"Another producer might have torn his hair out by now, or developed an ulcer or swallowed lots of tranquilizers", said Ben Ammar during the shoot. "But it's only a movie... Sure it's important to me that "Pirates" be a hit, but it's also important that by building the boat in this country, where unemployment stands at around 20 percent, I gave 2,400 people work for two years. Yes, Polanski does seem to be disaster-prone, but his talent is so great that wonderful actors like Matthau and the top European technicians all wanted to work here with him. "Pirates" is giving my staff lessons in filmmaking money couldn't buy."