Joe Camp, the writer, director and producer who taught that old dog Hollywood new tricks about animal movies as the creative force behind the 1974 franchise-spawning Benji, has died. He was 84.
Camp died Friday morning at his home in Bell Buckle, Tennessee, following a long illness, his son, filmmaker Brandon Camp, told The Hollywood Reporter.
Camp also directed and co-wrote the comedies Hawmps! (1976), about the U.S. Cavalry replacing horses with camels in the 1850s, and The Double McGuffin (1979), which revolved around kids trying to thwart a terrorist (Ernest Borgnine) and featured lots of in-jokes about Hitchcock movies.
Other than serving as an extra on the Robert Mitchum-starring Home From the Hill (1960), Camp had no Hollywood experience when he raised about $500,000 to make Benji, a story about a stray mixed breed — not a fancy pure breed like Lassie! — who helps rescue two youngsters from kidnappers.
Crucial to the movie’s success,...
Camp died Friday morning at his home in Bell Buckle, Tennessee, following a long illness, his son, filmmaker Brandon Camp, told The Hollywood Reporter.
Camp also directed and co-wrote the comedies Hawmps! (1976), about the U.S. Cavalry replacing horses with camels in the 1850s, and The Double McGuffin (1979), which revolved around kids trying to thwart a terrorist (Ernest Borgnine) and featured lots of in-jokes about Hitchcock movies.
Other than serving as an extra on the Robert Mitchum-starring Home From the Hill (1960), Camp had no Hollywood experience when he raised about $500,000 to make Benji, a story about a stray mixed breed — not a fancy pure breed like Lassie! — who helps rescue two youngsters from kidnappers.
Crucial to the movie’s success,...
- 3/15/2024
- by Mike Barnes
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The devilishly charming, rugged Robert Mitchum made a name for himself with a number of classics spanning many genres, most notably noirs, westerns, war dramas and crime thrillers. But how many of his titles stand the test of time? In honor of his birthday, let’s take a look back at 20 of his greatest films, ranked worst to best.
Born in 1917 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Mitchum cut his teeth in a number of bit parts before landing his star-making turn in “The Story of G.I. Joe” (1945), playing an army captain in WWII. The film brought him his sole Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor and solidified his screen persona as a world-weary, hardbitten antihero.
Mitchum found his greatest success in film noirs, where his cynical, playfully ironic demeanor proved a perfect match for the ultra-dark genre. Whether playing the hero in “Out of the Past” (1947) or the villain in “The Night of the Hunter...
Born in 1917 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Mitchum cut his teeth in a number of bit parts before landing his star-making turn in “The Story of G.I. Joe” (1945), playing an army captain in WWII. The film brought him his sole Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor and solidified his screen persona as a world-weary, hardbitten antihero.
Mitchum found his greatest success in film noirs, where his cynical, playfully ironic demeanor proved a perfect match for the ultra-dark genre. Whether playing the hero in “Out of the Past” (1947) or the villain in “The Night of the Hunter...
- 7/29/2023
- by Zach Laws and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
As 2021 mercifully winds down, the Criterion Channel have a (November) lineup that marks one of their most diverse selections in some time—films by the new masters Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Garrett Bradley, Dan Sallitt’s Fourteen (one of 2020’s best films) couched in a fantastic retrospective, and Criterion editions of old favorites.
Fourteen is featured in “Between Us Girls: Bonds Between Women,” which also includes Céline and Julie, The Virgin Suicides, and Yvonne Rainer’s Privilege. Of equal note are Criterion editions for Ghost World, Night of the Hunter, and (just in time for del Toro’s spin) Nightmare Alley—all stacked releases in their own right.
See the full list of October titles below and more on the Criterion Channel.
300 Nassau, Marina Lameiro, 2015
5 Card Stud, Henry Hathaway, 1968
Alone, Garrett Bradley, 2017
Álvaro, Daniel Wilson, Elizabeth Warren, Alexandra Lazarowich, and Chloe Zimmerman, 2015
America, Garrett Bradley, 2019
Angel Face, Otto Preminger, 1953
Angels Wear White,...
