If you're hoping to discover that Russell Johnson, the level-headed, boundlessly inventive Professor Roy Hinkley from "Gilligan's Island" lived a life riddled with scandal, prepare to be sorely disappointed. Aside from his 1948 divorce and the time he entered the Burbank Post Office parking lot through the exit lane because he was running late for a Kiwanis Club dinner, there's not so much as a speck of dirt on this guy.
Born in 1924, you won't be surprised to learn that he served in World War II. But you might be interested to learn that on his 45th bombing raid in the Pacific Theater, his B-25 was shot down, forcing him to ditch the aircraft off the coast of the Philippines. His co-pilot was killed, while Johnson broke both of his ankles. Johnson received a fistful of medals, was honorably discharged, and used the G.I. Bill to study performance at the Actors' Lab in Hollywood.
Born in 1924, you won't be surprised to learn that he served in World War II. But you might be interested to learn that on his 45th bombing raid in the Pacific Theater, his B-25 was shot down, forcing him to ditch the aircraft off the coast of the Philippines. His co-pilot was killed, while Johnson broke both of his ankles. Johnson received a fistful of medals, was honorably discharged, and used the G.I. Bill to study performance at the Actors' Lab in Hollywood.
- 9/23/2024
- by Jeremy Smith
- Slash Film
Among the myriad reasons we could call the Criterion Channel the single greatest streaming service is its leveling of cinematic snobbery. Where a new World Cinema Project restoration plays, so too does Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight. I think about this looking at November’s lineup and being happiest about two new additions: a nine-film Robert Bresson retro including L’argent and The Devil, Probably; and a one-film Hype Williams retro including Belly and only Belly, but bringing as a bonus the direct-to-video Belly 2: Millionaire Boyz Club. Until recently such curation seemed impossible.
November will also feature a 20-film noir series boasting the obvious and the not. Maybe the single tightest collection is “Women of the West,” with Johnny Guitar and The Beguiled and Rancho Notorious and The Furies only half of it. Lynch/Oz, Irradiated, and My Two Voices make streaming premieres; Drylongso gets a Criterion Edition; and joining...
November will also feature a 20-film noir series boasting the obvious and the not. Maybe the single tightest collection is “Women of the West,” with Johnny Guitar and The Beguiled and Rancho Notorious and The Furies only half of it. Lynch/Oz, Irradiated, and My Two Voices make streaming premieres; Drylongso gets a Criterion Edition; and joining...
- 10/24/2023
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
Five Inspirations is a series in which we ask directors to share five things that shaped and informed their work. The series Love Me, Click Me: Films by Eugene Kotlyarenko is now showing in most countries. The mini-retrospective of my work currently showing on Mubi has allowed me to reflect on the early days of my filmmaking journey and the people and work that inspired me along the way.Inspiration #1Directing the Film: Film Directors on Their Art (1976) by Eric ShermanDirecting the Film was a book my brother got me on my 13th birthday. Comprised of interviews with seminal directors, it's organized according to the filmmaking process. My key takeaway was that there's no right or wrong way to make a movie. Artists figure out their own path and methods. I've returned to it many times over the years.Inspiration #2Working with Agnès VardaA few months after I moved out to LA,...
- 3/21/2023
- MUBI
Raquel Welch, the actor who became an icon and sex symbol thanks to films like “One Million Years B.C.” and “Three Musketeers,” died Wednesday in Los Angeles after a brief illness, her manager confirmed to Variety. She was 82.
She came onto the movie scene in 1966 with the sci-fi film “Fantastic Voyage” and the prehistoric adventure “One Million Years B.C.,” the latter of which established Welch as a sex symbol. The actor went on to appear in the controversial adaptation of Gore Vidal’s “Myra Beckrinridge,” “Kansas City Bomber” and Richard Lester’s delightful romps “The Three Musketeers” (1973), for which she won a Golden Globe, and “The Four Musketeers: Milady’s Revenge” (1974). She was one of the first women to play the lead role — not the romantic interest — in a Western, 1971 revenge tale “Hannie Caulder” — an inspiration for Quentin Tarantino’s “Kill Bill” (2003), according to the director.
(Earlier, Marlene Dietrich and Joan Crawford...
