no chance, do you know that?

You know that.

Come on hawk, back here now.

- Dad!

Don't let him psych you dad, remember what you told me.

- One day an actor brought me a script

which I like very much about Allan.

So I called the lawyer of Stallone.

Stallone was getting millions of value.

So the lawyer says to me,

"menahem you cannot get him, he get $6 million."

So I said to him," I don't want to pay him 6 million.

"So what do you want, why are you calling me?"

I said, "I wanna pay him ten."

The next week I had a contract.

- Dad!

He's the world champion.

Lincoln hawk is the world champion.

- Other studios put you through a long

and contentious development process

that after doing 20 drafts,

you may end up with a much better screenplay

or you may end up in development hell

and your movie may never get made.

With Cannon you got an immediate yes or no

when you were shooting.

Cannon films, the home of high power,

high voltage,

motion picture entertainment.

- It was not a factor

but came down to the old way of Hollywood doing films.

One after the other

as one was going on, menahem was working on another one

and another.

We are Cannon films and we are dynamite.

Okay.

Let's first get rid of the bad news, huh?

- What are the bad news?

- Okay, it's money.

- Money is yoram - I have to make...

Money is yoram.

- Money is yoram.

- Yoram was great at finding money.

Menahem spent it faster than yoram could raise it.

Were it me, I would have tried to keep

menahem under check and have him not spend.

But yoram was not able or willing to do that.

- Menahem is a very stubborn man.

When it comes to movies...

When it comes to movies

and you start something

he does not know who is his wife or daughter or cousin.

Nobody.

It's up guys, here comes colonel Brady.

So why would colonel wanna to go to Cambodia?

To get her daughter across the fence.

- He's meeting a recon unit checking, enemy strength.

- Where?

They're loud, sir.

Eight years ago, menahem golan

and his cousin yoram globus

were virtually unknown outside of Israel.

They now run the most powerful independent film company

in the world.

Golan and globus control cinema chains in Italy,

Germany, and Holland.

All in all, they now own more than 1000 screens in Europe.

- In some way, everybody was kind of set

with the studio system as it was delivered.

And these guys said, why can't we have another one?

- They weren't Paramount to it.

But they were right up there

really close to that aspect of it.

And they were turning out more films and...

That some studios might make in 10 years.

- 50 years, there was not a new major.

50, huh!

50 years, you did not hear about a new company and new name.

Why?

Because Hollywood is very closed,

like this.

But in the last three months our company made more

successes than all the majors of america.

- Cannon represent in the last three months,

20% of the total box office in america.

- Hello?

You have to understand.

I know that many companies and small companies,

you know, negotiating and they bids and all of that.

If Cannon will give a bid, Cannon will have it.

Cannon is mean business, you understand?

So it's premature of these thing.

And the rumors that everybody is going after...

So it's not even a scoop anymore.

Now it's a fact,

the canon group knows no bounds.

In an unbelievable move,

Cannon acquires the emi library, abc screens

and hill street studios practically overnight

for not less than $270 million.

- When you want to build something,

you have to dedicate and handle it emotional.

When you build such a business, somebody gets hurt

and unfortunately

some of which you learn got hurt.

And with all the glamor and the success

there is sad side to that also.

- I have hurt my family.

It's right that film making,

if you devoted to it,

if you marry this art

it takes away some of your other life.

And no question about it.

To celebrate the move

to their new headquarters,

golan and globus invited Hollywood to a black tie party.

There were over 2000 persons.

- Nice to see you yoram.

Good evening, yes.

- Thank you for coming.

We're going to do that movie.

We have John And you.

And it's gonna be a blockbuster of the century.

- I'm delighted to see it.

- Delighted to see you.

- When I first was asked to come to their office,

it was a small little office door.

It was kind of dilapidated building.

Then come back a year later to go to that same little

Cannon films, the little door off a wheelchair

and somebody is coming out and he says,

"hey, you're gonna cross the street?"

And I go, "what do you mean?"

He goes, "look across the street."

I look across the street and it's an empire.

They built this brand new

huge building and they had a huge party.

Bronson was there, Charlie, my hero.

They got Charlie Bronson underneath this roof.

- Yoram and me, when we came from Israel and from Europe

we came to mecca.

The mecca of motion pictures.

And we came to pray.

And we prayed and prayed, in the beginning nobody listened.

But then we kept on praying,

and finally people begin to listen.