Fourteen is featured in “Between Us Girls: Bonds Between Women,” which also includes Céline and Julie, The Virgin Suicides, and Yvonne Rainer’s Privilege. Of equal note are Criterion editions for Ghost World, Night of the Hunter, and (just in time for del Toro’s spin) Nightmare Alley—all stacked releases in their own right.
See the full list of October titles below and more on the Criterion Channel.
300 Nassau, Marina Lameiro, 2015
5 Card Stud, Henry Hathaway, 1968
Alone, Garrett Bradley, 2017
Álvaro, Daniel Wilson, Elizabeth Warren, Alexandra Lazarowich, and Chloe Zimmerman, 2015
America, Garrett Bradley, 2019
Angel Face, Otto Preminger, 1953
Angels Wear White,...
- 10/25/2021
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
The opening of “The Domain” is a classic mid-length widescreen shot of a solitary tree silhouetted against the sky. The camera slowly pans left to reveal a second tree, with a man hanging from a branch. This too feels fairly familiar, if disturbing, and one watches imagining that director Tiago Guedes is using such archetypal images to then play with the form, or do something unusual with the subsequent nearly three-hour running time. Instead, his sprawling family epic spanning from 1946 to 1991 largely shifts from the derivative to the banal. Designed like a meaty novel in which Portugal’s political fortunes impact a privileged family of landowners,
Guedes (“Noise”) points to Westerns and some melodramas like Vincente Minnelli’s “Home From the Hill” as major influences, which demonstrably act as templates with added political overtones. Certainly the way the tug-of-war between dictatorship, revolution and capitalism batters the independent-minded Fernandes family does...
Guedes (“Noise”) points to Westerns and some melodramas like Vincente Minnelli’s “Home From the Hill” as major influences, which demonstrably act as templates with added political overtones. Certainly the way the tug-of-war between dictatorship, revolution and capitalism batters the independent-minded Fernandes family does...
- 9/5/2019
- by Jay Weissberg
- Variety Film + TV
Robert Mitchum would’ve celebrated his 102nd birthday on August 6, 2019. The devilishly charming, rugged leading man made a name for himself with a number of classics spanning many genres, most notably noirs, westerns, war dramas and crime thrillers. But how many of his titles stand the test of time? In honor of his birthday, let’s take a look back at 20 of his greatest films, ranked worst to best.
SEEOscar Best Supporting Actor Gallery: Every Winner in Academy Award History
Born in 1917 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Mitchum cut his teeth in a number of bit parts before landing his star-making turn in “The Story of G.I. Joe” (1945), playing an army captain in WWII. The film brought him his sole Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor and solidified his screen persona as a world-weary, hardbitten antihero.
Mitchum found his greatest success in film noirs, where his cynical, playfully ironic demeanor proved...
SEEOscar Best Supporting Actor Gallery: Every Winner in Academy Award History
Born in 1917 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Mitchum cut his teeth in a number of bit parts before landing his star-making turn in “The Story of G.I. Joe” (1945), playing an army captain in WWII. The film brought him his sole Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor and solidified his screen persona as a world-weary, hardbitten antihero.
Mitchum found his greatest success in film noirs, where his cynical, playfully ironic demeanor proved...
- 8/6/2019
- by Zach Laws and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
He-bull womanizer Robert Mitchum spars with wife Eleanor Parker for the future of their son George Hamilton in Vincente Minnelli’s attractive, sprawling tale of cruel family unrest. The real winners in the picture are the fresh-faced George Peppard and Luana Patten, whose small-town romance is more interesting than the main bout.
Home from the Hill
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1960 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 150 min. / Street Date August 14, 2018 / available through the WBshop / 21.99
Starring: Robert Mitchum, Eleanor Parker, George Peppard, George Hamilton, Everett Sloane, Luana Patten, Constance Ford, Ray Teal, Bill Hickman, Denver Pyle, Stuart Randall, Dub Taylor, Guinn ‘Big Boy’ Williams.