She came onto the movie scene in 1966 with the sci-fi film “Fantastic Voyage” and the prehistoric adventure “One Million Years B.C.,” the latter of which established Welch as a sex symbol. The actor went on to appear in the controversial adaptation of Gore Vidal’s “Myra Beckrinridge,” “Kansas City Bomber” and Richard Lester’s delightful romps “The Three Musketeers” (1973), for which she won a Golden Globe, and “The Four Musketeers: Milady’s Revenge” (1974). She was one of the first women to play the lead role — not the romantic interest — in a Western, 1971 revenge tale “Hannie Caulder” — an inspiration for Quentin Tarantino’s “Kill Bill” (2003), according to the director.
(Earlier, Marlene Dietrich and Joan Crawford...
- 2/15/2023
- by Carmel Dagan
- Variety Film + TV
We love this Fritz Lang western even though it’s not particularly good; only in hindsight do we realize that the brilliant director’s intentions may have been compromised. High-key lighting does Marlene Dietrich no favors, but she scores good scenes performing with Arthur Kennedy (revenged crazed cowpoke) and Mel Ferrer (tranquilized gunslinger). Lang fans will be impressed by the gaudy, over-bright restored Technicolor, and we can always blame Howard Hughes.
Rancho Notorious
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1952 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 89 min. / Available at Amazon.com / General site Wac-Amazon / Street Date January 10, 2023 / 21.99
Starring: Marlene Dietrich, Arthur Kennedy, Mel Ferrer, Lloyd Gough, William Frawley, Jack Elam, George Reeves, Frank Ferguson, Dan Seymour, John Doucette, Dick Elliott, Russell Johnson, Charlita.
Cinematography: Hal Mohr
Production Designer: Wiard Ihnen
Dietrich’s wardrobe designed by: Don Loper
Editorial Supervisor: Otto Ludwig
Original Music: Emil Newman
Written by Daniel Taradash, Silvia Richards
Produced by Howard Welsch
Directed...
Rancho Notorious
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1952 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 89 min. / Available at Amazon.com / General site Wac-Amazon / Street Date January 10, 2023 / 21.99
Starring: Marlene Dietrich, Arthur Kennedy, Mel Ferrer, Lloyd Gough, William Frawley, Jack Elam, George Reeves, Frank Ferguson, Dan Seymour, John Doucette, Dick Elliott, Russell Johnson, Charlita.
Cinematography: Hal Mohr
Production Designer: Wiard Ihnen
Dietrich’s wardrobe designed by: Don Loper
Editorial Supervisor: Otto Ludwig
Original Music: Emil Newman
Written by Daniel Taradash, Silvia Richards
Produced by Howard Welsch
Directed...
- 1/31/2023
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Lewis Milestone directed this poetic, optimistic ode to the American infantryman, a ‘lone patrol’ saga that emphasizes its soldiers’ hopes and fears. The lineup of fresh, eager acting talent is remarkable: Dana Andrews, Richard Conte, George Tyne, John Ireland, Lloyd Bridges, Sterling Holloway, Norman Lloyd, Herbert Rudley, Richard Benedict, Huntz Hall, James Cardwell, Steve Brodie. Voiceovers and ‘ballads’ give a six-mile beachhead incursion the tone of a spiritual rumination. A beautiful full film restoration brings the image back to prime quality. The controversial filmmakers and the unusual production circumstances are covered in Alan K. Rode’s commentary.
A Walk in the Sun
Blu-ray + DVD
Kit Parker Films / Mvd Visual
1945 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 117 min. / Street Date January 18, 2022 / The Definitive Restoration / Available from Amazon / 29.95
Starring: Dana Andrews, Richard Conte, George Tyne, John Ireland, Lloyd Bridges, Sterling Holloway, Norman Lloyd, Herbert Rudley, Richard Benedict, Huntz Hall, James Cardwell, Steve Brodie, Matt Willis,...
A Walk in the Sun
Blu-ray + DVD
Kit Parker Films / Mvd Visual
1945 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 117 min. / Street Date January 18, 2022 / The Definitive Restoration / Available from Amazon / 29.95
Starring: Dana Andrews, Richard Conte, George Tyne, John Ireland, Lloyd Bridges, Sterling Holloway, Norman Lloyd, Herbert Rudley, Richard Benedict, Huntz Hall, James Cardwell, Steve Brodie, Matt Willis,...
- 1/4/2022
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Gloria Henry — the actress best known for playing Alice Mitchell, mother of Dennis Mitchell on the 1959-63 sitcom “Dennis the Menace” — died on Saturday. She was 98.
“It is with great sadness to let of all my dear and amazing mother’s fans know that she passed peacefully,” her son, Adam, wrote in a Facebook post. “Please raise a glass and a toast to our beautiful mother Gloria Henry for a life well lived.”
