William Friedkin
Friedkin at The Exorcist (1973) set.
Born	(1935-08-29) August 29, 1935 (age 76) Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Occupation	Director, producer, screenwriter
Years active	1965–present
Spouse	Jeanne Moreau (1977-1979) Lesley-Anne Down (1982-1985) Kelly Lange (1987-1990) Sherry Lansing (1991-present)

William Friedkin (born August 29, 1935) is an American film director, producer and screenwriter best known for directing The French Connection in 1971 and The Exorcist in 1973; for the former, he won the Academy Award for Best Director. His film, Bug (2006) won the FIPRESCI prize at the Cannes Film Festival.

Career[link]

Friedkin was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Rae (née Green) and Louis Friedkin, a semi-professional softball player, merchant seaman, and men's clothing salesman.^[1] After seeing the movie Citizen Kane as a boy, Friedkin became fascinated with movies. He began working for WGN-TV immediately after high school. He eventually started his directorial career doing live television shows and documentaries, including The People vs. Paul Crump which won several awards and contributed to the commutation of Crump's death sentence. As mentioned in Friedkin's voice-over commentary on the DVD re-release of Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo, Friedkin also directed one of the last episodes of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour in 1965, called "Off Season".^[2]

Hitchcock admonished Friedkin for not wearing a tie while directing.^[3] In 1965 Friedkin moved to Hollywood and two years later released his first feature film, Good Times starring Sonny and Cher. In 1967 he directed a TV pilot for the ABC network called "The Pickle Brothers". It was written and produced by Dee Caruso and Gerald Gardner, and Quincy Jones did the music. Several other "art" films followed (including the gay-themed movie The Boys in the Band), although Friedkin did not necessarily want to be known as an art house director. He wanted to be known for action, serious drama, and for stories about an America turned upside down by crime, hypocrisy, the occult, and amorality, which he mounted up into his films. In addition, America was changing in the wake of Vietnam, the Sexual Revolution, and Watergate. Friedkin wanted to reflect what was going on.

In 1971, his The French Connection was released to wide critical acclaim. Shot in a gritty style more suited for documentaries than Hollywood features, the film won five Academy Awards, including an Academy Award for Best Picture and Best Director.

Friedkin followed up with 1973's The Exorcist, based on William Peter Blatty's best-selling novel, which revolutionized the horror genre and is considered by some critics to be one of the greatest horror movies of all time. Friedkin's directorial 'ethics' however, came into serious question when filming the now notorious scene where Linda Blair smacks Ellen Burstyn, causing her to fly backwards into a break-away table. Even after warning Friedkin the stuntman was "pulling her too hard," Friedkin prompted him to pull her harder, resulting in a permanent back injury for Burstyn. The Exorcist was nominated for 10 Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. It won the Best Screenplay Award.

Following these two critically acclaimed pictures, Friedkin, along with Francis Ford Coppola and Peter Bogdanovich, was deemed as one of the premier directors of New Hollywood. Unfortunately, Friedkin's later movies did not achieve the same success. Sorcerer (1977), a $22 million dollar American remake of the French classic Wages of Fear, starring Roy Scheider, was overshadowed by the box-office success of Star Wars, which was released around the same time. Friedkin considers it his finest film, and was personally devastated by its financial and critical failure (as mentioned by Friedkin himself in the documentary series The Directors (1999).

Sorcerer was shortly followed by the crime-comedy The Brink's Job (1978), based on the real-life Great Brink's Robbery in Boston, Massachusetts, which was also unsuccessful at the box-office. In 1980, he directed the highly controversial gay-themed crime thriller Cruising, starring Al Pacino, which was protested against even during its making and remains the subject of heated debate to this day.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Friedkin's films received mostly lackluster reviews and moderate ticket sales. Deal of the Century (1983), starring Chevy Chase, Gregory Hines and Sigourney Weaver, was sometimes regarded as a latter-day Dr. Strangelove, though it was generally savaged by critics. However, his action/crime movie To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), starring William Petersen and Willem Dafoe, was a critical favorite and drew comparisons to Friedkin's own The French Connection (particularly for its car-chase sequence), while his courtroom-drama/thriller Rampage (1987) received a fairly positive review from Roger Ebert despite major distribution problems. The Guardian (1990) and Jade (1995), starring Linda Fiorentino, received somewhat favorable response from critics and audiences. Friedkin even said that Jade was the favorite of all the films he had made.^[4]

Friedkin has also done features drawing attention to artists as different as Fritz Lang and Barbra Streisand.^[5]

In 2000, The Exorcist was re-released in theaters with extra footage and grossed $40 million in the U.S. alone. Friedkin's involvement in 2007's Bug resulted from a positive experience watching the stage version in 2004. He was surprised to find that he was, metaphorically, on the same page as the playwright and felt that he could relate well to the story.^[6]

Later, Friedkin directed an episode of the hit TV series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation titled "Cockroaches," which re-teamed him with To Live and Die In L.A. star William Petersen. He would go on to direct again for CSI's 200th episode, "Mascara."

In June 2010, author William Peter Blatty, promoting his latest novel, revealed that Friedkin has committed to direct the feature film adaptation of his thriller, Dimiter.^[7] This would mark almost forty years since their previous collaboration, The Exorcist, not counting the failed collaboration between the two on The Exorcist III. The idea for the book itself actually came to Blatty while sitting in Friedkin's office in 1972 during the first film's production, as he read an article concerning the then atheist-run state of Albania executing a priest for baptizing a newborn infant.^[8] He has been working on it on and off ever since 1974, and, upon its completion, sat down with Friedkin for a one-on-one interview in The Huffington Post a few days after Blatty named Friedkin as attached to direct. According to the author, his friend and director has been eager to adapt the story for the last three years.

Personal life[link]

He has been married four times, to Kelly Lange, Lesley-Anne Down, and a short marriage to French actress Jeanne Moreau. He has a daughter with Kelly Lange and two sons: Jack (with actress Lesley-Anne Down) and Cedric, whose mother is Australian dancer and choreographer Jennifer Nairn-Smith.^[9] He is currently married to former film executive Sherry Lansing.

Justin Green, in the 2009 edition of his 1972 graphic novel Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary, says Friedkin is his first cousin.

Filmography (as director)[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: William Friedkin

• William Friedkin at the Internet Movie Database
• William Friedkin at the Internet Broadway Database
• Watching Under the Influence: To Live and Die in L.A. essay at Slant Magazine
• "From 'Popeye' Doyle to Puccini: William Friedkin" NPR's Robert Siegel interviews Friedkin, 14 September 2006
• EXCL: Bug Director William Friedkin
• The Reeler interview with Friedkin
• American Film Institute interview

Friedrich Christian Anton "Fritz" Lang (December 5, 1890 – August 2, 1976) was an Austrian-American filmmaker, screenwriter, and occasional film producer and actor.^[3] One of the best known émigrés from Germany's school of Expressionism, he was dubbed the "Master of Darkness" by the British Film Institute.^[4] His most famous films are the groundbreaking Metropolis (the world's most expensive silent film at the time of its release) and M, made before he moved to the United States, his iconic precursor to the film noir genre.

