name	Vera Cruz
director	Robert Aldrich
producer	James Hill
writer	Roland KibbeeJames R. Webb
starring	Gary CooperBurt LancasterErnest BorgnineDenise DarcelCesar Romero
music	Hugo Friedhofer
cinematography	Ernest Laszlo
editing	Alan Crosland Jr.
distributor	United Artists
released	December 25, 1954
runtime	94 min.
country	US
language	EnglishSpanish
budget	$3,000,000 (estimated)
gross	$11,000,000 (estimated) }}

''Vera Cruz'' is a 1954 American Technicolor Western starring Gary Cooper and Burt Lancaster, and featuring Denise Darcel, Sara Montiel, and Cesar Romero. It was directed by Robert Aldrich from a story by Borden Chase. The film's amoral characters, Mexican setting, and cynical attitude towards violence (including a scene where Lancaster's character threatens to murder child hostages) was considered shocking at the time, and influenced future Westerns such as ''The Magnificent Seven'', ''The Wild Bunch'', and the films of Sergio Leone.

Plot

During the Franco-Mexican War, ex-Confederate soldier Ben Trane (Cooper) travels to Mexico seeking a job as a mercenary. He falls in with Joe Erin (Lancaster), a lethal gunslinger who heads a gang of cutthroats (including Ernest Borgnine, Jack Elam, Charles Bronson, and Archie Savage). They are recruited by Emperor Maximilian I of Mexico (George Macready) to help escort Countess Duvarre (Denise Darcel) to Vera Cruz.

Trane and Erin discover that the countess and Marquis Henri de Labordere (Cesare Romero) are secretly transporting a large cache of gold intended for the French army. All concerned, including Juarista secret agent Nina (Sara Montiel), conspire to steal it for their own purposes. Also involved in the mix is Morris Ankrum as a heroic Juarista leader.

In the end, Trane and Erin face off in a showdown that concludes with Erin's death.

Cast

Gary Cooper as Ben Trane

Burt Lancaster as Joe Erin

Denise Darcel as Countess Marie Duvarre

Cesar Romero as Marquis Henri de Labordere

Sara Montiel as Nina (billed as Sarita Montiel)

George Macready as Emperor Maximillian

Ernest Borgnine as Donnegan

Morris Ankrum as General Ramírez

Henry Brandon as Captain Danette

Charles Bronson as Pittsburgh (as Charles Buchinsky)

Jack Lambert as Charlie

Jack Elam as Tex

James McCallion as Little-Bit

James Seay as Abilene

Archie Savage as Ballard

Charles Horvath as Reno

Juan García as Pedro

References

External links

Category:1954 films Category:American films Category:Films directed by Robert Aldrich Category:Films shot in Technicolor Category:United Artists films Category:1950s Western films Category:French Intervention in Mexico films

ca:Veracruz (pel·lícula) de:Vera Cruz (Film) es:Vera Cruz (película) fr:Vera Cruz (film) it:Vera Cruz (film) nl:Vera Cruz (film) ja:ベラクルス (映画) pl:Vera Cruz (film) pt:Vera Cruz (filme) tr:İstiklal Kahramanları

Eva Wilma Rilfles (born December 14, 1933, Sao Paulo, Brazil) is a Brazilian actress who starred in the 1970s Brazilian television series, ''Alô Doçura''.

Marriages

She was married for 23 years to actor John Herbert, with whom she had two children, Vivian and John Jr. She later married actor Carlos Zara.

Selected filmography

''Cidade Ameaçada'' (1960)

References

External links

Eva Wilma official website

Category:1933 births Category:living people Category:Brazilian television actors Category:People from São Paulo (city) Category:Brazilian people of German descent Category:Brazilian people of Russian descent

it:Eva Wilma pt:Eva Wilma ru:Вилма, Эва

birth name	Frank James Cooper
birth date	May 07, 1901
birth place	Helena, Montana, U.S.
spouse	(his death)
children	Maria Cooper Janis
death date	May 13, 1961
death place	Los Angeles, California, U.S.
occupation	Actor
years active	1925–1961 }}

Frank James Cooper, known professionally as Gary Cooper, (May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American film actor. He was renowned for his quiet, understated acting style and his stoic, but at times intense screen persona, which was particularly well suited to the many Westerns he made. His career spanned from 1925 until shortly before his death in 1961, and comprised more than one hundred films.