Cinematography: Milton Krasner
Film Editor: Harold F. Kress
Original Music: Bronislau Kaper
Written by Harriet Frank Jr., Irving Ravetch from the novel by William Humphrey
Produced by Edmund Grainger, Sol C. Siegel
Directed by Vincente Minnelli
Two and a half hours for a dramatic film was considered long in 1960, but...
Home from the Hill
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1960 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 150 min. / Street Date August 14, 2018 / available through the WBshop / 21.99
Starring: Robert Mitchum, Eleanor Parker, George Peppard, George Hamilton, Everett Sloane, Luana Patten, Constance Ford, Ray Teal, Bill Hickman, Denver Pyle, Stuart Randall, Dub Taylor, Guinn ‘Big Boy’ Williams.
Cinematography: Milton Krasner
Film Editor: Harold F. Kress
Original Music: Bronislau Kaper
Written by Harriet Frank Jr., Irving Ravetch from the novel by William Humphrey
Produced by Edmund Grainger, Sol C. Siegel
Directed by Vincente Minnelli
Two and a half hours for a dramatic film was considered long in 1960, but...
- 8/4/2018
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Robert Mitchum ca. late 1940s. Robert Mitchum movies 'The Yakuza,' 'Ryan's Daughter' on TCM Today, Aug. 12, '15, Turner Classic Movies' “Summer Under the Stars” series is highlighting the career of Robert Mitchum. Two of the films being shown this evening are The Yakuza and Ryan's Daughter. The former is one of the disappointingly few TCM premieres this month. (See TCM's Robert Mitchum movie schedule further below.) Despite his film noir background, Robert Mitchum was a somewhat unusual choice to star in The Yakuza (1975), a crime thriller set in the Japanese underworld. Ryan's Daughter or no, Mitchum hadn't been a box office draw in quite some time; in the mid-'70s, one would have expected a Warner Bros. release directed by Sydney Pollack – who had recently handled the likes of Jane Fonda, Barbra Streisand, and Robert Redford – to star someone like Jack Nicholson or Al Pacino or Dustin Hoffman.
- 8/13/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Versatile actor best known for her roles in The Sound of Music and Of Human Bondage
In the Hollywood of the 1940s and 50s, when typecasting was an essential constituent of stardom, Eleanor Parker, who has died aged 91, never gained the recognition she deserved, because she refused to be pigeonholed. "It means I've been successful in creating the characters that I've portrayed – that I'm not just a personality who is seen in a variety of roles." Dana Andrews, her co-star in Madison Avenue (1962), called her "the least heralded great actress".
The 1957 film Lizzie is almost a reflection of her career. Parker plays three separate and distinct characters harboured inside one woman – the shy, self-effacing Elizabeth; the wanton, raunchy Lizzie; and the "normal" Beth – and switches brilliantly from one to the other. Parker was always able to be convincing in these three sorts of characters. She was naive as the girl...
In the Hollywood of the 1940s and 50s, when typecasting was an essential constituent of stardom, Eleanor Parker, who has died aged 91, never gained the recognition she deserved, because she refused to be pigeonholed. "It means I've been successful in creating the characters that I've portrayed – that I'm not just a personality who is seen in a variety of roles." Dana Andrews, her co-star in Madison Avenue (1962), called her "the least heralded great actress".
The 1957 film Lizzie is almost a reflection of her career. Parker plays three separate and distinct characters harboured inside one woman – the shy, self-effacing Elizabeth; the wanton, raunchy Lizzie; and the "normal" Beth – and switches brilliantly from one to the other. Parker was always able to be convincing in these three sorts of characters. She was naive as the girl...