Life and career[link]

Early life[link]

Lang was born in Vienna as the second son of Anton Lang (1860–1940),^[5] an architect and construction company manager, and his wife Pauline "Paula" Lang née Schlesinger (1864–1920). Fritz Lang himself was baptized on 28 December 1890 at the Schottenkirche in Vienna.^[6]

Lang's parents were of Moravian^{[citation needed]} descent and practicing Roman Catholics. His mother was born Jewish, but had converted to Catholicism when Fritz was ten. His mother took this conversion seriously and was dedicated to raising Fritz as a Catholic. Lang never had an interest in his Jewish heritage and identified himself as Catholic. Although he was not a particularly devout Catholic, he "regularly used Catholic images and themes [in] his films".^[7]

After finishing school, Lang briefly attended the Technical University of Vienna, where he studied civil engineering and eventually switched to art. In 1910 he left Vienna to see the world, traveling throughout Europe and Africa and later Asia and the Pacific area. In 1913, he studied painting in Paris, France.

At the outbreak of World War I, Lang returned to Vienna and volunteered for military service in the Austrian army and fought in Russia and Romania, where he was wounded three times. While recovering from his injuries and shell shock in 1916, he wrote some scenarios and ideas for films. He was discharged from the army with the rank of lieutenant in 1918 and did some acting in the Viennese theater circuit for a short time before being hired as a writer at Decla, Erich Pommer's Berlin-based production company.

Expressionist films: the Weimar years (1918-1933)[link]

His writing stint was brief, as Lang soon started to work as a director at the German film studio Ufa, and later Nero-Film, just as the Expressionist movement was building. In this first phase of his career, Lang alternated between art films such as Der Müde Tod ("The Weary Death") and popular thrillers such as Die Spinnen ("The Spiders"), combining popular genres with Expressionist techniques to create an unprecedented synthesis of popular entertainment with art cinema. In 1920, he met his future wife, the writer and actress Thea von Harbou. She and Lang co-wrote all of his movies from 1921 through 1933, including 1922's Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler (Dr. Mabuse the Gambler), which ran for over four hours in two parts in the original version and was the first in the Dr. Mabuse trilogy, 1924's five-hour Die Nibelungen, the famous 1927 film Metropolis, and the 1931 classic, M, his first "talking" picture.

Fritz Lang and Thea von Harbou in their Berlin flat, 1923 or 1924

Although some^[who?] consider Lang's work to be simple melodrama, he produced a coherent oeuvre that helped to establish the characteristics of film noir, with its recurring themes of psychological conflict, paranoia, fate and moral ambiguity.^{[citation needed]} His work influenced filmmakers as disparate as Jacques Rivette and William Friedkin.

In 1931, after Woman in the Moon, Lang directed what many film scholars consider to be his masterpiece: M, a disturbing story of a child murderer (Peter Lorre in his first starring role) who is hunted down and brought to rough justice by Berlin's criminal underworld. M remains a powerful work; it was remade in 1951 by Joseph Losey, but this version had little impact on audiences, and has become harder to see than the original film. Lang epitomized the stereotype of the tyrannical German film director such as Erich von Stroheim and Otto Preminger; he was known for being hard to work with. During the climactic final scene in M, he allegedly threw Peter Lorre down a flight of stairs in order to give more authenticity to Lorre's battered look. His wearing a monocle added to the stereotype.

At the end of 1932, Lang started filming The Testament of Dr. Mabuse. Adolf Hitler came to power in January 1933, and by March 30, the new regime banned it as an incitement to public disorder. Testament is sometimes deemed an anti-Nazi film as Lang had put phrases used by the Nazis into the mouth of the title character.

Whereas Lang was worried about the advent of the Nazi regime, partly because of his Jewish heritage,^[7] his wife and screen writer Thea von Harbou had started to sympathize with the Nazis in the early 1930s and joined the NSDAP in 1932. They soon divorced. Lang's fears would be realized following his departure from Austria, as under Nazi eugenics laws he would be identified as a Jew even though his mother was a converted Roman Catholic, and he was raised as such.

Emigration[link]

On the set of The Woman in the Moon, 1929.

Shortly afterwards, Lang left Germany. According to Lang, propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels called Lang to his offices to inform him that The Testament of Dr Mabuse was being banned but that he was nevertheless so impressed by Lang's abilities as a filmmaker (especially Metropolis), he was offering Lang a position as the head of German film studio UFA. Lang had stated that it was during this meeting that he had decided to leave for Paris - but that the banks had closed by the time the meeting was over. Lang has stated that he fled that very evening. ^[8][9]

Lang left Germany in 1934 and moved to Paris^[10] after his marriage to Thea von Harbou, who stayed behind, ended in 1933.^{[citation needed]}

In Paris, Lang filmed a version of Ferenc Molnár's Liliom, starring Charles Boyer. This was Lang's only film in French (not counting the French version of Testament). He then went to the United States.^[10]

Hollywood career (1936-1957)[link]

Upon his arrival in Hollywood, Lang joined the MGM studio and directed the crime drama Fury, starring Spencer Tracy as a man wrongly lynched for a crime he didn't commit. He became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1939. Lang made twenty-one features in the next twenty-one years, working in a variety of genres at every major studio in Hollywood, occasionally producing his films as an independent. These films, often compared unfavorably by contemporary critics to Lang's earlier works, have since been reevaluated as being integral to the emergence and evolution of American genre cinema, film noir in particular.

One of his most famous films noir is the police drama The Big Heat (1953), noted for its uncompromising brutality, especially for a scene in which Lee Marvin throws scalding coffee on Gloria Grahame's face. During this period, his visual style simplified (owing in part to the constraints of the Hollywood studio system) and his worldview became increasingly pessimistic, culminating in the cold, geometric style of his last American films, While the City Sleeps (1956) and Beyond a Reasonable Doubt (1956).

Lang found it harder to find congenial production conditions in Hollywood and his advancing age left him less inclined to grapple with American backers. The German producer Artur Brauner expressed interest in remaking The Indian Tomb (a story that Lang had developed in the twenties that was ultimately taken from him by studio heads and directed instead by Joe May),^[11] so Lang abandoned his plans for retirement and returned to Germany in order to make his "Indian Epic". Following the production, Brauner was ready to proceed with his remake of Das Testament des Doctor Mabuse when Lang approached him with the idea of adding another original film to the series. The result was The Thousand Eyes of Dr. Mabuse (1960), made in a hurry and with a relatively small budget. It can be viewed as the marriage between the director's early experiences with expressionist techniques in Germany as well as the spartan style already visible in his late American work. Lang was approaching blindness during the production, making it his final project.

Death and legacy[link]

While his career had ended without fanfare, his American and later German works were championed by the critics of the Cahiers du cinéma. Lang died in 1976 and was interred in the Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles.^[12]

Filmography[link]

Pop culture[link]

• Lang appears as himself in Jean-Luc Godard's 1963 film Le Mepris. During the film, his reputation is discussed, and he somewhat lampoons his own reputation for being a temperamental director.

• An old German director with the demeanor of Lang appears during the filming of a bank robbery in Woody Allen's 1969 comedy Take the Money and Run.