Cooper received five Academy Award nominations for Best Actor, winning twice for ''Sergeant York'' and ''High Noon''. He also received an Honorary Award in 1961 from the Academy.

Decades later, the American Film Institute named Cooper among the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Stars, ranking 11th among males from the Classical Hollywood cinema period. In 2003, his performances as Will Kane in ''High Noon'', Lou Gehrig in ''The Pride of the Yankees'', and Alvin York in ''Sergeant York'' made the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains list, all of them as heroes.

Early life

Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, one of two sons of an English farmer from Bedfordshire, who later became an American lawyer and judge, Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946), and Kent (England)-born Alice (née Brazier) Cooper (1873–1967). His mother hoped for their two sons to receive a better education than that available in Montana and arranged for the boys to attend Dunstable Grammar School in Bedfordshire, England between 1910 and 1913. Upon the outbreak of World War I, Cooper's mother brought her sons home and enrolled them in a Bozeman, Montana, high school.

When Cooper was 13, he injured his hip in a car accident. He returned to his parents' ranch near Helena to recuperate by horseback riding at the recommendation of his doctor. Cooper studied at Iowa's Grinnell College until the spring of 1924, but did not graduate. He had tried out, unsuccessfully, for the college's drama club. He returned to Helena, managing the ranch and contributing cartoons to the local newspaper. In 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles. Their son, unable to make a living as an editorial cartoonist in Helena, joined them, moving there that same year, reasoning that he "would rather starve where it was warm, than to starve and freeze too."

Career

Failing as a salesman of electric signs and theatrical curtains, as a promoter for a local photographer and as an applicant for newspaper work in Los Angeles, Cooper found work as an actor in 1925. He earned money as an "extra" in the motion picture industry, usually cast as a cowboy. He is known to have had an uncredited role in the 1925 Tom Mix Western, ''Dick Turpin''. The following year, he had screen credit in a two-reeler, ''Lightnin' Wins'', with actress Eileen Sedgwick as his leading lady.

After the release of this short film, Cooper accepted a long-term contract with Paramount Pictures. He changed his name to Gary in 1925, following the advice of casting director Nan Collins, who felt it evoked the "rough, tough" nature of her native Gary, Indiana.

"Coop," as he was called by his peers, went on to appear in over 100 films. Cooper broke through in a supporting role in ''Wings'' (1927), the only silent film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture, following that with ''Nevada'' (1927) co-starring Thelma Todd and William Powell, based on the Zane Gray novel, which was remade in 1944 as an early Robert Mitchum vehicle, the only time Cooper and Mitchum played the same role. He became a major star with his first sound picture, ''The Virginian'' (1929) opposite Walter Huston as the villainous Trampas. ''The Spoilers'' appeared the following year with Betty Compson, which was remade in 1942 with Compson lookalike Marlene Dietrich and John Wayne in Cooper's role. Cooper followed this action film with his own Dietrich film entitled ''Morocco'' (1930) in which he played a Foreign Legionnaire. ''Devil and the Deep'' (1932) featured Cary Grant in a supporting role with Talullah Bankhead and Cooper in the leads alongside Charles Laughton. The following year, Cooper was the second lead in the sophisticated Ernst Lubitsch comedy production of Noël Coward's ''Design for Living''. He was billed under Fredric March in the kind of fast-talking role Cooper never played again after Cary Grant staked out the light comedy leading man field with ''The Awful Truth'' four years later. The screen adaptation of ''A Farewell to Arms'' (1932), directed by Frank Borzage, and the title role in Frank Capra's ''Mr. Deeds Goes to Town'' (1936) furthered Cooper's box office appeal.

Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the role of Rhett Butler in the 1939 film ''Gone with the Wind''. When Cooper turned down the role, he was passionately against it. He is quoted as saying, "''Gone with the Wind'' is going to be the biggest flop in Hollywood history. I’m glad it’ll be Clark Gable who’s falling flat on his nose, not me". Alfred Hitchcock wanted him to star in ''Foreign Correspondent'' (1940) and ''Saboteur'' (1942). Cooper later admitted he had made a "mistake" in turning down the director. For the former film, Hitchcock cast look-alike Joel McCrea instead.