- 12/11/2013
- by Ronald Bergan
- The Guardian - Film News
Most people probably know versatile character actress Eleanor Parker, who died on December 9 at age 91, from classic big-screen musical "The Sound of Music." She played the platinum blonde Baroness, who isn't slow to pick up on Christopher Plummer's Captain Von Trapp's true feelings for governess Maria (Julie Andrews). TCM is rolling out an entire Parker retrospective to celebrate her career on December 17, so viewers can become better acquainted, or reacquainted, with her body of work. Check out the lineup, below, plus an obit roundup.The following is a complete schedule of TCM's tribute to Eleanor Parker:Tuesday, Dec. 176 a.m. – The Very Thought of You (1944)7:45 a.m. – Of Human Bondage (1946)9:45 a.m – The Woman in White (1948)11:45 p.m. – Caged (1950)1:30 p.m. – Scaramouche (1952)3:30 p.m. – Interrupted Melody (1955)5:15 p.m. – Home from the Hill (1960)Here's TCM's obit:a remarkably versatile leading lady of the 1940s and '50s,...
- 12/10/2013
- by Beth Hanna
- Thompson on Hollywood
Eleanor Parker today: Beautiful as ever in Scaramouche, Interrupted Melody Eleanor Parker, who turns 91 in ten days (June 26, 2013), can be seen at her most radiantly beautiful in several films Turner Classic Movies is showing this evening and tomorrow morning as part of their Star of the Month Eleanor Parker "tribute." Among them are the classic Scaramouche, the politically delicate Above and Beyond, and the biopic Interrupted Melody, which earned Parker her third and final Best Actress Academy Award nomination. (Photo: publicity shot of Eleanor Parker in Scaramouche.) The best of the lot is probably George Sidney’s balletic Scaramouche (1952), in which Eleanor Parker plays one of Stewart Granger’s love interests — the other one is Janet Leigh. A loose remake of Rex Ingram’s 1923 blockbuster, the George Sidney version features plenty of humor, romance, and adventure; vibrant colors (cinematography by Charles Rosher); an elaborately staged climactic swordfight; and tough dudes...
- 6/18/2013
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Above: The Penn Station set for The Clock.
"Loving evaluation of texture, the screen being filled as a window is dressed in a swank department store." —Orson Welles
If we accept Raymond Durgnat's theory that in cinema, landscape is the equation of the state of the soul and architecture constitutes an X-ray photograph of the heroes'1, then Minnelli's films, especially musicals and melodramas, can be described as full-color X-ray photography of the inner universe of his characters, with a particular interest in artists, daydreamers, painters and dancers.
Minnelli's films generally happen in strange places. In his musicals the absence of modern urban life (unlike Stanley Donen, for instance) is noticeable. The real is recreated by studio-manufactured settings, where also the unreal, the fantasy, takes place. Minnelli's films are the encounter of two worlds, two parallel lines, which in reality never happen to cross each other. Although it is true that...
"Loving evaluation of texture, the screen being filled as a window is dressed in a swank department store." —Orson Welles
If we accept Raymond Durgnat's theory that in cinema, landscape is the equation of the state of the soul and architecture constitutes an X-ray photograph of the heroes'1, then Minnelli's films, especially musicals and melodramas, can be described as full-color X-ray photography of the inner universe of his characters, with a particular interest in artists, daydreamers, painters and dancers.
Minnelli's films generally happen in strange places. In his musicals the absence of modern urban life (unlike Stanley Donen, for instance) is noticeable. The real is recreated by studio-manufactured settings, where also the unreal, the fantasy, takes place. Minnelli's films are the encounter of two worlds, two parallel lines, which in reality never happen to cross each other. Although it is true that...
- 5/4/2012
- MUBI
She hasn't made a documentary for four years but the BFI's release of a collection of her documentaries is still an event
She hasn't made a documentary for four years but today's BFI release of a collection of Molly Dineen's documentaries is still an event. Since the BBC bought Home from the Hill, her film school documentary about an elderly British cavalry officer returning to the UK in the mid-1980s after a lifetime spent on the ebbing tide of empire, she has quietly watched the impact of change on individuals. At least that's what she would say she has done, but it only partly describes her work. Her most recent films, on the final days of the old House of Lords, and on the death of (and on) the small farm, belong in that category. But The Ark, about London Zoo as it all but fell apart, and...
