Top Ten Contributors - The Chase (1946)
I watched this mediocre film noir via 50 Dark Crimes disc set that I recently purchased. Here are the major contributors that brought this movie to the screen.
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- Prolific mystery writer Cornell Woolrich was born in New York City, but his parents separated when he was young and he spent much of his childhood in Latin America with his father. Then he was sent back to New York to live with his rich, domineering mother, Claire. He attended Columbia University where he wrote his first novel, a Jazz Age piece published in 1926 titled "Cover Charge". Another book, "Children of the Ritz", followed in 1927. Hollywood beckoned but his time there as an (uncredited) screenwriter proved to be unhappy. A disastrous marriage to a producer's daughter failed quickly and he headed back to New York -- and Claire. He found his niche writing suspense stories for magazines such as "Argosy", "Black Mask" and "Thrilling Mystery". Sales were made to Hollywood, his reputation grew, and his bank account increased. Some called him "the Poe of the 20th century". Then his mother sank into a lengthy illness and his output fell as he devoted more and more of his time to her care. By the time she died in 1957, he was "burned out". From then until his death in 1968, he lived a lonely life marked by alcoholism and poor health (he delayed visiting a doctor when his leg started bothering him; he eventually lost it to gangrene). When he died his funeral went unattended.
He bequeathed money to Columbia to set up a creative writing course which was not named after him but after who else?-Claire.wrote the book "The Black Path of Fear" - Writer
- Producer
- Director
Arthur Ripley started his movie career as an apprentice at Kalem Pictures and then worked for several studios, including Vitagraph and Metro. By early 1920s he had become a gag writer for Mack Sennett. In 1923 Sennett signed vaudeville comic Harry Langdon and gave his writers the job of developing something for Langdon's character. Ripley and fellow Sennett gagman Frank Capra created the perfect story lines for the pantomime of Langdon and soon his two-reel comedies were hugely popular. For the next few years Sennett cranked out film after film with Langdon, written by Ripley and Capra and directed by Harry Edwards. The last film on the Sennett lot was Saturday Afternoon (1926), which was released as a three-reeler.
In 1926 Langdon left Sennett to form his own company, the Harry Langdon Corporation, and took Edwards, Capra and Ripley with him. The first picture they made together was Tramp, Tramp, Tramp (1926), which became a big hit. After one film Edwards left and Capra became director, although still writing with Ripley. Capra directed the next two films, The Strong Man (1926) and Long Pants (1927), and then he also departed, leaving Ripley as head writer and Langdon not only starring but taking over as director. Without Capra, however, the next three films flopped and Ripley was soon looking for another job. During the 1930s he would work as gag writer in a number of shorts, not unlike the job he held a decade before. He would also occasionally direct and in the 1940s he would add producer to his credits.asked by Nero films to direct- Writer
- Producer
- Actor
Philip Yordan was born on 1 April 1914 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. He was a writer and producer, known for Detective Story (1951), Broken Lance (1954) and Dillinger (1945). He was married to Faith Clift and Marilyn Nash. He died on 24 March 2003 in La Jolla, California, USA.responsible for the screenplay- Composer
- Music Department
- Soundtrack
Michel Michelet was born on 14 July 1894 in Kiev, Russian Empire [now Ukraine]. He was a composer, known for Voice in the Wind (1944), The Hairy Ape (1944) and Lured (1947). He died on 28 December 1995 in Los Angeles, California, USA.musical director- Cinematographer
- Camera and Electrical Department
Descended from a wealthy family of landowners in what was then Austria-Hungary, Franz Planer understood the importance of photography as an art form early in his life. He first stood behind the camera as a portrait photographer, working out of Vienna from 1910. He soon branched out, filming newsreels in Paris and, in 1919, joined the growing German film industry as chief cameraman for Emelka (which became Bavaria Studios in 1932), in Munich. During the 1920s and early 1930's, he acquired a reputation for style, having worked as cinematographer for such distinguished directors as F.W. Murnau and Wilhelm Thiele, most of his films being commercially popular entertainments.
Anticipating the "Anschluss" - the forcible annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler - Planer left Austria in 1937 and, using the pseudonym Frank F. Planer, sought work in Hollywood. He joined the American Society of Cinematorgaphers and was signed under contract at Columbia from 1938-45, and, again, from 1949-50 (in between working at Universal from 1947-49), filming in a variety of different genres. At this stage in his career, he often used real-life locations and shot primarily in black-and-white, in almost semi-documentary style. Like other European cinematographers, he was heavily influenced by German expressionism and used chiaroscuro lighting and stark contrasts between light and shade to achieve thematic mood requirements - particularly for films noir, such as Criss Cross (1949) and 711 Ocean Drive (1950). Planer's creative collaboration with director Max Ophüls is frequently cited as among his best work, notably the melancholic romantic drama Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948).