• In David Foster Wallace's novel Infinite Jest, Lang is mentioned in tandem with James Cameron on page 48.

• A fictional Lang appears as a main character in the Fullmetal Alchemist movie Conqueror of Shambala.

• In Episode 11 of Season 1 of City Hunter, the antagonist's name is Fritz Lang.

• Madonna portrayed Lang for a sequence in her 1989 music video for "Express Yourself", complete with Lang's signature suit and monocle. The video itself is a tribute to Metropolis (film).

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Michaux, Agnès. 'Je les chasserai jusqu'au bout du monde jusqu'à ce qu'ils en crèvent; Paris: Editions 1, 1997; ISBN 2-86391-933-4
• Friedrich, Otto. City of Nets: A Portrait of Hollywood in the 1940s; New York: Harper & Row, 1986; ISBN 0-06-015626-0 (See e.g. pp. 45–46 for anecdotes revealing Lang's arrogance.)
• McGilligan, Patrick. Fritz Lang: The Nature of the Beast; New York: St. Martins Press, 1997; ISBN 0-312-13247-6
• Schnauber, Cornelius. Fritz Lang in Hollywood; Wien: Europaverlag, c1986; ISBN 3-203-50953-9 (in German)
• Youngkin, Stephen (2005). The Lost One: A Life of Peter Lorre. University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 0-8131-2360-7.  - Contains interviews with Lang and a discussion of the making of the film M

External links[link]

Biography portal

• Fritz Lang at the Internet Movie Database
• Fritz Lang Bibliography (via UC Berkeley Media Resources Center)
• Senses of Cinema - Biographie
• Fritz Lang at filmportal.de
• Interview with Fritz Lang from 1967
• Bibliography
• Fritz Lang at Find a Grave
• (French) "Symptôme, exhibition, angoisse. Représentation de la terreur dans l’œuvre allemande de Fritz Lang (1919-1933/1959-1960)", un article de Nicole Brenez extrait de De la Figure en général et du Corps en particulier (1998).

Gene Hackman
Hackman in June 2008
Born	Eugene Allen Hackman (1930-01-30) January 30, 1930 (age 82) San Bernardino, California, U.S.
Residence	Santa Fe, New Mexico
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Pasadena Playhouse
Occupation	Actor, Author
Years active	1961–2006
Home town	Danville, Illinois
Spouse	Faye Maltese (m. 1956–1986; divorced) Betsy Arakawa (m. 1991–present)
Children	3
Awards	Academy Award, Golden Globe Award, BAFTAs Award

Eugene Allen "Gene" Hackman^[1] (born January 30, 1930) is a retired American actor and novelist.

Nominated for five Academy Awards, winning two, Hackman has also won three Golden Globes and two BAFTAs in a career that spanned five decades. He first came to fame in 1967 with his performance as Buck Barrow in Bonnie and Clyde. His major subsequent films include The French Connection (1971), in which he played Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle; The Poseidon Adventure (1972); The Conversation (1974); Superman (1978), in which he played arch-villain Lex Luthor; Hoosiers (1986); Mississippi Burning (1987); Unforgiven (1992); The Firm (1993); Crimson Tide (1995); Get Shorty (1995); The Birdcage (1996); Enemy of the State (1998); and The Royal Tenenbaums (2001).

Early life[link]

Hackman was born in San Bernardino, California, the son of Lyda (née Gray) and Eugene Ezra Hackman.^[2] He has a brother, Richard. His family moved frequently, finally settling in Danville, Illinois, where they lived in the house of his English-born maternal grandmother, Beatrice.^[3] Hackman's father operated the printing press for the Commercial-News, a local paper.^[4] Hackman's parents divorced in 1943 and his father subsequently left the family.^[3][4]

Gene lived briefly in Storm Lake, Iowa and his sophomore home room photograph is in the 1945 Storm Lake High School "Breeze" year-book. At sixteen years, Hackman left home to join the United States Marine Corps, where he served four-and-a-half years as a field radio operator.^[5] After his discharge, he moved to New York, working in several minor jobs.^[5] His mother died in 1962 as a result of a fire she accidentally set while smoking.^[6]

Career[link]

1960s[link]

In 1956, Hackman began pursuing an acting career; he joined the Pasadena Playhouse in California.^[5] It was there that he forged a friendship with another aspiring actor, Dustin Hoffman.^[5] Already seen as outsiders by their classmates, Hackman and Hoffman were later voted "The Least Likely To Succeed."^[5] Determined to prove them wrong, Hackman hopped on a bus bound for New York City. A 2004 article in Vanity Fair described how Hackman, Hoffman and Robert Duvall were all struggling actors and close friends while living in New York City in the 1960s. Hackman was working as a doorman when he ran into an instructor whom he had despised at the Pasadena Playhouse. Reinforcing "The Least Likely To Succeed" vote, the man had said, "See, Hackman, I told you you wouldn't amount to anything."

Hackman began performing in several Off-Broadway plays. In 1964, he had an offer to co-star in the play^[7] Any Wednesday with actress Sandy Dennis. This opened the door to film work. His first role was in Lilith, with Warren Beatty in the leading role. In 1967, Hackman appeared in an episode of the television series The Invaders entitled The Spores. Another supporting role, Buck Barrow in 1967's Bonnie and Clyde,^[5] earned him an Academy Award nomination as Best Supporting Actor. In 1968, he appeared in an episode of "I Spy", in the role of "Hunter", in the episode "Happy Birthday...Everybody".^[7] In 1969, he played a ski coach in Downhill Racer and an astronaut in Marooned. Also in that year, he played the role of a member of a barnstorming skydiving team that entertained mostly at county fairs: The Gypsy Moths. He nearly accepted the role of Mike Brady for the upcoming TV series, The Brady Bunch, but was advised by his agent to decline in exchange for a more promising role, which he did.

1970s[link]

In 1971, he was nominated for the Best Supporting Actor Academy Award again, this time for 1970's I Never Sang for My Father, working alongside Melvyn Douglas and Estelle Parsons. The next year, he won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance as New York City Detective Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle in The French Connection, marking his graduation to leading man status.^[5]

He followed this with leading roles in the disaster film The Poseidon Adventure (1972) and Francis Ford Coppola's The Conversation (1974), which was nominated for several Oscars.^[5] That same year, Hackman appeared in what became one of his most famous comedic roles as the blind hermit in Young Frankenstein.

He later appeared as one of Teddy Roosevelt's former Rough Riders in the Western horse-race saga Bite the Bullet (1975), as well as in that year's sequel French Connection II and the star-studded war film A Bridge Too Far (1977), as Polish General Stanislaw Sosabowski. Hackman showed a talent for both comedy and the "slow burn" as criminal mastermind Lex Luthor in Superman: The Movie (1978), as he would in its 1980 and 1987 sequels.

1980s[link]

Gene Hackman in 1989

By the end of the 1980s, Hackman alternated between leading and supporting roles, earning another Best Actor nomination for Mississippi Burning. He had a memorable part as a Secretary of Defense trying to cover up a homicide in 1987's No Way Out opposite Kevin Costner.