Born Gloria Eileen McEniry on April 2, 1923 in New Orleans, she began her acting career in the early 1940s after moving to Los Angeles as a teenager, where she adopted her stage name, Gloria Henry. In 1947, she made her film debut co-starring in the horse racing drama “Sport of Kings.” Other credits from her early career included two films with Gene Autry — “The Strawberry Roan” and “Riders in the Sky” — as well as the Lucille Ball romantic comedy...
“It is with great sadness to let of all my dear and amazing mother’s fans know that she passed peacefully,” her son, Adam, wrote in a Facebook post. “Please raise a glass and a toast to our beautiful mother Gloria Henry for a life well lived.”
Born Gloria Eileen McEniry on April 2, 1923 in New Orleans, she began her acting career in the early 1940s after moving to Los Angeles as a teenager, where she adopted her stage name, Gloria Henry. In 1947, she made her film debut co-starring in the horse racing drama “Sport of Kings.” Other credits from her early career included two films with Gene Autry — “The Strawberry Roan” and “Riders in the Sky” — as well as the Lucille Ball romantic comedy...
- 4/5/2021
- by Ross A. Lincoln
- The Wrap
Gloria Henry, who is best known for her role as the mother on the classic 1960s comedy Dennis the Menace has died. She was 98.
The actress died on April 3, according to multiple media reports. Her son, Adam Ellwood posted photos of Henry on his Facebook page, paying tribute to her.
Henry was born Gloria Eileen McEniry in New Orleans, Louisiana on April 2, 1923. She moved to Los Angeles in her late teens and worked on radio shows, commercials and performed in theater groups.
She made her movie debut in 1947 in Sport of Kings and went on to appear in Miss Grant Takes Richmond (1949) alongside Lucille Ball as well as the western Rancho Notorious (1952) with Marlene Dietrich. Her other movie credits The Strawberry Roan (1948) Triple Threat (1948), Racing Luck (1948), Riders in the Sky (1949), and Kill the Umpire (1950).
She appeared in TV series such as My Little Margie, Father Knows Best, Perry Mason and The Life of Riley.
The actress died on April 3, according to multiple media reports. Her son, Adam Ellwood posted photos of Henry on his Facebook page, paying tribute to her.
Henry was born Gloria Eileen McEniry in New Orleans, Louisiana on April 2, 1923. She moved to Los Angeles in her late teens and worked on radio shows, commercials and performed in theater groups.
She made her movie debut in 1947 in Sport of Kings and went on to appear in Miss Grant Takes Richmond (1949) alongside Lucille Ball as well as the western Rancho Notorious (1952) with Marlene Dietrich. Her other movie credits The Strawberry Roan (1948) Triple Threat (1948), Racing Luck (1948), Riders in the Sky (1949), and Kill the Umpire (1950).
She appeared in TV series such as My Little Margie, Father Knows Best, Perry Mason and The Life of Riley.
- 4/5/2021
- by Dino-Ray Ramos
- Deadline Film + TV
The best Westerns often come from outsiders. Fred Zinnemann’s Oscar-winner “High Noon,” Fritz Lang’s “Rancho Notorious,” William Wyler’s “The Big Country,” Wim Wenders’ “Paris, Texas” — all from Germans and Austrians. And of course, Sergio Leone’s classics starring Clint Eastwood were filmed by an Italian in Spain.
Now we can add U.K. filmmaker Andrew Haigh and China-born Chloé Zhao to their number. Neither set out to comment on classic western genre tropes with “Lean on Pete” (A24) and “The Rider” (Sony Pictures Classics), both of which earned raves on the festival circuit before hitting theaters this month. They shot in the badlands of Colorado and South Dakota, respectively. And both filmmakers explore the relationship between young men, their horses, and the nature that surrounds them. (Their distributors are slowly rolling them out across the heartland.)
“The Rider”
New Yorker Zhao shot her 2013 documentary “Songs My Brothers Taught Me” in South Dakota.
Now we can add U.K. filmmaker Andrew Haigh and China-born Chloé Zhao to their number. Neither set out to comment on classic western genre tropes with “Lean on Pete” (A24) and “The Rider” (Sony Pictures Classics), both of which earned raves on the festival circuit before hitting theaters this month. They shot in the badlands of Colorado and South Dakota, respectively. And both filmmakers explore the relationship between young men, their horses, and the nature that surrounds them. (Their distributors are slowly rolling them out across the heartland.)
“The Rider”
New Yorker Zhao shot her 2013 documentary “Songs My Brothers Taught Me” in South Dakota.
