Editing Tabu: A Story of the South Seas (section)

==Production==
===Pre-production===
Murnau was coming off two troubled [[Fox Film|Fox Studios]] productions, ''[[Four Devils]]'' (1928) and ''[[City Girl (1930 film)|City Girl]]'' (1930), while Flaherty's Native American documentary ''Acoma the Sky City'' had been shut down. The two directors knew each other through Flaherty's brother David, and Murnau expressed a desire to make a film in [[Tahiti]] with Flaherty who had experience with the natives there.<ref name="crosbyinterview">Langer, Mark ''Flaherty's Period: The Crosby Version'' (Wide Angle 20, 1998)</ref> Murnau and Flaherty wrote a story called ''Turia'' and started their own production company, Flaherty-Murnau Productions. ''Turia'' was based on a legend Flaherty had heard while working on [[W. S. Van Dyke]]'s ''[[White Shadows in the South Seas]]'' (1928) and contained many elements which would later evolve into ''Tabu: A Story of the South Seas''.<ref name="scotteyman">Eyman, Scott ''Sunrise in Bora Bora'' (Film Comment, 1990)</ref>

Murnau visited Tahiti in May 1929 and was joined by Flaherty a month later to scout for locations on the nearby island of Bora Bora.<ref name="scotteyman" /> While scouting, they found their leading lady, Anne Chevalier, in a local cocktail bar.<ref name="scotteyman" />

The production was originally supposed to be financed by a small production company called Colorart. By September, however, Murnau had only received $5,000 of the due money. After a series of telegrams asking for the rest of the money, Murnau got fed up and decided to fund it himself.<ref name="scotteyman" /><ref name="davidflaherty">Flaherty, David ''A Few Reminiscences'' (Film Culture, 1959)</ref>

To cut costs, Murnau sent the Hollywood crew home and trained the natives to work as the crew. He also scrapped plans to shoot the film in colour and changed to black and white.<ref name="filmnotes">Heller, Amy and Doros, Dennis "Film Notes" (Milestone Film & Video, 1992)</ref> The film's script was rewritten and the title was changed to ''Tabu: A Story of the South Seas'' to avoid potential legal issues with Colorart.<ref name="scotteyman" /><ref name="filmnotes" /> This was the start of a poor working relationship between Flaherty and Murnau. Flaherty disliked the new script, feeling it was overly plotted and Westernized.<ref name="filmnotes" />

===Production===
Production began in January 1930, with Flaherty directing the opening scene of the film. This would be the only scene he directed.<ref name="scotteyman" /> Flaherty began having technical problems, as his camera was causing the film to rip. He called in cinematographer Floyd Crosby for help and the rest of the film was shot by Crosby.<ref name="crosbyinterview" /><ref name="scotteyman" /> Murnau, Flaherty, and Crosby were the only professional filmmakers working on ''Tabu: A Story of the South Seas''; the rest of the crew was made up of local natives.<ref name="scotteyman" /> Flaherty worked on the story with Murnau during production, but he was not the co-director as he originally thought he would be. He spent most of his time on the film working in the lab developing the film.<ref name="scotteyman" /> Flaherty disliked Murnau immensely because of this and the arrogance and selfishness Murnau displayed during production.<ref name="crosbyinterview" />

===Post-production===
Production finished in October 1930.<ref name="scotteyman" /> Flaherty had been living on only $40 a week and was broke by the end of the shoot. A couple of days after the wrap, Flaherty sold his share of the film to Murnau for $25,000.<ref name="scotteyman" /> Returning to Los Angeles, Murnau spent the winter editing the film and used the last of his money to hire [[Hugo Riesenfeld]] for the music scoring. The distribution rights were sold to [[Paramount Pictures|Paramount]] for five years for a sum of $75,000, which helped Murnau pay off Flaherty.