During the 1950s Planer was much in demand and used by many of Hollywood's top directors, including Robert Siodmak, John Huston, Edward Dmytryk and Stanley Kramer. Increasingly comfortable with color photography from 1954, Planer worked on several A-grade productions. He created a particularly realistic feel for The Caine Mutiny (1954) and The Nun's Story (1959) by utilizing sparse, functional interiors. Unusual camera angles/perspectives, tracking shots and objects inserted between camera and subject contributed to the look of the popular Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961). Planer never won an Academy Award, though he was nominated five times: for Champion (1949), Death of a Salesman (1951), Roman Holiday (1953), The Nun's Story (1959) and The Children's Hour (1961).director of photography- Actor
- Director
- Producer
Effective light comedian of '30s and '40s films and '50s and '60s TV series, Robert Cummings was renowned for his eternally youthful looks (which he attributed to a strict vitamin and health-food diet). He was educated at Carnegie Tech and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Deciding that Broadway producers would be more interested in an upper-crust Englishman than a kid from Joplin, Missouri, Cummings passed himself off as Blade Stanhope Conway, British actor. The ploy was successful. Cummings decided that if it worked on Broadway, it would work in Hollywood, so he journeyed west and assumed the identity of a rich Texan named Bruce Hutchens. The plan worked once more, and he began securing small parts in films. He soon reverted to his real name and became a popular leading man in light comedies, usually playing well-meaning, pleasant but somewhat bumbling young men. He achieved much more success, however, in his own television series in the '50s, The Bob Cummings Show (1955) and My Living Doll (1964).plays lead role of Chuck Scott- A classic beauty, blonde French actress Michèle Morgan was one of her country's most popular leading ladies for over five decades. Born Simone Renee Roussel on Leap Year Day (February 29) in 1920, she ran away from home as a teenager and studied acting under René Simon, beginning her film career at 16 working as a film extra to pay for drama classes.
The young actress soon caught the eye of director Marc Allégret, who cast her in Heart of Paris (1937), which clinched her stardom. Her remote, enigmatic features and gloomy allure had audiences comparing her to a young Greta Garbo. She went on to appear elegantly opposite Charles Boyer in the drama Orage (1938) directed by Allegret; opposite Jean Gabin in Moth and the Flame (1938) directed by Marcel Carné, as well as both Coral Reefs (1939) and Remorques (1941). She had her first top-billed roles in L'entraîneuse (1939) and La loi du nord (1939).
Michèle's eventual fled war-torn France for Hollywood and earned roles based purely on her European prestige. She did not stand out among the other female foreign imports of that time, however, such as Ingrid Bergman. Cast in rather routine sultry roles amid WWII surroundings, she received only a modest reception for such US-based films as Joan of Paris (1942) with Paul Henreid; Two Tickets to London (1943) with Alan Curtis; Passage to Marseille (1944) opposite Humphrey Bogart; and the noirish The Chase (1946) starring Robert Cummings.
Michèle succeeded much better at home continuing prolifically in such films as The Proud and the Beautiful (1953), The Moment of Truth (1952), Oasis (1955), The Grand Maneuver (1955), Shadow of the Guillotine (1956) (as Marie Antoinette), Grand Hotel (1959), Bluebeard (1963), Web of Fear (1964), The Diary of an Innocent Boy (1968) and Cat and Mouse (1975). Back in the late 1940's, she received the very first Cannes Film Festival award for "best actress" for her touching performance as the blind heroine in Pastoral Symphony (1946). She also received an honorary Cesar Award in 1992.
Married during the war and early post-war years (1942-1949) to American actor/singer William Marshall, Michèle's second husband was handsome Gallic star Henri Vidal and they appeared together in a couple of films, including both the historical drama Fabiola (1949) and romantic drama La belle que voilà (1950), plus The Seven Deadly Sins (1952) (albeit different "sin" segments) and Napoleon (1955). Following Vidal's sudden death of a heart at age 40 in 1959, the actress married a third time one year later to well-known French actor/writer/director Gérard Oury. They had unbilled cameos in A Man and a Woman: 20 Years Later (1986). She was left a widow in 2006.
Semi-retired by the 1970's, Michèle's last feature film was a small bit in the Marcello Mastroianni film Everybody's Fine (1990). She retired in 1999 after a few sporadic 90's TV parts. She died in her home town of Hauts-de-Seine, France on December 20, 2016, at age 96.plays role of Lorna Roman - Actor
- Director
- Writer
Born Robert Alexander Cochran, son of a California lumberman, he worked mostly in the theatre before landing a contract with Samuel Goldwyn in 1945. His debut was Wonder Man (1945) with Virginia Mayo and Danny Kaye. From 1949 to 1952, he was signed to Warner Brothers, then started up his own production company. In 1965, he sailed off in his yacht to Guatemala to look for suitable filming locations but died of a lung infection before reaching land.plays husband Eddie Roman- Actor
- Soundtrack
Don Wilson was born in Lincoln, Nebraska. Not much is known about his early life but what is known is that he played football for the University of Colorado in the 1920s. Wilson began his radio career as a singer in Denver's radio station, KFEL, in 1923. In 1929, he started working at radio station KFI in Los Angeles, California.