Cooper cemented his cowboy credentials again in ''The Westerner'' (1940) opposite Walter Brennan as Judge Roy Bean and followed that immediately afterward with the lavish ''North West Mounted Police'' (1940), directed by Cecil B. DeMille and featuring Paulette Goddard.

In 1942, Cooper won his first Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance as the title character in ''Sergeant York''. It has often been rumored that Alvin York refused to authorize a movie about his life unless Cooper portrayed him. Evidence has since surfaced that the film's producer, Jesse L. Lasky, sent a telegram pleading with Cooper to take the part and signed York's name to it. ''Meet John Doe'' was released earlier the same year, a smash hit under the direction of Frank Capra. Ingrid Bergman had just made ''Casablanca'' when she and Cooper collaborated on ''For Whom the Bell Tolls'' (1943), based on a novel by Cooper's close friend Ernest Hemingway. As a change of pace, he made a Western comedy lampooning his hesitant speech and mannerisms and his own image in general called ''Along Came Jones'' (1945) in which he relied on gunslinging Loretta Young to save him when the chips were down. Cooper also starred in the original version of the Ayn Rand novel ''The Fountainhead'' (1949) with Patricia Neal.

In 1953, Cooper won his second Best Actor Academy Award for his performance as Marshal Will Kane in ''High Noon'', arguably considered his finest role. Ill with an ulcer, he wasn't present to receive his Academy Award in February 1953. He asked John Wayne to accept it on his behalf, a bit of irony in light of Wayne's stated distaste for the film.

Cooper continued to play the lead in films almost to the end of his life. Among his later box office hits were the stark Western adventure ''Garden of Evil'' (1954) with Susan Hayward and Richard Widmark; ''Vera Cruz'' (1954), an extremely influential Western in which he guns down villain Burt Lancaster in a showdown; his portrayal of a Quaker farmer during the American Civil War in William Wyler's ''Friendly Persuasion'' (1956); and Anthony Mann's ''Man of the West'' (1958), a hard-edged action Western with Lee J. Cobb. His final motion picture was a British film, ''The Naked Edge'' (1961), directed by Michael Anderson. Among his final projects was narrating an NBC documentary, ''The Real West,'' in which he helped clear up myths about famous Western figures.

Cooper appeared in live radio "remakes" of several of his films.

Congressional testimony

In 1944, Cooper joined the anti-communist Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals. While filming ''Good Sam'', he testified before the House Committee on Un-American Activities on October 23, 1947, characterized as a "friendly" witness. Asked if he had observed "communistic influence in Hollywood", Cooper named no one in particular but said he had "turned down quite a few scripts because I thought they were tinged with communistic ideas"; he also said he had heard statements such as "don't you think the Constitution of the United States is about 150 years out of date?" and "perhaps this would be a more efficient government without a Congress"— statements he characterized as "very un-American". He also told the committee the following:

''"Several years ago, when communism was more of a social chit-chatter in parties for offices, and so on when communism didn't have the implications that it has now, discussion of communism was more open and I remember hearing statements from some folks to the effect that the communistic system had a great many features that were desirable. It offered the actors and artists — in other words, the creative people — a special place in government where we would be somewhat immune from the ordinary leveling of income. And as I remember, some actor's name was mentioned to me who had a house in Moscow which was very large — he had three cars, and stuff, with his house being quite a bit larger than my house in Beverly Hills at the time — and it looked to me like a pretty phony come-on to us in the picture business. From that time on, I could never take any of this pinko mouthing very seriously, because I didn't feel it was on the level."''

Cooper's testimony occurred a month before the Hollywood blacklist was established.

Personal life

Cooper was friends with Ernest Hemingway and spent many vacations with the writer in Sun Valley, Idaho.

Family and relationships

Cooper had high-profile relationships with actresses Clara Bow, Lupe Vélez and the American-born socialite-spy Countess Carla Dentice di Frasso (née Dorothy Caldwell Taylor, formerly wife of British pioneer aviator Claude Grahame-White).

On December 15, 1933, Cooper wed Veronica Balfe (May 27, 1913 – February 16, 2000), known as "Rocky." Balfe was a New York Roman Catholic socialite who had briefly acted under the name of Sandra Shaw. She appeared in the film ''No Other Woman'', but her most widely seen role was in ''King Kong'', as the woman dropped by Kong. Her third and final film was ''Blood Money''. Her father was governor of the New York Stock Exchange, and her uncle was motion-picture art director Cedric Gibbons. During the 1930s she also became the California state women's skeet shooting champion. Cooper and Balfe had one child, Maria, now Maria Cooper Janis, married to classical pianist Byron Janis.

