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Caper Story
The caper story is a subgenre of crime fiction. The typical caper story involves one or more crimes (especially thefts, swindles, or occasionally kidnappings) perpetrated by the main characters in full view of the reader. The actions of police or detectives attempting to prevent or solve the crimes may also be chronicled, but are not the main focus of the story. The caper story is distinguished from the straight crime story by elements of humor, adventure, or unusual cleverness or audacity. The main characters often have comical idiosyncrasies and the law enforcement individuals are characterized by ineptitude or inadequacies. The criminals comically plan a crime with details unnecessary for the nature of the crime and humour is created when their personalities clash and their quirks are exposed. For instance, the Dortmunder stories of Donald E. Westlake are highly comic tales involving unusual thefts by a gang of offbeat characters — in different stories Dortmunder's gan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crime Fiction
Crime fiction, detective story, murder mystery, mystery novel, and police novel are terms used to describe narratives that centre on criminal acts and especially on the investigation, either by an amateur or a professional detective, of a crime, often a murder. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as historical fiction or science fiction, but the boundaries are indistinct. Crime fiction has multiple subgenres, including detective fiction (such as the whodunit), courtroom drama, hard-boiled fiction, and legal thrillers. Most crime drama focuses on crime investigation and does not feature the courtroom. Suspense and mystery are key elements that are nearly ubiquitous to the genre. History The '' One Thousand and One Nights'' (''Arabian Nights'') contains the earliest known examples of crime fiction. One example of a story of this genre is the medieval Arabic tale of "The Three Apples", one of the tales narrated by Scheherazade in the ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The League Of Gentlemen (novel)
''The League of Gentlemen'' (1958) is a pulp-fiction novel by English author John Boland. The novel was made into the film ''The League of Gentlemen ''The League of Gentlemen'' is a surreal British comedy horror sitcom that premiered on BBC Two in 1999. The programme is set in Royston Vasey, a fictional town in northern England, originally based on Alston, Cumbria, and follows the lives o ...'', which was released in 1960 and became the year's most successful British film. Plot summary Lt. Col. Hyde is forced into early retirement after 25 years of service as an officer in the British Army. To get his revenge, Hyde recruits seven other former officers for a special project. They are all in bad standing with the Army—having been forced out for quite serious indiscretions—and are equally dissatisfied and have skeletons in their closets. The job Hyde is planning turns out to be a bank robbery. Hyde has chosen the officers for their respective specialties, qualities that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Steve McQueen
Terrence Stephen McQueen (March 24, 1930November 7, 1980) was an American actor. His antihero persona, emphasized during the height of the counterculture of the 1960s, made him a top box-office draw for his films of the late 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. He was nicknamed the "King of Cool" and used the alias Harvey Mushman in motor races. McQueen received an Academy Award nomination for his role in ''The Sand Pebbles'' (1966). His other popular films include ''Love With the Proper Stranger'' (1963), ''The Cincinnati Kid'' (1965), ''Nevada Smith'' (1966), '' The Thomas Crown Affair'' (1968), ''Bullitt'' (1968), ''Le Mans'' (1971), '' The Getaway'' (1972), and '' Papillon'' (1973). In addition, he starred in the all-star ensemble films ''The Magnificent Seven'' (1960), '' The Great Escape'' (1963), and ''The Towering Inferno'' (1974). In 1974, McQueen became the highest-paid movie star in the world, although he did not act in film for another four years. He was combative with director ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Aldrich
Robert Burgess Aldrich (August 9, 1918 – December 5, 1983) was an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. His notable credits include '' Vera Cruz'' (1954), ''Kiss Me Deadly'' (1955), ''The Big Knife'' (1955), '' Autumn Leaves'' (1956), '' Attack'' (1956), '' What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?'' (1962), '' Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte'' (1964), '' The Flight of the Phoenix'' (1965), ''The Dirty Dozen'' (1967) and '' The Longest Yard'' (1974). Early life Family Robert Burgess Aldrich was born in Cranston, Rhode Island, into a family of wealth and social prominence – "The Aldriches of Rhode Island". His father, Edward Burgess Aldrich (1871–1957) was the publisher of ''The Times'' of Pawtucket and an influential operative in state Republican politics. His mother, Lora Elsie (née Lawson) of New Hampshire (1874–1931), died when Aldrich was 13 and was remembered with fondness by her son. Ruth Aldrich Kaufinger (1912–1987) was his elder sister and only sib ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michael Crichton
John Michael Crichton (; October 23, 1942 – November 4, 2008) was an American author and filmmaker. His books have sold over 200 million copies worldwide, and over a dozen have been adapted into films. His literary works heavily feature technology and are usually within the science fiction, techno-thriller, and medical fiction genres. His novels often explore technology and failures of human interaction with it, especially resulting in catastrophes with biotechnology. Many of his novels have medical or scientific underpinnings, reflecting his medical training and scientific background. Crichton received an M.D. from Harvard Medical School in 1969 but did not practice medicine, choosing to focus on his writing instead. Initially writing under a pseudonym, he eventually wrote 26 novels, including: ''The Andromeda Strain'' (1969), ''The Terminal Man'' (1972), '' The Great Train Robbery'' (1975), '' Congo'' (1980), ''Sphere'' (1987), '' Jurassic Park'' (1990), '' Rising Sun'' (19 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Great Train Robbery (novel)