In the summer of 1932, Wilson worked as a sportscaster, covering the opening of the 1932 Summer Olympics games and, in the early part of 1934, Wilson was working as the announcer on George Gershwin's series, "Music by Gershwin", when Jack Benny heard him on the radio and insisted that he come to work for him and, on 6 April 1934, Wilson made his first broadcast as Benny's announcer in his live radio show, that started a relationship with Benny that lasted for over thirty years.
Wilson was a "portly man" with a deep resonating voice and a robust figure that made him very popular with sponsors as, in the early days of radio, the show's announcer read the commercial pitches for the sponsors and the sponsors believes a deep voice was more agreeable to the audience. Being a good business man, Wilson always made sure his contracts allowed him to freelance and take on other endeavors, and he did just that, as in 1946, Wilson was a regular on the daytime comedy, "Glamour Manor" (1946). He also worked as an announcer for variety shows and comedy radio programs. In 1950, Jack Benny made the move to television and Wilson made the move as well, until 1965, when The Jack Benny Program (1950) ended.
In 1966, Wilson made his last television appearance on the Batman (1966) TV series (1966-1968) episode, Dizzoner the Penguin (1966), where he played the uncredited role of newscaster "Walter Klondike", a spoof of Walter Cronkite. From 1968 until the mid-1970s, Wilson and his wife hosted a television show called "Town Talk" in the Palm Springs area and he continued to do interviews on radio and television whenever the topic was about Jack Benny or old time radio (He was considered a authority on both).
Don Wilson died of a stroke on April 25, 1982 at age 81 in Cathedral City, California. He was survived by his wife of over 30 years, radio actress Lois Corbett.plays the role of Fats- Actor
- Writer
- Director
Peter Lorre was born László Löwenstein in Rózsahegy in the Slovak area of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the son of Hungarian Jewish parents. He learned both Hungarian and German languages from birth, and was educated in elementary and secondary schools in the Austria-Hungary capitol Vienna, but did not complete. As a youth he ran away from home, first working as a bank clerk, and after stage training in Vienna, Austria, made his acting debut at age 17 in 1922 in Zurich, Switzerland. He traveled for several years acting on stage throughout his home region, Vienna, Berlin, and Zurich, including working with Bertolt Brecht, until Fritz Lang cast him in a starring role as the psychopathic child killer in the German film M (1931).
After several more films in Germany, including a couple roles for which he learned to speak French, Lorre left as the Nazis came to power, going first to Paris where he made one film, then London where Alfred Hitchcock cast him as a creepy villain in The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934), where he learned his lines phonetically, and finally arrived in Hollywood in 1935. In his first two roles there he starred as a mad scientist in Mad Love (1935) directed by recent fellow-expatriate Karl Freund, and the leading part of Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment (1935), by another expatriate German director Josef von Sternberg, a successful movie made at Lorre's own suggestion. He returned to England for a role in another Hitchcock film, Secret Agent (1936), then back to the US for a few more films before checking into a rehab facility to cure himself of a morphine addiction.
After shaking his addiction, in order to get any kind of acting work, Lorre reluctantly accepted the starring part as the Japanese secret agent in Thank You, Mr. Moto (1937), wearing makeup to alter his already very round eyes for the part. He ended up committed to repeating the role for eight more "Mr. Moto" movies over the next two years.
Lorre played numerous memorable villain roles, spy characters, comedic roles, and even a romantic type, throughout the 1940s, beginning with his graduation from 30s B-pictures The Maltese Falcon (1941). Among his most famous films, Casablanca (1942), and a comedic role in the Broadway hit film Arsenic and Old Lace (1944).
After the war, between 1946 and '49 Lorre concentrated largely on radio and the stage, while continuing to appear in movies. In Autumn 1950 he traveled to West Gemany where he wrote, directed and starred in the critically acclaimed but generally unknown German-language film The Lost Man (1951), adapted from Lorre's own novel.
Lorre returned to the US in 1952, somewhat heavier in stature, where he used his abilities as a stage actor appearing in many live television productions throughout the 50s, including the first James Bond adaptation Casino Royale (1954), broadcast just a few months after Ian Fleming had published that first Bond novel. In that decade, Lorre had various roles, often to type but also as comedic caricatures of himself, in many episodes of TV series, and variety shows, though he continued to work in motion pictures, including the Academy Award winning Around the World in 80 Days (1956), and a stellar role as a clown in The Big Circus (1959).
In the late 50s and early 1960s he worked in several low-budget films, with producer-director Roger Corman, and producer-writer-director Irwin Allen, including the aforementioned The Big Circus and two adventurous Disney movies with Allen. He died from a stroke the year he made his last movie, playing a stooge in Jerry Lewis' The Patsy (1964).plays role of Gino