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A Personal Journey With Martin Scorsese Through American Movies
''A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies'' is a 1995 British documentary film of 225 minutes in length, presented by Martin Scorsese and produced by the British Film Institute. In the film Martin Scorsese examines a selection of his favorite American films grouped according to four different types of directors: the director as storyteller; the director as an illusionist such as D.W. Griffith and F. W. Murnau, who created new editing techniques among other innovations that made the appearance of sound and color possible later on; the director as a smuggler such as filmmakers Douglas Sirk, Samuel Fuller, and Vincente Minnelli, who used to hide subversive messages in their films; and the director as an iconoclast, those filmmakers attacking social conventionalism such as Charles Chaplin, Erich von Stroheim, Orson Welles, Elia Kazan, Nicholas Ray, Stanley Kubrick, Arthur Penn, and Sam Peckinpah. Summary The documentary is structured in segments: *Part I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese ( , ; born November 17, 1942) is an American film director, producer, screenwriter and actor. Scorsese emerged as one of the major figures of the New Hollywood era. He is the recipient of List of awards and nominations received by Martin Scorsese, many major accolades, including an Academy Award, a Grammy Award, three Primetime Emmy Awards, Emmy Awards, four British Academy Film Awards, two Directors Guild of America Awards, an AFI Life Achievement Award and the Kennedy Center Honor in 2007. Five of his films have been inducted into the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant". Scorsese received an Master of Arts, MA from New York University's Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development in 1968. His directorial debut, ''Who's That Knocking at My Door'' (1967), was accepted into the Chicago Film Festival. In the 1970s and 1980s decades, Martin Scorsese filmography, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sam Peckinpah
David Samuel Peckinpah (; February 21, 1925 – December 28, 1984) was an American film director and screenwriter. His 1969 Western epic ''The Wild Bunch'' received an Academy Award nomination and was ranked No. 80 on the American Film Institute's top 100 list. His films employed a visually innovative and explicit depiction of action and violence as well as a revisionist approach to the Western genre. Peckinpah's films deal with the conflict between values and ideals, as well as the corruption and violence in human society. His characters are often loners or losers who desire to be honorable but are forced to compromise in order to survive in a world of nihilism and brutality. He was given the nickname "Bloody Sam" owing to the violence in his films. Peckinpah's combative personality, marked by years of alcohol and drug abuse, affected his professional legacy. The production of many of his films included battles with producers and crew members, damaging his reputation and caree ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Murder By Contract
''Murder by Contract'' is a 1958 American film noir crime film directed by Irving Lerner. Academy Award-nominated screenwriter Ben Maddow did uncredited work on the film. Centering on an existentialist hit man assigned to kill a woman, the film is often praised for its spare style and peculiar sense of cool. Though not widely seen at the time of its release, it finally appeared on DVD, included in the boxed set "Columbia Pictures Film Noir Classics, Vol. 1 (The Big Heat / 5 Against the House / The Lineup / Murder by Contract / The Sniper)," released November 3, 2009. The film has exerted an influence on American cinema, most notably on director Martin Scorsese, who famously cited ''Murder by Contract'' as "the film that has influenced immost." Plot and main character Plot synopsis Claude (Vince Edwards) is a disaffected man who, in search of fast money to purchase a $28,000 house, decides to become a contract killer for a Mr. Brink. After proving his worth by killing targets in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Naked Kiss
''The Naked Kiss'' is a 1964 American neo-noir melodrama film, written and directed by Samuel Fuller and starring Constance Towers, Anthony Eisley, Michael Dante, and Virginia Grey. The film follows a former prostitute who attempts to assimilate in suburbia after fleeing her pimp, but finds that the small town to which she has relocated is not as picturesque as she had believed. It was Fuller's second film for Allied Artists after his 1963 film '' Shock Corridor''. Plot Kelly is a prostitute who arrives by bus in the small town of Grantville, just one more burg in a long string of quick stops on the run after being chased out of the big city by her former pimp. She engages in a quick tryst with local police captain Griff, who then tells her to stay out of his town and refers her to a cat-house just across the state line. Instead, she decides to give up her illicit lifestyle, becoming a nurse at a hospital for disabled children. Griff doesn't trust reformed prostitutes, h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock (13 August 1899 – 29 April 1980) was an English filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 feature films, many of which are still widely watched and studied today. Known as the "Master of Suspense", he became as well known as any of his actors thanks to his many interviews, his cameo roles in most of his films, and his hosting and producing the television anthology '' Alfred Hitchcock Presents'' (1955–65). His films garnered 46 Academy Award nominations, including six wins, although he never won the award for Best Director despite five nominations. Hitchcock initially trained as a technical clerk and copy writer before entering the film industry in 1919 as a title card designer. His directorial debut was the British-German silent film '' The Pleasure Garden'' (1925). His first successful film, '' The Lodger: A Story of the London F ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vertigo (film)
''Vertigo'' is a 1958 American film noir psychological thriller film directed and produced by Alfred Hitchcock. The story was based on the 1954 novel ''D'entre les morts'' (''From Among the Dead'') by Boileau-Narcejac. The screenplay was written by Alec Coppel and Samuel A. Taylor. The film stars James Stewart as former police detective John "Scottie" Ferguson, who has retired because an incident in the line of duty has caused him to develop acrophobia (an extreme fear of heights) and vertigo, a false sense of rotational movement. Scottie is hired by an acquaintance, Gavin Elster, as a private investigator to follow Gavin's wife Madeleine (Kim Novak), who is behaving strangely. The film was shot on location in the city of San Francisco, California, as well as in Mission San Juan Bautista, Big Basin Redwoods State Park, Cypress Point on 17-Mile Drive, and Paramount Studios in Hollywood. It is the first film to use the dolly zoom, an in-camera effect that distorts perspective ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bigger Than Life