''The Great Train Robbery'' is a bestselling 1975 historical novel written by Michael Crichton, his third novel under his own name and his thirteenth novel overall. Originally published in the US by Alfred A. Knopf (then a division of Random House), it is currently published by Avon, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. The novel tells the story of the Great Gold Robbery of 1855, a massive gold heist that takes place on a train travelling through Victorian-era England on 22 May 1855. Most of the book takes place in London. A 1978 film adaptation was written for the screen and directed by Crichton. Plot In 1854, master thief Edward Pierce plans to steal a shipment of gold worth more than £12,000 being transported monthly from London to the Crimean War front. The bank has locked the gold in two custom-built safes, each with two locks, thus requiring a total of four keys to open. He recruits Robert Agar, a specialist in copying keys, as an accomplice. Pierce's first target is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Morton Freedgood
Morton Freedgood (1913 – April 16, 2006) was an American author who wrote '' The Taking of Pelham One Two Three'' and many other detective and mystery novels under the pen name John Godey. Biography Freedgood was born in Brooklyn, New York City, New York in 1913 and began writing at a young age. In the 1940s, he had several articles and short stories published in ''Cosmopolitan'', ''Collier's'', ''Esquire'' and other magazines while working full-time in the motion picture industry in New York City. He held public relations and publicity posts for United Artists, 20th Century Fox, Paramount and other companies for several years before focusing on his writing. Freedgood also served as an infantryman in the U.S. Army during World War II.John Godey |
The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three (novel)
''The Taking of Pelham One Two Three'' (1973) is a thriller novel by Morton Freedgood, writing under the pen name John Godey. The novel's title is derived from the train's radio call sign. When a New York City Subway train leaves to start a run, it is given a call sign based upon the time it left and where; in this case, Pelham Bay Park station at 1:23 p.m. Plot A normal day on the subway is disrupted by the hijacking of a 6 train, designated Pelham One Two Three to indicate its point and time of origin. Four men armed with submachine guns detach the lead car and drive it into a tunnel with its 17 passengers as hostages. The hijackers are led by Ryder, a former mercenary, and consist of disgruntled former motorman Longman, violent ex-Mafia thug Joey Welcome, and powerful, laconic brute Steever. The gang threaten to execute one hostage per minute unless the city delivers to them a one million dollar ransom within one hour. One of the hostages is an armed undercover police ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Walter Wager
Walter Herman Wager (September 4, 1924 – July 11, 2004) was an American crime and espionage-thriller novelist and former editor-in-chief of ''Playbill'' magazine. The movie '' Telefon'', starring Charles Bronson, was inspired by his novel of the same name. His book '' 58 Minutes'' was adapted into ''Die Hard 2'', starring Bruce Willis. Education and career Walter Wager was born in The Bronx, New York City, the son of a doctor and a nurse who had emigrated from the Russian Empire. A 1944 graduate of Columbia College, where he was a member of the Philolexian Society, he went on to a Harvard Law School degree three years later. Passing the bar exams but choosing not to practice, he went on to receive a master's degree in aviation law from Chicago's Northwestern University in 1949, while also serving as an editor of the '' Journal of Air Law and Commerce'', then based in that city. Afterward, he spent a year at the Sorbonne, in Paris, as a Fulbright Fellow. He spent a year in I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter O'Donnell
Peter O'Donnell (11 April 1920 – 3 May 2010) was an English writer of mysteries and of comic strips, best known as the creator of ''Modesty Blaise'', an action heroine/undercover trouble-shooter. He was also an award-winning gothic historical romance novelist who wrote under the female pseudonym Madeleine Brent, in 1978, his novel ''Merlin's Keep'' won the Romantic Novel of the Year Award by the Romantic Novelists' Association. Biography Born on 11 April 1920 in Lewisham, London, O'Donnell was the son of Bernard O'Donnell, a journalist on the ''Empire News'', and was educated at Catford Central School. He began to write professionally at the age of 16. In 1938 he joined the British Army, and during the war served as an NCO in mobile radio detachment (3 Corps) of Royal Corps of Signals in the 8th Army. He saw active service in Persia in 1942, after which his unit was moved to Syria, Egypt, the Western Desert, and Italy, and he was with forces that went into Greece in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Modesty Blaise
''Modesty Blaise'' is a British comic strip featuring a fictional character of the same name, created by author Peter O'Donnell and illustrator Jim Holdaway in 1963. The strip follows Modesty Blaise, an exceptional young woman with many talents and a criminal past, and her trusty sidekick Willie Garvin. It was adapted into films in 1966, 1982, and 2003, and from 1965 onwards, 11 novels and two short-story collections were written. Fictional character biography In 1945, a nameless girl escapes from a displaced person (DP) camp in Kalyros, Greece. She remembers nothing from her short past and wanders through post-World War II Mediterranean, the Middle East, and regions of North Africa, where she learns to survive the hard way. She befriends Lob, another wandering refugee, who is a Jewish Hungarian scholar from Budapest. He gives her an education and a first name: Modesty. Sometime later, Modesty chooses her last name, Blaise, after Merlin's tutor from the Arthurian legends. Whe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Topkapi (film)
''Topkapi'' is a 1964 Technicolor heist film produced by Filmways Pictures and distributed by United Artists. The film was produced and directed by the émigré American film director Jules Dassin. The film is based on Eric Ambler's novel '' The Light of Day'' (1962), adapted as a screenplay by Monja Danischewsky. The film stars Melina Mercouri, Peter Ustinov, Maximilian Schell, Robert Morley and Akim Tamiroff. The music score was by Manos Hadjidakis, the cinematography by Henri Alekan and the costume design by Theoni V. Aldredge. The film won an Academy Award in 1965, with Peter Ustinov taking home the trophy for Best Supporting Actor, his second such award in 4 years. Plot Elizabeth Lipp ( Melina Mercouri) visits Istanbul, where she sees a traveling fair featuring replicas of treasures from the Topkapı Palace. Next she cases the Topkapı, fascinated by the emerald-encrusted dagger of Sultan Mahmud I. Leaving Turkey, she recruits her ex-lover, Swiss master-criminal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
