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[#165183]
Written by: DocFreak08 [21/08/11, 05:08] Action: [ Reply ] [ Quote ] |
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-"Film is a battleground. Love, hate, violence, action, death...In a word, emotion."- -"Am I a cult director? Yeah, I love all that. I want to join the cult of the $100- to $200-million grossers and still make an artistic picture."- -"I hate violence. That has never prevented me from using it in my films."- Samuel Fuller (1911-1997) brought his background as a former crime reporter, pulp-fiction writer and decorated war hero to his gritty, compelling films. He was a jack of all trades before the high-school dropout directed his first film at age thirty-six. But once he was contacted by Poverty Row producer Robert L. Lippert, a fan of his writing, Fuller was turned on to cinema—his true calling. "The heat of the story is what I'm interested in," Fuller tells film historian Richard Schickel in their interview. At age 17, Samuel Fuller was the youngest reporter ever to be in charge of the events section of the New York Journal Graphic. He served as a rifleman in the U.S. 1st Infantry Division during World War II. Fuller saw action in North Africa, Sicily, Omaha Beach on D-Day, and then on through Europe to Czechoslovakia. He was awarded the Silver Star, Bronze Star, and Purple Heart. He later used many of his war experiences in The Big Red One (1980). After war he directed some minor action productions for which he mostly wrote the scripts himself and which he also produced, like The Baron of Arizona (1950). His masterpiece was Pickup On South Street (1953) for 20th Century Fox, but at the end of the 1950s, he returned to independent filmmaking, and in the sixties (after his artistic cred had been given a shot in the arm by the French New Wavers’ embrace of him as a major stylistic influence), he directed two of his most acclaimed titles, the pulpy and profound Shock Corridor(1963) and The Naked Kiss (1964), both corrosive satires of American culture. Even in his career’s twilight, Fuller didn’t shy away from controversy: his early eighties social horror film White Dog (1982) was shelved by the studio for more than a decade due to its provocative, bloody investigation of American racism. Although most of Fuller's films were considered "B" action movies at the time, he lent them such a daring and distinctive stamp that many have since become cult favorites. Fuller made movies about people whose outsides were tough and insides were missing. They were war movies and westerns, crime thrillers and journalism chillers--and most were dismissed the first go-round by critics and audiences who didn't get it, who mistook his scorn for heartlessness. Schickel and Fuller set straight the broken record, and in the process make you want to see all of his films. In The Men Who Made the Movies: Sam Fuller (2002), the director discusses his philosophy about filmmaking, life experiences, specific films and key scenes in his movies. Included in the documentary are clips from The Steel Helmet (1951), a timely and hard-hitting study of the Korean War, which was the first movie on the subject and was made while that war was still being fought; The Naked Kiss (1964), starring Constance Towers as a strong-willed prostitute fighting hypocrisy in her struggle to go straight (it's an example of Fuller's raw, tabloid-influenced style), and Pickup on South Street (1953). Also included are clips from Forty Guns (1957), Shock Corridor (1963) and The Big Red One (1980). Producer/Writer/Director: Richard Schickel Narrator: Sydney Pollack A Lorac Production for Turner Classic Movies (2002) |
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