In the 1950s Cooper was slowly drawn to Catholicism and was baptized a Catholic in 1958. After he was married, but prior to his conversion, Cooper had affairs with several famous co-stars, including Marlene Dietrich, Grace Kelly and Patricia Neal. He pressured Neal to have an abortion in 1950, because fathering a child out of wedlock could have destroyed his career. Cooper's daughter Maria, when she was a little girl, famously spat at Neal, but many years later, the two became friends. Cooper separated from his wife between 1951 and 1954.

Politics

Cooper was a staunch supporter of the Republican Party. He voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924 and Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932. He campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940, and heavily campaigned for Thomas Dewey in 1944.

In 1947, he testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee as a 'friendly witness'. He was a member of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals and in his testimony spoke out against the Communist influence in Hollywood at the time. Fellow members in the Alliance included Clark Gable, Ginger Rogers, Victor Fleming and Barbara Stanwyck among many others.

Death

In April 1960, Cooper underwent surgery for prostate cancer after it had spread to his colon. It spread to his lungs and bones shortly thereafter.

Cooper was too ill to attend the Academy Awards ceremony in April 1961, so his close friend James Stewart accepted the honorary Oscar on his behalf. Stewart's emotional speech hinted that something was seriously wrong, and the next day newspapers ran the headline, "Gary Cooper has cancer." One month later, on May 13, 1961, six days after his 60th birthday, Cooper died.

Cooper was originally interred in Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974 his body was removed from the Grotto Section of Holy Cross Cemetery, when his widow Veronica remarried and moved to New York, and she had Cooper's body exhumed and reburied in Sacred Heart Cemetery, in Southampton, New York, on Long Island. Veronica "Rocky" Cooper-Converse died in 2000 and was buried near Cooper at Sacred Heart Cemetery.

Legacy

For his contribution to the film industry, Cooper has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Blvd.

In 1966, he was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

In September 2009, Cooper was featured on a commemorative U.S. postage stamp.

He is mentioned in the Irving Berlin song, ''Puttin' on the Ritz''.

He is briefly mentioned in the song ''Streets Of Pain'' written by Richard Marx and Fee Waybill, performed by Marx.

Filmography

References

;Notes ;Citations ;Bibliography

Arce, Hector. ''Gary Cooper: An Intimate Biography''. New York: Bantam Books, 1980, First edition 1979. ISBN 978-0553141306.

Donnelley, Paul. ''Fade To Black: A Book Of Movie Obituaries, 2nd Edition''. Omnibus Press, 2005, First edition 2003. ISBN 978-1844494309.

Janis, Maria Cooper. ''Gary Cooper Off Camera: A Daughter Remembers''. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1999. ISBN 978-0810941304.

Meyer, Jeffrey. ''Gary Cooper: American Hero''. New York: William Morrow, 1998. ISBN 978-0688154943.

Rogers, Ginger. ''Ginger: My Story''. New York: Harper Collins, 1991. ISBN 978-0061564703.

Selznick, David O. ''Memo from David O. Selznick''. New York: Modern Library, 2000. ISBN 0-375-75531-4.

Shearer, Stephen Michael. ''Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life''. Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky, 2006. ISBN 978-0813123912.

Swindell, Larry. ''The Last Hero: A Biography of Gary Cooper''. New York: Doubleday, 1980. ISBN 0-385-14316-8.

External links

Profile @ Turner Classic Movies

Photographs of Gary Cooper from virtual-history.com

Inside High Noon – The Documentary

Gary Cooper in the 1910 US Census, 1920 US Census, 1930 US Census, and Social Security Death Index.

Category:Academy Honorary Award recipients Category:American film actors Category:Actors from Montana Category:American Roman Catholics Category:20th-century actors Category:American silent film actors Category:Best Actor Academy Award winners Category:Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:Burials at Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City Category:California Republicans Category:Montana Republicans Category:Converts to Roman Catholicism Category:Deaths from prostate cancer Category:American people of English descent Category:Grinnell College people Category:People from Helena, Montana Category:Western (genre) film actors Category:Cancer deaths in California Category:1901 births Category:1961 deaths Category:People educated at Dunstable Grammar School

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