She hasn't made a documentary for four years but today's BFI release of a collection of Molly Dineen's documentaries is still an event. Since the BBC bought Home from the Hill, her film school documentary about an elderly British cavalry officer returning to the UK in the mid-1980s after a lifetime spent on the ebbing tide of empire, she has quietly watched the impact of change on individuals. At least that's what she would say she has done, but it only partly describes her work. Her most recent films, on the final days of the old House of Lords, and on the death of (and on) the small farm, belong in that category. But The Ark, about London Zoo as it all but fell apart, and...
- 12/5/2011
- The Guardian - Film News
They win awards and critical acclaim – but are in-depth documentaries under threat? Mark Lawson talks to film-makers about risk-taking, total immersion and the cult of celebrity
Is this a good time for factual film-making? It depends on your definitions of fact and film. There are executives and directors who complain that there are too few documentaries on television these days; and yet programmes from Brian Cox's The Wonders of the Universe to My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding have large and enthusiastic audiences. The problem is that what traditionalists mean by documentary (Adam Curtis's new series) is quite different from the star vehicles and "constructed reality" shows (Made in Chelsea, The Only Way is Essex) that are currently popular.
The past decade has also seen a big increase in the number of documentaries made for cinema. The success of Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine (2002) and Morgan Spurlock's...
Is this a good time for factual film-making? It depends on your definitions of fact and film. There are executives and directors who complain that there are too few documentaries on television these days; and yet programmes from Brian Cox's The Wonders of the Universe to My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding have large and enthusiastic audiences. The problem is that what traditionalists mean by documentary (Adam Curtis's new series) is quite different from the star vehicles and "constructed reality" shows (Made in Chelsea, The Only Way is Essex) that are currently popular.
The past decade has also seen a big increase in the number of documentaries made for cinema. The success of Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine (2002) and Morgan Spurlock's...
- 5/26/2011
- by Mark Lawson
- The Guardian - Film News
Enter The Void
DVD, e-one
Confessions
DVD & Blu-ray, Third Window
Honestly, you wait ages for a film to arrive that pushes the limits of what cinema can achieve, and then two arrive at once.
Employing film-making tricks in interesting, unfamiliar and creative ways, both of these movies have the potential to infuriate and confuse as many viewers as they'll delight. First off is Gaspar Noé's Enter The Void, where the Tibetan book of the dead is first summarised by one character then played out by another as we follow the spirit of a dead drug dealer around Tokyo. Few things are as dull as watching or listening to someone's drug story so Noé makes the viewer feel like they are the one on mind-altering substances with the help of weird lenses, dizzying camera moves and CGI (the film also makes nods to Kubrick's 2001 and even Disney's Tron). Extras include...
DVD, e-one
Confessions
DVD & Blu-ray, Third Window
Honestly, you wait ages for a film to arrive that pushes the limits of what cinema can achieve, and then two arrive at once.
Employing film-making tricks in interesting, unfamiliar and creative ways, both of these movies have the potential to infuriate and confuse as many viewers as they'll delight. First off is Gaspar Noé's Enter The Void, where the Tibetan book of the dead is first summarised by one character then played out by another as we follow the spirit of a dead drug dealer around Tokyo. Few things are as dull as watching or listening to someone's drug story so Noé makes the viewer feel like they are the one on mind-altering substances with the help of weird lenses, dizzying camera moves and CGI (the film also makes nods to Kubrick's 2001 and even Disney's Tron). Extras include...
- 4/22/2011
- by Phelim O'Neill
- The Guardian - Film News
The title of Lee Server’s acclaimed 2002 biography, Robert Mitchum: Baby I Don’t Care (MacMillan), offers a perfect encapsulization of the eponymous actor: a hard-partying Hollywood Bad Boy who didn’t give a damn what moralizing finger-waggers thought of him, or what his peers in the movie business thought, or the press, or even the public. He was going to go his own way and to hell with you, and anyone positioning themselves to make strong objection was just as likely to get a punch in the nose as shown the actor’s broad back. He worked hardest at conveying the idea that the thing he did for a living – acting – was also the thing he cared least about; an impression that may have been his most convincing performance.