During this decade Hackman also could be seen in Reds, Under Fire, Hoosiers, Power, Uncommon Valor and Bat*21. A 2008 American Film Institute poll voted Hoosiers the fourth-greatest film of all time in the sports genre.

1990s[link]

In 1990, the actor underwent an angioplasty, which kept him from work for a while, although he found time for Narrow Margin—a remake of The Narrow Margin (1952). In 1992, he played the sadistic sheriff "Little" Bill Daggett in the western Unforgiven directed by Clint Eastwood and written by David Webb Peoples which earned him a second Oscar, this time for Best Supporting Actor. The film won Best Picture.^[5]

Hackman co-starred with Tom Cruise as a corrupt lawyer in The Firm (1993) and appeared in a second John Grisham story in 1996, playing a convict on death row in The Chamber.

In 1995, Hackman played an inept Hollywood producer in Get Shorty and the villainous fast-draw champion John Herrod in The Quick and the Dead opposite Sharon Stone, Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe, as well as submarine Captain Frank Ramsey in the film Crimson Tide with Denzel Washington.

In 1996, he took a comedic turn as ultra-conservative Senator Kevin Keeley in The Birdcage with Robin Williams and Nathan Lane. He also co-starred with Will Smith in the 1998 film Enemy of the State, where his character was reminiscent of the one from The Conversation.

He played a President of the United States who commits a murder in 1997's Absolute Power, re-teaming with director-star Clint Eastwood.

2000s[link]

Hackman starred in the David Mamet crime film Heist, as an aging professional thief of considerable skill who is forced into one final job and the comedy Heartbreakers alongside Sigourney Weaver, Ray Liotta and Jennifer Love Hewitt. He also had a leading role as the head of an eccentric family in the ensemble cast film The Royal Tenenbaums and in yet another Grisham legal drama, Runaway Jury, at long last getting to make a picture with his longtime friend Dustin Hoffman.

In 2003 at the Golden Globes, Hackman was honored with the Cecil B. DeMille Award for his "outstanding contribution to the entertainment field."^[8]

Retirement[link]

Hackman at a book signing in June 2008

Together with undersea archaeologist Daniel Lenihan, Hackman has written three historical fiction novels: Wake of the Perdido Star (1999), a sea adventure of the 19th century, Justice for None (2004), a Depression-era tale of murder, and Escape from Andersonville (2008) about a prison escape during the Civil War. Payback at Morning Peak (2011) is his first solo effort, a story of love and revenge set in the Old West.

On July 7, 2004, Hackman gave a rare interview to Larry King, in which Hackman announced that he had no future film projects lined up and believes his acting career is over. In 2008, while promoting his third novel, Hackman confirmed that he had retired from acting.^[9] In 2011, Hackman appeared on the Fox Sports radio show, the Loose Cannons, where he discussed his career and novels with Pat O'Brien, Steve Hartman and Vic "the Brick" Jacobs. His final film to date was Welcome to Mooseport (2004), a comedy with Ray Romano in which Hackman portrayed a former President of the United States.

Personal life[link]

Hackman's first wife was Faye Maltese. They had three children, Christopher Allen, Elizabeth Jean and Leslie Anne.^{[citation needed]} The couple divorced in 1986 after three decades of marriage. In 1991, Hackman married Betsy Arakawa. They live in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Betsy is co-owner of an upscale retail home furnishings store in Santa Fe called Pandora's, Inc.

Hackman competed in Sports Car Club of America races driving an open wheeled Formula Ford in the late seventies. In 1983, Hackman drove a Dan Gurney Team Toyota in the 24 Hours of Daytona Endurance Race. He also won the Long Beach Grand Prix Celebrity Race.

Hackman is an avid fan of the Jacksonville Jaguars and regularly attended Jaguars games as a guest of then head coach Jack Del Rio. Hackman is friends with Del Rio from Del Rio's playing days at the University of Southern California.^[10]

On January 13, 2012, Gene Hackman was struck by a car while riding a bicycle in Islamorada, Florida. He sustained minor injuries and was transported to Ryder Trauma Center in Miami, Florida.^[11]

Filmography[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Biography portal

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Gene Hackman

• Gene Hackman at the Internet Movie Database
• Gene Hackman at AllRovi
• Gene Hackman at the TCM Movie Database
• Gene Hackman at the Internet Broadway Database
• Gene Hackman at the Internet Off-Broadway Database

Stanley Kubrick
Kubrick filming Barry Lyndon (1975)
Born	(1928-07-26)July 26, 1928 Manhattan, New York, United States
Died	March 7, 1999(1999-03-07) (aged 70) Harpenden, Hertfordshire, England, United Kingdom
Cause of death	Heart attack
Nationality	American
Ethnicity	Jewish
Occupation	Film director, producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, editor
Years active	1951–1999
Notable work(s)	2001: A Space Odyssey, Dr. Strangelove, The Shining, A Clockwork Orange, Full Metal Jacket
Influenced by	Max Ophüls · Sergei Eisenstein · Elia Kazan · Fritz Lang · G. W. Pabst · Vsevolod Pudovkin · Orson Welles
Influenced	Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Woody Allen, Terry Gilliam, Ridley Scott, Christopher Nolan, David Fincher, Guillermo del Toro, David Lynch, Lars von Trier, Michael Mann, George A. Romero, Coen brothers, Quentin Tarantino, Gaspar Noé, Michael Moore, Tim Burton, P.T. Anderson, Darren Aronofsky, Matt Groening, Frank Darabont, Peter Jackson, Joss Whedon
Spouse	Toba Etta Metz (1948–51; divorced) Ruth Sobotka (1954–57; divorced) Christiane Harlan (1958–99; his death)

Stanley Kubrick (/ˈkuːbrɪk/; July 26, 1928 – March 7, 1999) was an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and editor. He is regarded as having been one of America's greatest filmmakers. His films, typically adaptations of novels or short stories, were noted for their "dazzling"^[1] and unique cinematography, attention to details to achieve realism and an inspired use of music scores. Kubrick's films covered a variety of genres, including war, black comedy, horror and science fiction. Kubrick was also noted for being a perfectionist, using painstaking care with scene staging and working closely with his actors.

Starting out as a photographer in New York City, he taught himself all aspects of film production and directing after graduating high school. His earliest films were made on a shoestring budget, followed by one Hollywood blockbuster, after which he spent most of the rest of his career living and filming in England. His home became his workplace where he did his writing, research, editing and management of production details. This allowed him to have almost complete artistic control, but with the rare advantage of having financial support from major Hollywood studios.

Several of his films broke new cinematic ground. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) was a science-fiction film noted for innovative visual effects and scientific realism. In Barry Lyndon (1975) Kubrick used specially-designed lenses to film scenes lit by natural candlelight. Kubrick's The Shining (1980) was among the first feature films to make use of a Steadicam to allow stabilized and fluid tracking shots. As with his earlier shorts, Kubrick was the cinematographer and editor on the first two of his thirteen feature films. He directed, produced and wrote all or part of the screenplays for nearly all his films.