''Bigger Than Life'' is a 1956 American drama film directed by Nicholas Ray and starring James Mason, Barbara Rush, and Walter Matthau. Its plot follows an ailing school teacher and family man whose life spins out of control when he misuses cortisone. It is based on a 1955 article by medical writer Berton Roueché in ''The New Yorker'', titled "Ten Feet Tall". In addition to starring in the film, Mason produced it. Though it was a box-office flop upon its initial release, many modern critics hail it as a masterpiece and a brilliant indictment of contemporary attitudes towards mental illness. In 1963, Jean-Luc Godard named it one of the ten best American sound films ever made. Plot Schoolteacher and family man Ed Avery has been suffering bouts of severe pain and even blackouts. His strange illness begins to concern his wife, Lou. After he collapses at home one night, Ed is hospitalized. When a cab driver visits Ed, Lou—who suspected him of being unfaithful —learns that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frank Tashlin
Frank Tashlin (born Francis Fredrick von Taschlein, February 19, 1913 – May 5, 1972), also known as Tish Tash and Frank Tash, was an American animator, cartoonist, children's writer, illustrator, screenwriter, and film director. He was best known for his work on the ''Looney Tunes'' and ''Merrie Melodies'' series of animated shorts for Warner Bros., as well as his work as a director of live-action comedy films. Animator and brief career as cartoonist Born in Weehawken, New Jersey, Tashlin drifted from job to job after dropping out of high school in New Jersey at age 13. In 1930, he began working for John Foster as a cartoonist on the ''Aesop's Fables'' cartoon series, then worked briefly for Amadee J. Van Beuren, but he was just as much a drifter in his animation career as he had been as a teenager. Tashlin joined Leon Schlesinger's cartoon studio at Warner Bros. as an animator in 1933, where he was known as a fast animator. He used his free time to start his own comic stri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Musical Film
Musical film is a film genre in which songs by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, but in some cases, they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate "production numbers". The musical film was a natural development of the stage musical after the emergence of sound film technology. Typically, the biggest difference between film and stage musicals is the use of lavish background scenery and locations that would be impractical in a theater. Musical films characteristically contain elements reminiscent of theater; performers often treat their song and dance numbers as if a live audience were watching. In a sense, the viewer becomes the diegetic audience, as the performer looks directly into the camera and performs to it. With the advent of sound in the late 1920s, musicals gained popularity with the public and are exemplified by the films of Busby Ber ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Girl Can't Help It
''The Girl Can't Help It'' is a 1956 American musical comedy film starring Jayne Mansfield in the titular role, Tom Ewell, Edmond O'Brien, Henry Jones, and Julie London. The picture was produced and directed by Frank Tashlin, with a screenplay adapted by Tashlin and Herbert Baker from an uncredited 1955 short story, "Do Re Mi" by Garson Kanin. Filmed in DeLuxe Color, the production was originally intended as a vehicle for the American sex symbol Jayne Mansfield, with a satirical subplot involving teenagers and rock 'n' roll music. The unintended result has been called the "most potent" celebration of rock music ever captured on film. The original music score, including the title song performed by Little Richard, was by Bobby Troup, with an additional credit to Ray Anthony for the tune "Big Band Boogie". Plot A slot machine mobster, Marty "Fats" Murdock, wants his blonde girlfriend, Jerri Jordan, to be a singing star, despite her seeming lack of talent. He hires alcoholic press ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Dieterle
William Dieterle (July 15, 1893 – December 9, 1972) was a German-born actor and film director who emigrated to the United States in 1930 to leave a worsening political situation. He worked in Hollywood primarily as a director for much of his career, becoming a United States citizen in 1937. He moved back to Germany in the late 1950s. His best-known films include ''The Story of Louis Pasteur'' (1936), ''The Hunchback of Notre Dame'' (1939) and ''The Devil and Daniel Webster'' (1941). His film ''The Life of Emile Zola'' (1937) won the Academy Award for Best Picture, the second biographical feature to do so. Early life and career He was born Wilhelm Dieterle in Ludwigshafen, the youngest child of nine, to factory worker Jacob and Berthe (Doerr) Dieterle. As a child, he lived in considerable poverty and earned money by various means, including carpentry and as a scrap dealer. He became interested in theater early and would stage productions in the family barn for friends and f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
King Vidor
King Wallis Vidor (; February 8, 1894 – November 1, 1982) was an American film director, film producer, and screenwriter whose 67-year film-making career successfully spanned the silent and sound eras. His works are distinguished by a vivid, humane, and sympathetic depiction of contemporary social issues. Considered an auteur director, Vidor approached multiple genres and allowed the subject matter to determine the style, often pressing the limits of film-making conventions. His most acclaimed and successful film in the silent era is ''The Big Parade'' (1925). Vidor's sound films of the 1940s and early 1950s arguably represent his richest output. Among his finest works are ''Northwest Passage'' (1940), ''Comrade X'' (1940), ''An American Romance'' (1944), and '' Duel in the Sun'' (1946). His dramatic depictions of the American western landscape endow nature with a sinister force where his characters struggle for survival and redemption. Vidor's earlier films tend to identify ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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