- 4/17/2018
- by Anne Thompson
- Indiewire
Wow! Fritz Lang's second western is a marvel -- a combo of matinee innocence and that old Germanic edict that character equals fate. It has a master's sense of color and design. Robert Young is an odd fit but Randolph Scott is nothing less than terrific. You'd think Lang was born on the Pecos. Western Union Blu-ray Kl Studio Classics 1941 / Color /1:37 flat Academy / 95 min. / Street Date November 8, 2016 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Randolph Scott, Robert Young, Virginia Gilmore, Dean Jagger, John Carradine, Chill Wills, Slim Summerville, Barton MacLane, Victor Kilian, George Chandler, Chief John Big Tree, Iron Eyes Cody, Jay Silverheels. Cinematography Edward Cronjager, Allen M. Davey Original Music David Buttolph Written by Robert Carson from the novel by Zane Grey Produced by Harry Joe Brown (associate) Directed by Fritz Lang
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Darryl Zanuck of 20th Fox treated most writers well, was good for John Ford...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Darryl Zanuck of 20th Fox treated most writers well, was good for John Ford...
- 11/1/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Savant uncovers the true, hidden ending to this Fritz Lang masterpiece. The moral outrage of Lang's searing attack on lynch terror hasn't dimmed a bit -- with his first American picture the director nails one of our primary social evils. MGM imposed some re-cutting and re-shooting, but it's still the most emotionally powerful film on the subject. Fury DVD-r The Warner Archive Collection 1936 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 92 min. / Street Date August 2, 2016, 2016 / available through the WB Shop / 17.99 Starring Sylvia Sidney, Spencer Tracy, Walter Abel, Bruce Cabot, Edward Ellis, Walter Brennan, Frank Albertson, George Walcott, Arthur Stone, Morgan Wallace, George Chandler, Roger Gray, Edwin Maxwell, Howard C. Hickman, Jonathan Hale, Leila Bennett, Esther Dale, Helen Flint. Cinematography Joseph Ruttenberg Film Editor Frank Sullivan Original Music Franz Waxman Written by Bartlett Cormack, Fritz Lang story by Norman Krasna Produced by Joseph L. Mankiewicz Directed by Fritz Lang
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Just...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Just...
- 10/1/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
The icon-establishing performances Marilyn Monroe gave in Howard Hawks’ Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) and in Billy Wilder’s Some Like It Hot (1959) are ones for the ages, touchstone works that endure because of the undeniable comic energy and desperation that sparked them from within even as the ravenous public became ever more enraptured by the surface of Monroe’s seductive image of beauty and glamour. Several generations now probably know her only from these films, or perhaps 1955’s The Seven-Year Itch, a more famous probably for the skirt-swirling pose it generated than anything in the movie itself, one of director Wilder’s sourest pictures, or her final completed film, The Misfits (1961), directed by John Huston, written by Arthur Miller and costarring Clark Gable and Montgomery Clift.
But in Don’t Bother to Knock (1952) she delivers a powerful dramatic performance as Nell, a psychologically devastated, delusional, perhaps psychotic young woman apparently on...
But in Don’t Bother to Knock (1952) she delivers a powerful dramatic performance as Nell, a psychologically devastated, delusional, perhaps psychotic young woman apparently on...
- 4/11/2016
- by Dennis Cozzalio
- Trailers from Hell
An Encore Edition brings back Fritz Lang's searing police corruption tale, with the great performances of Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame and Lee Marvinaided by several pots of fresh, hot coffee. As is usual, Fritz Lang leads the way in modernizing a genre -- this one is a keeper. The Big Heat Blu-ray Encore Edition Twilight Time Limited Edition 1953 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 89 min. / Ship Date February 9, 2016 / available through Twilight Time Movies / 29.95 Starring Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame, Jocelyn Brando, Alexander Scourby, Lee Marvin, Jeanette Nolan, Willis Bouchey, Robert Burton, Adam Williams, Howard Wendell, Dorothy Green, Carolyn Jones, Dan Seymour, Edith Evanson, John Crawford, John Doucette. Cinematography Charles Lang Film Editor Charles Nelson Original Music Henry Vars Written by Sydney Boehm from the book by William P. McGivern Produced by Robert Arthur Directed by Fritz Lang
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Four years after Twilight Time's initial release, this Encore Edition...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Four years after Twilight Time's initial release, this Encore Edition...