Some of his films were controversial, including A Clockwork Orange (1971), Lolita (1962) and Paths of Glory (1957). Many of Kubrick's films were met with mixed reviews, although they were acclaimed years later as masterpieces. He was widely admired by other prominent filmmakers, including Orson Welles, who considered him a "giant" and a "great director".^[2] Steven Spielberg called Space Odyssey his generation's "big bang". From the mid-1950s onward, all of Kubrick's films except The Shining were nominated for Oscars, Golden Globes or BAFTAs. His one personal win was for the special effects in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Film critic and historian Michel Ciment considers his films to be "among the most important contributions to world cinema in the twentieth century".^[3]

Early years[link]

Stanley Kubrick was born on July 26, 1928, at the Lying-In Hospital in Manhattan, New York, the first of two children of Jacques (Jacob) Leonard Kubrick (1901–85) and his wife Sadie Gertrude (née Perveler; 1903–85), both of whom were Jewish. His sister, Barbara Mary Kubrick, was born in 1934. Jacques Kubrick, whose parents and paternal grandparents were of Austrian, Romanian and Polish origin, was a doctor. At Stanley's birth, the Kubricks lived in an apartment at 2160 Clinton Avenue in The Bronx.^[4]:6

The Kubrick biographer Geoffrey Cocks writes that Kubrick's family was not religious, although his parents had been married in a Jewish ceremony.^[5] When, in 1980, Michel Ciment asked Kubrick whether he had had a religious upbringing, he replied "No, not at all." Like many Jews who lead secular lives, he had no bar mitzvah and did not attend synagogue.

A friend of Kubrick's family notes that although his father was a prominent doctor, "Stanley and his mom were such regular people. They had no airs about them."^[4]:24 As a boy, he was considered "bookish" and generally uninterested in activities in his Bronx neighborhood. According to a friend, "When we were teenagers hanging around the Bronx, he was just another bright, neurotic, talented guy—just another guy trying to get into a game with my softball club and mess around with girls".^[5] Many of his friends from his "close-knit neighborhood" would become involved with his early films, including writing music scores and scripts.^[5]

When he was twelve, Kubrick's father taught him chess. The game remained a lifelong obsession and appeared in many scenes in his films. Kubrick explained the value of playing chess to his career thus:

If chess has any relationship to filmmaking, it would be in the way it helps you develop patience and discipline in choosing between alternatives at a time when an impulsive decision seems very attractive.^[6]:11

When he was thirteen, Kubrick's father bought him a Graflex camera, triggering a fascination with still photography. As a teenager, Kubrick was interested in jazz, and briefly attempted a career as a drummer. His father was disappointed in his failure to achieve excellence in school, which he felt Stanley was capable of. He encouraged him to read from his library at home while at the same time permitting him to take up photography as a serious hobby.^[5]

Kubrick attended William Howard Taft High School from 1941 to 45. He was a poor student, with a meager 67 grade average.^[7] According to his English teacher, "the idea of literature and the reading of literature, from a non-academic, from a more human point of view, clearly was what interested him. He was a literary guy even as a young man . . . "^[4]:23 Kubrick had a poor attendance record, and often skipped school to take in double-feature films.^[4]:15 He graduated in 1945, but his poor grades, combined with the demand for college admissions from soldiers returning from the Second World War, eliminated hope of higher education. Later in life, Kubrick spoke disdainfully of his education and of education in general, maintaining that nothing about school interested him. His parents sent him to live with relatives for a year in Los Angeles in the hopes that it would help his academic growth.

Kubrick photo of Chicago taken as photographer for Look magazine, 1949

While still in high school, he was chosen as an official school photographer for a year. In 1946, since he was not able to gain admission to day session classes at colleges, he briefly attended evening classes at the City College of New York (CCNY).^[4]:33 Eventually, he sought jobs as a freelance photographer, and by graduation, he had sold a photographic series to Look magazine. Kubrick supplemented his income by playing chess "for quarters" in Washington Square Park and various Manhattan chess clubs.^[8]

In 1946 he became an apprentice photographer for Look and later a full-time staff photographer. (Many early [1945–50] photographs by Kubrick have been published in the book Drama and Shadows [2005, Phaidon Press] and also appear as a special feature on the 2007 Special Edition DVD of 2001: A Space Odyssey.) In 2011, many of his photos for "Look," previously available only for viewing in museum archives or books, were hand selected from thousands by curators at the Museum of the City of New York, and made available as limited edition prints.^[9]

During his Look magazine years, Kubrick married his high-school sweetheart Toba Metz in May 1948. They lived together in Greenwich Village. During this time, Kubrick began frequenting film screenings at the Museum of Modern Art and the cinemas of New York City. He was inspired by the complex, fluid camerawork of the director Max Ophüls, whose films influenced Kubrick's later visual style, and by the director Elia Kazan, whom he described as America's "best director" at that time, with his ability of "performing miracles" with his actors.^[3]

Career[link]

Short films[link]

In 1951, Kubrick made a few short documentaries, beginning with The March of Time newsreels to movie theatres. His first was the independently financed Day of the Fight (1951), notable for using reverse tracking shot, later to become one of Kubrick's characteristic camera movements.^[10] Inspired by this early success, Kubrick quit his job at Look and began work on others, including, Flying Padre (1951) and The Seafarers (1953), Kubrick's first color film. These three films constitute Kubrick's only surviving documentary works, although some historians believe he made others.^[11] He also served as second unit director on an episode of the TV show, Omnibus, about Abraham Lincoln, clips of which are included in the documentary Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures (2001).

Kubrick told writer Joseph Gelmis in 1969 how he became interested in making those documentaries:

I’d had my job with Look since I was seventeen, and I’d always been interested in films, but it never actually occurred to me to make a film on my own until I had a talk with a friend from high school, Alex Singer, who wanted to be a director himself.^[12]

At the time, Singer worked in the offices of the newsreel production company, The March of Time, and Kubrick felt he could make a film for much less than the company was paying other filmmakers, telling an interviewer, "I can’t believe it costs that much to make eight or nine minutes of film."^[13] He began learning all he could about filmmaking on his own, calling film suppliers, laboratories, and equipment rental houses. Kubrick decided to make a short film documentary about a boxer, the same one he wrote a story about for Look a year earlier. He rented a camera and produced a 16-minute black-and-white documentary, Day of the Fight. Kubrick summarizes this first effort at filmmaking:

I was cameraman, director, editor, assistant editor, sound effects man–you name it, I did it. It was invaluable experience, because being forced to do everything myself I gained a sound and comprehensive grasp of all the technical aspects of filmmaking.^[12]

[edit] Fear and Desire (1953)

Fear and Desire (1953) was the story of a team of soldiers caught behind enemy lines in a fictional war. Kubrick and his then-wife, Toba Metz, were the only crew on the film, which was written by his friend Howard Sackler. Fear and Desire garnered a few respectable reviews but was a commercial failure. Kubrick was later embarrassed by the film as an amateur effort and tried to keep it out of circulation.^[14] It was shown for the first time on Turner Classic Movies in December 2011,^[15] and four of his early films, including this one, will be available in the Fall of 2012.^[16]

[edit] Killer's Kiss (1955)

Killer's Kiss is a 67-minute film noir film about a young heavyweight boxer's involvement with a woman being abused by her criminal boss. Like Fear and Desire, it was privately funded by Kubrick's family and friends, and production was again made with "a virtual one-man crew," with Kubrick co-writing the script with Sackler.^[17]