The Bad Boy part of Mitchum’s reputation was honestly come by. As a youth, he’d been booted from more than one school,...
The Bad Boy part of Mitchum’s reputation was honestly come by. As a youth, he’d been booted from more than one school,...
- 2/28/2011
- by Bill Mesce
- SoundOnSight
Irving Ravetch, who with Harriet Frank Jr. formed one of the great husband-and-wife screenwriting teams in Hollywood history, died Sunday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles after a lingering illness. He was 89.
Ravetch and Frank shared Academy Award nominations for their adapted screenplays for "Hud" (1963) and "Norma Rae" (1979), which contributed to Oscar wins for actresses Patricia Neal and Sally Field, respectively.
The couple teamed on 18 other films, many of which are regarded as some of the finest Hollywood films produced during the 1960s, '70s and '80s, including "The Sound and the Fury" (1959), "The Dark at the Top of the Stairs" (1960), "Home From the Hill" (1960), "The Long Hot Summer" (1965), "Hombre" (1967), "The Rievers" (1969), "The Cowboys" (1972), "Conrack" (1974) and "Murphy's Romance" (1985).
In 1988, Ravetch and Frank were awarded the WGA's Laurel Award for Screen Writing Achievement. In addition to co-writing "Hud," "Hombre" and "The Rievers," Ravetch served as a producer on those films.
Ravetch and Frank shared Academy Award nominations for their adapted screenplays for "Hud" (1963) and "Norma Rae" (1979), which contributed to Oscar wins for actresses Patricia Neal and Sally Field, respectively.
The couple teamed on 18 other films, many of which are regarded as some of the finest Hollywood films produced during the 1960s, '70s and '80s, including "The Sound and the Fury" (1959), "The Dark at the Top of the Stairs" (1960), "Home From the Hill" (1960), "The Long Hot Summer" (1965), "Hombre" (1967), "The Rievers" (1969), "The Cowboys" (1972), "Conrack" (1974) and "Murphy's Romance" (1985).
In 1988, Ravetch and Frank were awarded the WGA's Laurel Award for Screen Writing Achievement. In addition to co-writing "Hud," "Hombre" and "The Rievers," Ravetch served as a producer on those films.
- 9/20/2010
- by By Mike Barnes
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Fifty years ago, the Palme d'Or winner at Cannes was Fellini's "La Dolce Vita." More every year I realize that it was the film of my lifetime. But indulge me while I list some more titles.
The other entries in the official competition included "Ballad of a Soldier," by Grigori Chukhrai; "Lady with a Dog," by Iosif Kheifits; "Home from the Hill," by Vincente Minnelli; "The Virgin Spring," by Ingmar Bergman;" "Kagi," by Kon Ichikawa; "L'Avventura," by Michelangelo Antonioni; "Le Trou," by Jacques Becker; "Never on Sunday," by Jules Dassin; "Sons and Lovers," by Jack Cardiff; "The Savage Innocents," by Nicholas Ray, and "The Young One," by Luis Bunuel.
And many more. But I am not here at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival to mourn the present and praise the past.
Cannes is still the most important annual event in the world of what some of us consider good cinema. The...
The other entries in the official competition included "Ballad of a Soldier," by Grigori Chukhrai; "Lady with a Dog," by Iosif Kheifits; "Home from the Hill," by Vincente Minnelli; "The Virgin Spring," by Ingmar Bergman;" "Kagi," by Kon Ichikawa; "L'Avventura," by Michelangelo Antonioni; "Le Trou," by Jacques Becker; "Never on Sunday," by Jules Dassin; "Sons and Lovers," by Jack Cardiff; "The Savage Innocents," by Nicholas Ray, and "The Young One," by Luis Bunuel.
And many more. But I am not here at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival to mourn the present and praise the past.
Cannes is still the most important annual event in the world of what some of us consider good cinema. The...
- 5/13/2010
- by Roger Ebert
- blogs.suntimes.com/ebert
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