- 3/8/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
During the editing (which is when I really start to see the film), I saw that it was Hitchcock who had guided us through the writing and Lang who guided us through the shooting: especially his last films, the ones where he leads the spectator in one direction before he pushes them in another completely different direction, in a very brutal, abrupt way.
—Jacques Rivette on his Secret défense (1998), fro http://www.jacques-rivette.com/
Long before the much-vaunted, high-concept ‘mind-game movies’ like Memento (2000), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) or Inception (2010), there was Fritz Lang’s Secret Beyond the Door… (1947). The film is like a broken puzzle at every level, virtually begging us to rearrange its pieces and find its key. Indeed, one almost needs to formulate a ‘hypothesis of the stolen film,’ Ruiz-style, since the movie we have before us is not quite the one Lang and his talented writer Silvia Richards (Possessed,...
—Jacques Rivette on his Secret défense (1998), fro http://www.jacques-rivette.com/
Long before the much-vaunted, high-concept ‘mind-game movies’ like Memento (2000), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) or Inception (2010), there was Fritz Lang’s Secret Beyond the Door… (1947). The film is like a broken puzzle at every level, virtually begging us to rearrange its pieces and find its key. Indeed, one almost needs to formulate a ‘hypothesis of the stolen film,’ Ruiz-style, since the movie we have before us is not quite the one Lang and his talented writer Silvia Richards (Possessed,...
- 9/1/2014
- by Cristina Álvarez López & Adrian Martin
- MUBI
The upcoming week is absolutely packed with incredible archival screenings to tell you about, and there are a couple of new releases that are worth making time for as well. First up, let's focus on the Austin Film Society, who are continuing their Johnnie To series with 35mm screenings of 1999's Running Out Of Time this weekend. In advance of the upcoming local opening of Computer Chess, Afs is also hosting Andrew Bujalski on Sunday afternoon for a Q&A at a rare 35mm screening of Funny Ha-Ha. Essential Cinema presents the outrageous pre-code Night Nurse with Barbara Stanwyck and Clark Cable in 35mm on Tuesday night while director Matt Wolf is stopping by on Wednesday for a Doc Nights premiere of his new film Teenage.
The Paramount Summer Classic Film Series has a some tremendously well-programmed 35mm double features on deck this week including Spirit Of The Beehive and Pan's Labyrinth on Sunday,...
- 8/16/2013
- by Matt Shiverdecker
- Slackerwood
"Dan Callahan's Barbara Stanwyck: The Miracle Woman is a serious book about a serious woman, less a biography of an actress than a biography of her career," writes Scott Eyman in the Wall Street Journal. "Mr Callahan follows her choices of roles and tries to capture what she was saying about herself through her acting. It was an astonishing career, whose impressive outlines only became clear in retrospect. Most actors want to be loved — it's the Achilles' heel of the profession — but Stanwyck seems to have been after something else: respect."
Introducing his interview with Dan Callahan at the L, Mark Asch notes that "Dan concludes that Stanwyck was the most open, raw, unshowy and affectless of the Golden Age movie queens, in both her performances and offscreen attitudes; he builds a compelling personal narrative out of her contradictions: her bootstrapping tough-broad self-sufficiency (this slum kid was a...
Introducing his interview with Dan Callahan at the L, Mark Asch notes that "Dan concludes that Stanwyck was the most open, raw, unshowy and affectless of the Golden Age movie queens, in both her performances and offscreen attitudes; he builds a compelling personal narrative out of her contradictions: her bootstrapping tough-broad self-sufficiency (this slum kid was a...
- 2/19/2012
- MUBI
Marlene Dietrich on TCM Pt.2: A Foreign Affair, The Blue Angel Schedule (Et) and synopses from the TCM website: 6:00 Am The Monte Carlo Story (1957) Two compulsive gamblers fall in love on the French Riviera. Dir: Samuel A. Taylor. Cast: Marlene Dietrich, Vittorio De Sica, Arthur O'Connell. C-101 mins, Letterbox Format. 7:45 Am Knight Without Armour (1937) A British spy tries to get a countess out of the new Soviet Union. Dir: Jacques Feyder. Cast: Marlene Dietrich, Robert Donat, Irene Van Brugh. Bw-107 mins. 9:45 Am The Lady Is Willing (1942) A Broadway star has to find a husband so she can adopt an abandoned child. Dir: Mitchell Leisen. Cast: Marlene Dietrich, Fred MacMurray, Aline MacMahon. Bw-91 mins. 11:30 Am Kismet (1944) In the classic Arabian Nights tale king of the beggars enters high society to help his daughter marry a handsome prince. Dir: William Dieterle. Cast: Ronald Colman, Marlene Dietrich, James Craig.