Although the film met with limited commercial success,^[18][19] film historian Alexander Walker notes that it was an "oddly compelling work that tells much about the young Kubrick and explains why he stirred up immediate critical notice."^[6]:45 The film had a number of striking aspects, states Walker: "Kubrick's talent for lighting and photographing a scene so as to abstract its latent emotional value"; and the tone of the film with its urban loneliness and melancholy.^[6]:45

[edit] The Killing (1956)

The Killing is a fictional story of a meticulously planned racetrack robbery gone wrong, starring Sterling Hayden. This is Kubrick's first full-length feature film shot with a professional cast and crew. Its non-linear narrative would have a major influence on later directors, including Quentin Tarantino,^[20][21][22] The Killing followed many of the conventions of film noir, in both its plotting and cinematography style, and although the genre peaked in the 1940s, many critics regard this film as one of its best.^[23] Not a financial success, it still received good reviews,^[24] and brought Kubrick and his producer partner, James B. Harris, to the attention of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer,^[25] which offered them its massive collection of stories from which to choose their next project.

[edit] Paths of Glory (1957)

Kubrick's next film, Paths of Glory, set during World War I, is based on Humphrey Cobb's 1935 antiwar novel, and stars Kirk Douglas. It follows a French army unit ordered on an impossible mission by their superiors. The film was his first significant commercial success,^[26] and was critically acclaimed and admired within the industry, establishing Kubrick as a major up-and-coming young filmmaker.

Critics praised the film's unsentimental, spare, and unvarnished combat scenes and its raw, black-and-white cinematography.^[27] However, the film was banned in both France and (for less time) Germany for many years for its fictionalized depictions of the French military.

Kubrick's cinematography was particularly commented on by critics, along with other directors. "Colonel Dax's (Kirk Douglas) march through his soldier's trench in a single, unbroken reverse-tracking shot has become a classic cinematic trope cited in film classes," and director Steven Spielberg once named this his favorite film.^[26]

[edit] Uncredited work on One-Eyed Jacks (1961)

Kubrick worked for six months on the Marlon Brando vehicle One-Eyed Jacks (1961). The script was written by then unknown Sam Peckinpah, but Kubrick insisted on rewriting it. Kubrick quit as director, explaining, "When I left Brando's picture, it still didn't have a finished script. It had just become obvious to me that Brando wanted to direct the movie."^[28]

[edit] Spartacus (1960)

Spartacus is based on the true life story of the historical figure and the events of the Third Servile War. It was produced by Kirk Douglas who also starred as rebellious slave Spartacus, and Laurence Olivier as his foe, the Roman general and politician Marcus Licinius Crassus. Douglas hired Kubrick to take over direction soon after he fired director Anthony Mann.

Although Kubrick, now thirty-one years of age, had by this time already directed four feature films, this became his largest by far, with a cast of over 10,000, and at the time was the most expensive film ever made in America.^[17] It was also the first time that Kubrick filmed using 70 mm Super Technirama film to achieve ultra-high definition, and which allowed him to capture large panoramic scenes, including one with 8,000 trained soldiers from Spain representing the Roman army.^[26] Kubrick was accustomed to staging and lighting all scenes as a result of his photography background. According to film author Alan K. Rode, Kubrick began directing cinematographer Russell Metty, who was twice Kubrick's age, how to photograph and light scenes, which led to Metty threatening to quit. However, Metty later muted his criticisms after winning the Oscar for Best Cinematography, his first and only win during his career.^[29]:134

Kubrick had conflicts with Douglas, including his dissatisfaction with the screenplay. He also complained about not having full creative control over the artistic aspects. For Douglas, the film was a "labor of love." He had used his own funds to purchase an option on the book Spartacus from author Howard Fast, and he hired all the primary creative forces involved in production, including Kubrick.^[30]:226 Nevertheless, Kubrick realized that in the future he wanted to have autonomy on any films he worked on. "Spartacus is the only film on which I did not have absolute control," he would later say.^[4]:193[31]

Spartacus was a critical and commercial success and established Kubrick as a major director, receiving six Academy Award nominations and winning four. However, it marked the end of the working relationship between Kubrick and Douglas, although co-star Tony Curtis, in his autobiography, called Kubrick his favorite director, and writing, "His greatest effectiveness was his one-on-one relationship with actors."^[4]:193

[edit] Lolita (1962)

In 1962, Kubrick moved to England to film Lolita, his first attempt at black comedy. It was an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Vladimir Nabokov, the story of a middle-aged college professor becoming infatuated with a 14-year-old nymphet. It starred Peter Sellers, James Mason, Shelley Winters and Sue Lyon. Lolita was Kubrick's first film to generate controversy because of its provocative story.^[32] Kubrick toned down the screen adaptation to remove much of the eroticism in the novel^[4]:225 and made it into "an epic comedy of frustration rather than lust," writes film author Adrian Turner.^[17]

Kubrick searched for nearly a year to find what Nabokov called "the perfect nymphet," to play the part. After interviewing Sue Lyon, he found her to be nearly perfect and recalls his reaction:

From the first, she was interesting to watch—even in the way she walked in for her interview, casually sat down, walked out. She was cool and non-giggly. She was enigmatic without being dull. She could keep people guessing about how much Lolita knew about life. When she left us, we shouted to each other, 'Now if she can only act!'^[4]:203

Kubrick was deeply impressed by the chameleon-like range of actor Peter Sellers and gave him one of his first opportunities to wildly improvise during shooting while filming him with three cameras. To best utilize Sellers' talents, Kubrick in consultation with him vastly expanded the role of Clare Quilty and added new material in which Quilty impersonates various other characters.^{[4]:204–205}

Stylistically, Lolita was a transitional film for Kubrick, "marking the turning point from a naturalistic cinema...to the surrealism of the later films," notes film critic Gene Youngblood.^[33] The film received mixed reviews, with some critics praising it for its daring subject matter, while others, like Pauline Kael, describing it as the "first new American comedy" since the 1940s. "Lolita is black slapstick and at times it's so far out that you gasp as you laugh."^[4]:224

According to social historian Stephen E. Kercher, the film "demonstrated that its director possessed a keen, satiric insight into the social landscape and sexual hang-ups of cold war America." Kubrick had shown an affinity for liberal satire when he approached others he hoped would become collaborators: he asked comedian Lenny Bruce to work with him on a film, and did the same with fellow Bronx native, cartoonist Jules Feiffer, whom he invited to Los Angeles to work with him on a screenplay titled Sick, Sick, Sick.^[34]:331

[edit] Dr. Strangelove (1964)

Kubrick's next project was Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), another satirical black comedy. Because Kubrick came of age after World War II and the beginning of the Cold War period, he, like many others, was worried about the possibilities of nuclear war. He became preoccupied with it in the late 1950s, fearing that New York, where he lived, could be a likely target, and even considered moving to Australia. He began consulting with others about the possibility of making the subject into a movie.^[4]:227

The novel Red Alert was recommended to Kubrick, and after reading it he saw in it the makings of a good film story about nuclear war. Kubrick then began working on a screenplay along with his producer, James B. Harris, who had produced three of his previous films.