Golan and globus may sound

like a couple of middle eastern cities

but they are actually the Israeli cousins

who own and operate the first Cannon group

affectionately and disparagingly known as the "go go boys."

They come as close to old time movie moguls

as anyone in the business.

- Yes, they are the go go boys.

Innovative, just like the old moguls came out.

They were a replica of those guys.

- In newsweek,

they put us on the cover.

But you know who gets on the cover?

Only heads of government and presidents et cetera.

To be on the cover of newsweek,

they call us "go go boys."

- They would not think that anything could go wrong.

And they kept pushing.

- "Go go."

It means go go.

- But now to Sylvester Stallone.

He who was paid the tidy little sum of $12 million

for starring in and helping to write "over the top"

at the cost of $40 million.

And before the film was released in america,

Stallone himself was wondering

quite how his fans would respond

to a lack of physical violence.

- It isn't as raucous or as outrageous

as some of the other things that I've done.

So they might be taken aback.

- But "over the top"

hasn't gone over particularly well with American audiences.

Indeed, it could turn out

to be one of Stallone's biggest fiops.

This news isn't just disturbing for Stallone himself

but also for the man who produced and directed the film

menahem golan, head or the rather beleaguered

Cannon film group.

Of course,

Very good.

- You're all right? - Yes.

It's a big honor Mr. Vice president.

Well thank you so much.

- Some of you be quiet

it's the vice president of the United States.

- On some level, and I say this now

having run a studio for 10 years,

we made 20 movies a year.

It isn't a volume business, it's a hits business.

You have to make hits in order to survive.

- You know, a couple of good movies could have saved him.

Like anywhere, one big breakout movie or what

just didn't happen for him.

And on success which is based on cheap movies,

but now that's changing.

Golan is trying to improve Cannon's image

with big budget movies and running into big problems.

With money from the bank Cannon is expanding it's empire,

buying up movie chains and film distribution rights

around the world.

And the big debt could be big trouble for Cannon.

- First it was little money trouble with a little movie.

Then it became the big money trouble

with bigger movies.

You know, like they say, little kids, little problems,

big kids, big problems.

- Last month, Cannon announced a loss of $90 million

for the two years, 1985, 86.

The company lost $14 million

in the last quarter.

Their stock this year has lost 75% of its value.

And by mid December

Cannon was raised $18 million

to pay off a debt in britain.

Golan has been up and down many times in his life.

- I can't be worried because I'm too busy making the movies

and I'm so excited and I'm so into it.

I believe that we know what we are doing.

And I believe that our future is safe.

- When they first got into money trouble,

their solution was

let's make more movies.

If we can make a million dollars a movie

and we're running out of money making 20 movies,

let's make 30, let's make 40, let's make 50.

- That was going so fast, they were making so many films

and they trusted a lot of the agents that were selling them

films that should never have been made

that they couldn't give away.

- This is some of their advertising.

Many films that were not even made.

It was all falling apart.

And so for me, you know being part of the family

when they went down, I went down

- we were like a rocket, the success

year after year, we became better and better

and more successful, more successful.

And I think when I asked him to stop for six months

and to reevaluate and just to relax

that was the time that he should have listened to me.

But he ran like crazy.

As Cannon in London

planned the launch of "Superman four" here in rehearsal,

golan and globus miss wish more than most

that the miraculous rescues of film fantasy

might come their way.

It could easily happen.

- To Superman we should have put all of our efforts

to make from it a hit movie.

A better movies in the first three.

And because of so many production

you don't have the time to devote to it.

This is for me,

our biggest fiasco.

It could have been,

our breakthrough

to the top of Hollywood.

- Just over 12 months ago,

the cousin's menahem and golan

and yoram globus bought their way

into the British filmmaking establishment

but all has not gone as they hoped.

In October their accounting practices

came under the scrutiny

of the American securities and exchange commission.

The American securities and exchange commission

report into their accounting practices

is expected this summer.

Cannon stock is now trading in New York at $4.75 a share.

A year ago they were $45.5.

- While investigating this story,

news night asked Mr. Golan and Mr. Globus for an interview.

But until the sec report is published

they decided to remain silent.

- I had to deal with it three years of my life with sec.

I used to fly to the states every couple of months

to be a witness and to be an investigate.

It's very tough.

It's very tough.

It's very tough when you know that you're completely clean

and you have to prove it.

-At this point,

the company is not able to continue to operate profitably.

The movies are not doing well at the box office.