- 9/1/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Adopting another's identity is seen as a melodramatic trick of the movies, like the evil twin in soap operas – but aren't we all imposture experts?
In The Big Picture, Romain Duris plays a prosperous Parisian lawyer who accidentally kills his wife's lover. And then, because he has always yearned to be an artist, he swaps identities with the dead man and starts a new life as a boho photographer. Taking the place of a dead person (as opposed to posing as a dead person, like Shaun of the Dead and friends) is a recurring motif of the noirish thriller, most memorably in Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr Ripley, filmed by both Réné Clément (as Plein Soleil, starring Alain Delon at the peak of his male pulchritude) and Anthony Minghella.
Ripley murders the man whose identity he appropriates, but impersonators more often drift passively into imposture because circumstances enable or even demand it.
In The Big Picture, Romain Duris plays a prosperous Parisian lawyer who accidentally kills his wife's lover. And then, because he has always yearned to be an artist, he swaps identities with the dead man and starts a new life as a boho photographer. Taking the place of a dead person (as opposed to posing as a dead person, like Shaun of the Dead and friends) is a recurring motif of the noirish thriller, most memorably in Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr Ripley, filmed by both Réné Clément (as Plein Soleil, starring Alain Delon at the peak of his male pulchritude) and Anthony Minghella.
Ripley murders the man whose identity he appropriates, but impersonators more often drift passively into imposture because circumstances enable or even demand it.
- 7/21/2011
- by Anne Billson
- The Guardian - Film News
One of the downsides of going to the Rotterdam Film Festival (more on which next week) was having to miss a whole week of Film Forum’s essential “Fritz Lang in Hollywood” retrospective which continues through February 10th. To search through Lang’s American posters (and the foreign posters for his American films) is to skulk through a world of fisted revolvers, prison cell bars, street corner shadows, knives, nooses, and dames in various stages of manhandled distress; a world of heightened emotions and febrile desperation with barely a smile to be seen.
While the foreign posters are often the most striking (like the French poster, above, for one of my very favorite American Langs, You Only Live Once), what many of the original American posters have going for them are their lurid taglines which up the ante of Langian doom another notch or two. Rancho Notorious: “Where anything goes ...for a price!
While the foreign posters are often the most striking (like the French poster, above, for one of my very favorite American Langs, You Only Live Once), what many of the original American posters have going for them are their lurid taglines which up the ante of Langian doom another notch or two. Rancho Notorious: “Where anything goes ...for a price!
- 2/6/2011
- MUBI
Serge Daney once said that there were two types of filmmakers: those that believe that everything has already been filmed and they are only making variations on pre-existing ideas, and those that understand that even those variations represent something more than just images, that filmmaking isn't something limited to films; he added that morality began with the second category. Pedro Costa is the director who has taken that distinction closest to heart; Clint Eastwood, who has probably never heard of Serge Daney and doesn't need to, is the filmmaker whose work best proves it. Eastwood has taken the classical Hollywood model of filmmaking and its rules of framing and editing into the present; if Allan Dwan or John Ford were still alive and working today, their films would resemble Eastwood's. It's unfortunately more and more common (which is not to say necessary) to have to defend Eastwood, but a defense...
- 12/11/2009
- MUBI
Character Actor Jack Elam Dies
Character actor Jack Elam, best known for his roles as the scene-stealing, wild-eyed villain in westerns such as Gunfight at the O.K. Corral and Once Upon a Time in the West, died Tuesday at his Ashland, OR, home of an unspecified illness; he was 84. Though most film biographies listed the actor as 86, longtime friend Al Hassan confirmed that Elam was actually 84, having lied about his age early in his career in order to qualify for work. A Hollywood accountant in the late 40s, Elam toiled away in bit parts until his tough-guy turn opposite Tyrone Power in 1951's Rawhide, which proved to be his breakout performance. Roles in High Noon, Rancho Notorious, Kiss Me Deadly and Gunfight at the O.K. Corral followed as he racked up innumerable credits in a variety of films. The late 60s saw the actor turn more towards comedy, parodying his longtime villain status in movies like Once Upon a Time in the West, Support Your Local Sheriff and Rio Lobo. Instantly recognizable by his immobile cockeye (the result of a scuffle as a 12 year-old), Elam worked mainly in television through the 80s and early 90s; in 1994, the actor was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers in the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum. --Prepared by IMDb staff...
- 10/22/2003
- WENN
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