During that writing period, Kubrick decided that turning the otherwise frightening and serious story into a satire would be the best way to make it into a film, although Harris felt otherwise, and chose not to produce it. Kubrick told Harris, "The only way this thing really works for me is as a satire. It's the same point, but it's just a better way of making the point."^{[4]:228–229} Harris recalls that period:

I said to myself, 'I leave him alone for ten minutes and he's going to blow his whole career.' I was actually convinced he was out of control to do this as a comedy — as it turns out, it's my favorite Kubrick picture.^[4]:229

According to LoBrutto and others, "Kubrick was taking a bold and dangerous leap" in his decision to make Red Alert into a comedy, as the topic of nuclear war as a film subject at that time was "considered taboo" and "hardly socially acceptable."^[4]:229 Nevertheless, before writing the screenplay as a satire, Kubrick studied over forty military and political research books. He decided that a "serious treatment" of the subject would not be believable, and that some of his most salient points would be fodder for comedy. He then decided to try to "treat the story as a nightmare comedy"^[6]:29

Kubrick found that the film would be impossible to make in the U.S. for various technical and political reasons, forcing him to move production to England. There, he developed what became the "first important visual effects crew in the world."^[4]:233 To help him write the screenplay, Kubrick hired noted black comedy and satirical writer Terry Southern. Together, they worked closely to transform Red Alert into "an outrageous black comedy" loaded with "outrageous dialogue". LoBrutto notes that the final product is a "raucous satire" that merges Kubrick's "devilishly dark sense of humor" from the New York streets and Southern's "manic comedic mind"^[4]:233

From his collection of thousands of record albums, both classical and golden oldies, Kubrick also selected background songs and music which added to the satirical and sardonic effect: during the opening credits with B-52 bombers in flight, the song "Try a Little Tenderness" was played; as the pilots flew into hostile territory, knowing they would not return, the song "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" was heard in the background; during scenes with nuclear explosions in populated areas, the song "We'll Meet Again" was played.

Because of perception that Peter Sellers had been pivotal to the success of Lolita, Sellers was again cast to employ his ability to mimic different characters, this time in three different roles. As he had in Lolita, Kubrick allowed Sellers to wildly improvise his dialogue.^[35]

The film stirred up much controversy and mixed opinions. New York Times film critic Bosley Crowther worried that it was a "discredit and even contempt for our whole defense establishment . . . the most shattering sick joke I've ever come across."^[34] Whereas Time, the Nation, Newsweek and Life, among many, gave it "positive, often ecstatic reviews."^[34] Historian and philosopher Lewis Mumford, decades later, "saluted" Kubrick for "having successfully utilized the only method capable of evading our national censor—relentless but hilarious satire."^[34]

[edit] 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Kubrick spent five years developing his next film, 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). The film was adapted from the short story The Sentinel, by science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke, and the screenplay was written by Kubrick and Clarke in collaboration. The theme of the film is a depiction of various stages of man, from ape to star child, as man is reborn into a new existence, all controlled by an enigmatic alien intelligence seen manifested only as a black monolith. The film was conceived as a Cinerama spectacle and was photographed in Super Panavision 70.

Upon its release in 1968, the film was said to defy genre convention and was claimed to be unlike any science-fiction movie before it, and different from any of Kubrick's earlier films or stories.^[36] It contained ground-breaking special effects designed by Kubrick to give the viewer a "dazzling mix of imagination and science," and winning Kubrick his only personal Oscar, an Academy Award for Visual Effects.

Kubrick was very much interested in science and the possibilities that life existed beyond Earth. When Kubrick first contacted Clarke through his friend about helping him write the film, he assumed Clarke was a "recluse," then living in Ceylon. Clarke replied back to his friend, "Frightfully interested in working with Enfant Terrible. . . What makes Kubrick think I'm a recluse?" They first met in person in New York, although Kubrick did not offer Clarke the job of writing at that point, nor was the possible film discussed. LoBrutto notes that Clarke "emerged from the meeting impressed with Kubrick's pure intelligence and his ability to comprehend new ideas and concepts instantaneously."^[4]:257

Subsequently, after they agreed to the story, Kubrick worked closely with Clarke for three months to produce a 130-page treatment for the film, and consulted with other experts and agencies while doing so.^[37]:146 Initially, Clarke worked in Kubrick's apartment office on Central Park West with an electric typewriter. Science writer Albert Rosenfeld explains Kubrick's method of learning about subjects:

When a subject interested Kubrick, he never let it get away until he was through with it. He probed with a ruthless tenacity, asking the right questions, comprehending all he was told, never getting enough details to satisfy him.^[38]

Clarke would later comment about this period: "Every time I get through a session with Stanley, I have to go lie down."^[38]

Kubrick describes the movie as "a nonverbal experience,"^[39] but would not elaborate on the film's meaning during a Playboy magazine interview in 1968:

[I] tried to create a visual experience, one that bypasses verbalized pigeon-holing and directly penetrates the subconscious with an emotional and philosophic content . . . , just as music does. . . . You're free to speculate as you wish about the philosophical and allegorical meaning.^[39]

The film was also noted for its scientific realism in depicting space flight, for example in its depiction of artificial gravity and the absence of sound in outer space.

Space Odyssey was the first of several Kubrick films in which classical music played an important role. It made famous the introductory track of Richard Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra which is invoked in the opening credits, in "The Dawn of Man" sequence and in the final transformation of astronaut David Bowman into an otherworldly "star child". Kubrick also used music by contemporary avant-garde Hungarian composer György Ligeti; it was the first wide commercial exposure of Ligeti's work.

The film was not an immediate hit among many critics, however, who faulted its lack of dialogue, slow pacing, and seemingly impenetrable storyline. Others, like Penelope Gilliatt,^[40] called it "a great film," and numerous directors were inspired by it.^[4]:314 Many today consider it among the greatest science fiction films ever made,^[41] as well as one of the most influential.^[42] In hindsight, many film critics regard it "as the most significant Hollywood breakthrough since Citizen Kane in 1941,"^[39] Steven Spielberg calling it his generation's "big bang".^[43] It is a staple on All Time Top 10 lists.^[44]

Napoleon, unrealized film

After 2001, Kubrick initially attempted to make a film about the life of Napoleon and had already begun extensive research on his life. It was well into pre-production when the studio suddenly pulled the plug and cancelled the project. Screenwriter and director Andrew Birkin, one of his young assistants on 2001, was sent to the Isle of Elba, Austerlitz and Waterloo, and took thousands of pictures which he went over with Kubrick. Kubrick had him read scholarly monographs about Napoleon as well as his personal commentaries. Decades later, Birkin remembered this period when he saw Kubrick on television receiving an award, recalling how Kubrick "quite frequently gave young people opportunities."