I would recommend stockholders and also bond holders

that they should in some form unite

in order to put the company into this kind of a bankruptcy.

- Wall street came

and start to think about different way of doing movies

instead of five, 10, three, 70, that a hundred million

it became completely different philosophy.

That wasn't their philosophy.

Their philosophy, were craft.

I think I left Hollywood because there were no anymore

golan and globus in Hollywood.

Just a month ago,

the Cannon Titanic had a $200 million debt

and was about to go under.

But now it seems golan and globus

have one more life boat in reserve,

Giancarlo parretti of pathe pictures

is the shiny new partner of this unstoppable Israeli duel.

- Parretti was a guy who showed up in town

and he was representing a lot of money

and he got into the company and bought the company.

In my mind this was part of the end

of Cannon.

- We had an empire.

We are the company that created an empire.

But then some powers,

which are more belonging to the world of numbers,

mathematics, money, they took away your yoram from me.

- I really collapsed because

it's like running after money all the time and to finish is,

you know, the 45 movies cost almost a billion dollar.

$1 billion it's a lot of money.

And to finish the movie I had to earn

and I didn't want to do it all my life.

Menahem, we tried to stop him, so he wanted to live.

And I told him, "I'm not going with you."

- This was the last row.

But the whole thing was...

I think the difference of philosophy of motion pictures,

he wanted to buy cinemas, I wanted to make movies.

I couldn't stay, couldn't take it.

And I told yoram, "a divorce is a divorce is a divorce."

And we divorced, in home it was.

Yoram brought his lawyers, his friends, I was there alone.

They all tried to convince me

to take a vacation to forget it.

But that was so hurt that I couldn't come back

to the people who were in Cannon.

- This was like my home

and at some point yoram and menahem were like my parents

and they split.

So it was like,

when your parents are getting divorced or something.

- He said, "divorce is till the end"

and I paid him official $15 million.

Which was a lot.

And I got him 25 from Cannon, so it's 40 million.

And I arranged for him a line of credit of $35 million.

So he had $75 million.

And he said to me,

"I will teach you how I doing dabbles in Cannon."

Why do you choose cannes

for your main launch of your new company?

- Well, cannes is my new real, my Christmas.

I count my years from cannes to cannes.

The industry will have great difficulty

coping with you on your own without your cousin

because you've been together, I think about 30 years?

- That's right.

Well, a divorce is a divorce and you get used to it.

And you find that life offers you away to go on.

And now for me,

it's the dawn of the 21st century in my new company.

- Menahem went on and he tried to make a go of it

and it just...

It wasn't the same.

- Ready?

Take two.

The whole thing should be speedy, Gonzalez.

Fast, fast, fast.

- I'm starving and there's no food for me here.

What do I do?

- This crew is going to have lunch today at 2 o'clock

- at that location. - Fine, fine.

- How are we gonna do that?

- It's on 12:15. - Without killing them.

12:15 is not...

- So you're telling me there's enough time...

- Yes. - To do what we got to do...

- If you don't talk to me now wee should shoot over there.

Let's go, let's move this staff...

One thing which I really dislike is that people here

give more attention to the lunches and off time

than the time they work.

Every body is worried to...

Worried about their lunch from the start of the morning,

I don't hear anything else, but about lunch.

I didn't have the power

that I should have had when I had yoram.

I didn't have that half of me.

I was working with only my left hand and not my right.

I made a mistake

and it took me some difficult years

but I kept on doing movies, I never stopped.

In a shocking turn of events,

mgm chairman, Giancarlo parretti is accused of fraud

and money laundering with the Italian mafia.

- I'm a believer in yoram.

I believe that he believed that parretti actually had money.

Whereas in actual reality parretti was

cooking the books.

- It was very difficult for me to accept it

what's happening, but it was the real life

and I couldn't do nothing.

When everything is suddenly starting to fall on you

and you are living because you don't want to be there

it hurts.

Hurts very much.

I quit from the company.

I decided I'm out.

And then I decided I'm coming back to Israel.

After leaving mgm.

I had to start all over again.

So I began to welcome a new dream.

Building a real Hollywood studio

between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

- Then I decided where I can make movies,

I go back to the place and I went back to Israel

where I can make movies.

And that's what I'm doing all the time.

- Of course.

We lost 20 years.

We could the been Colombia, mgm, universal.

Who are they?

We could be better than them.

It's a waste of talent.

And now I have a script

that I foresee that will bring us to the top.