At first I didn't recognize him, he looked like a biblical patriarch. Then I saw the old Stanley when he smiled slightly, and there was that old gleam in his eyes. I adored the man, worshiped him like a hero, and regret that I never told him that I was enormously grateful to him.^[3]:283

Julian Senior, V.P. of London's Warner Brothers' office, also said of Kubrick that "he's a great help to young directors, he recommends them to the company if he feels they have talent."^[3]:225

[edit] A Clockwork Orange (1971)

When financing fell through, Kubrick searched for a project that he could film quickly on a small budget. He settled on A Clockwork Orange (1971). His adaptation of Anthony Burgess' novel of the same name is an exploration of violence and experimental rehabilitation by law enforcement authorities. LoBrutto describes the film as a "sociopolitical statement about the government's threat against personal freedom,"^[4]:371 and Ciment explains that through the story, Kubrick "is denouncing brainwashing of every kind and making a plea for free-will."^[3]:122 Kubrick did not deny those conclusions, asserting that even with good motives there were limits to how society should maintain "law and order".

The State sees the spectre looming ahead of terrorism and anarchy, and this increases the risk of its over-reaction and a reduction in our freedom.^[3]:163

Because of its depiction of teenage violence, however, the film became one of the most controversial films of the decade, and part of an ongoing debate about violence in cinema.^[45] Detractors claimed the film glorified violence. Kubrick personally pulled the film from release in England after receiving death threats after a series of copycat crimes based on the film. It was not re-released in England until 2001. Kubrick disagreed that a film could transform a person into a criminal, and argued that "violent crime is invariably committed by people with a long record of anti-social behavior"^[3]:163

Nevertheless, Kubrick defended the depiction of high levels of violence in the film arguing "The violence in the story has to be given sufficient dramatic weight so that the moral dilemma it poses can be seen in the right context" otherwise the viewer would not reach a "meaningful conclusion about relative rights and wrongs". The State cannot turn even the most "vicious criminals into vegetables."^{[3]:162–163}

Kubrick also expanded his ideas to the nation's popular media and worried that it could have a similar effect on a wider scale. In a letter Kubrick had published by the New York Times in 1972, he warned against what he described as multimedia "fascism" that could also turn human beings into "zombies." Author Julian Rice explains that in this larger context, Kubrick implies that "spectators" of media can become a "massive entity subject to predictable response."^[46]

A Clockwork Orange was rated 'X' for violence in the USA on its original release just a year before that rating became linked to pornography. Kubrick later released a cut version for an 'R' rating, though the original version has now been re-rated to 'R'.

[edit] Barry Lyndon (1975)

directing Barry Lyndon

Barry Lyndon (1975) was an adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's The Luck of Barry Lyndon (also known as Barry Lyndon), a picaresque novel about the adventures of an 18th-century Irish gambler and social climber. The cinematography and lighting techniques Kubrick used in Barry Lyndon were highly innovative. Most notably, interior scenes were shot with a specially adapted high-speed f/0.7 Zeiss camera lens originally developed for NASA. Many scenes were lit only with candlelight, creating two-dimensional, diffused-light images reminiscent of 18th-century paintings.^[47] Like its two predecessors, the film does not have an original score. Irish traditional songs (performed by The Chieftains) are combined with classical works from the period.

Barry Lyndon found a great audience in Europe, particularly in France. However, its measured pace and length at three hours put off many American critics and audiences, although the film was nominated for seven Academy Awards and won four, more than any other Kubrick film. As with most of Kubrick's films, Barry Lyndon's reputation has grown through the years, particularly among filmmakers. The director Martin Scorsese has cited it as his favorite Kubrick film. Spielberg has praised its "impeccable technique", although he had panned it when much younger.^[48]

According to some critics who recognized the technical skills and special lenses used for the film, "every scene could have been a painting." Writer George Lewis points out that for many of the scenes, Kubrick posed the actors for an instant before the action, thereby emphasizing this painting quality. He adds, "The scenes look like European paintings of the 1700s and 1800s," and such paintings are considered art in the American popular mind.^[49] The effect was accentuated, notes Ciment, by Kubrick's use of "slow reverse zoom which, moving out from a single character, enlarges the field of vision until its powerful scrutiny takes possession of the whole decor."^[3]:114

[edit] The Shining (1980)

The Shining, released in 1980, was adapted from the novel of the same name by bestselling horror writer Stephen King. The film stars Jack Nicholson as a writer who takes a job as a winter caretaker of a large and isolated hotel in the Rocky Mountains. He spends the winter there with his wife, played by Shelley Duvall, and their young son, who displays paranormal abilities. During their stay, they confront both Jack's descent into madness and apparent supernatural horrors lurking in the hotel.

Kubrick, who was noted for giving his actors freedom to extend the script, and even improvise on occasion, did so with the film's main stars, Nicholson and Duvall. Nicholson notes that actors were given new script pages or revisions on almost a daily basis. According to LoBrutto, Kubrick made it clear that the printed script was to be used as a guide "to use to find the real scene with the actors . . ." On the set, Nicholson always appeared in character, and if Kubrick felt confident, after they considered how a scene could be shot, that he knew his lines well enough, he might encourage him, as he did Peter Sellers, to improvise.^[4]:434 As a result, writes LoBrutto, "one of Nicholson's inspired improvisations was the now legendary 'Here's Johnny!' line after he has axed in the bathroom door to get to the frightened Wendy."^[4]:433

Vivian Kubrick's film, The Making of The Shining, shows Nicholson and Duvall rehearsing the scene and revising the script along with Kubrick.^[50] Kubrick allowed his daughter Vivian to film the documentary, an unusual move as he kept access to the set closed to all others.^[4]:434

Kubrick made extensive use of the newly invented Steadicam, a weight-balanced camera support, which allowed for smooth hand-held camera movement in scenes where a conventional camera track was impractical. According to Garrett Brown, Steadicam's inventor, it was the first picture to utilize its full potential.^[51] Kubrick's perfectionist style required dozens of takes of certain scenes.^[52] Nicholson's scene with the ghostly bartender was shot thirty-six times, for example.

The film opened to mixed reviews, but proved a commercial success. As with most Kubrick films, subsequent critical reaction has treated the film more favorably. Among horror movie fans, The Shining is a cult classic, with memorable scenes like that of a deranged Nicholson crashing through a bathroom door wielding an axe, yelling, "Here's Johnny!"^[53] The film's financial success renewed Warner Brothers' faith in Kubrick's ability to make profitable films after the commercial failure in the US of Barry Lyndon.

While Kubrick admitted he had always been interested in the subject of ESP and paranormal experiences, he only first became interested in doing the film after he read King's novel, calling it "one of the most ingenious and exciting stories of the genre I had read." Kubrick added that he believed that such "fantasy stories at their best serve the same function for us that fairy tales and mythology formerly did. . . . The nineteenth century was the golden age of realistic fiction. The twentieth century may be the golden age of fantasy."^[3]:181

King was surprised when Kubrick told him he thought stories of the supernatural "were always optimistic" because they "suggest we survive death." Kubrick concluded, "If we survive death, that’s optimistic."^[54] In a subsequent interview, Kubrick expanded on this idea and its relevance to The Shining's story:

I think the unconscious appeal of a ghost story, for instance, lies in its promise of immortality. If you can be frightened by a ghost story, then you must accept the possibility that supernatural beings exist. If they do, then there is more than just oblivion waiting beyond the grave.^[3]:181

[edit] Full Metal Jacket (1987)