| |
|
Victor Fleming |
|
Director / Producer |
 |
|
1883 - 1949 |
|
Born February 23,
Pasadena, California, USA |
|
Key Production Country: USA |
|
Key Genres:
Romance, Drama, Romantic Drama, Melodrama |
|
Key
Collaborators: Cedric
Gibbons (Production Designer), John Lee Mahin (Screenwriter), Spencer
Tracy (Leading Player), Harold Rosson (Cinematographer), Lionel
Barrymore (Leading Player), Clark Gable (Leading Player), Jean Harlow
(Leading Player), Frank Morgan (Leading Character Player), Blanche
Sewell (Editor), Franz Waxman (Composer) |
|
|
Highly Recommended: The
Wizard of Oz (1939)*, Gone with the Wind (1939)* |
|
Recommended: Red
Dust (1932), Bombshell (1933) |
|
Worth a Look:
Mantrap (1926), Treasure Island (1934), Reckless (1935), Test Pilot
(1938), Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941), A Guy Named Joe (1943)** |
|
Approach with Caution:
Captains Courageous (1937), Tortilla Flat (1942) |
|
* Listed in TSPDT's
1,000 Greatest Films
section; **
Listed in TSPDT's
Ain't Nobody's Blues But My Own
section. |
|
| |
|
|
| |
|
Links: [
Amazon
] [
IMDB ] [
All-Movie
Guide ] [
Film Reference ]
[
Reel Classics ] [
Time Article (2008) ] |
|
Books: [
Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master
] |
|
|
    |
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
"Fleming's
career is an unusual one. He is credited as director for two of
the most famous Hollywood movies ever: The Wizard of Oz
(1939) and Gone with the Wind (1939). Yet his
contribution to both seems intangible: no single person seems
responsible for The Wizard of Oz, and Gone with the
Wind properly belongs to Selznick. Nevertheless, Fleming's
work on Oz has left to posterity a movie whose magic has
influenced generations of writers, artists and film-makers."
-
(The Movie Book, 1999) |
|
| |
|
|
| |
"Fleming's
work has a Jekyll and Hyde quality of its own. Within the same
year, Jekyll could turn out the raucously entertaining
Bombshell while Hyde was being heavy-handed with White
Sister... This mysterious figure probably expressed more of
Hollywood's contradictions than did most of his colleagues. Yet,
aside from
Cukor, he was the only
Metro director who could occasionally make the lion roar." -
Andrew
Sarris (The American Cinema, 1968) |
|
| |
|
|
| |
"A first-rate craftsman, and part of an expert team, Victor
Fleming happened to be at MGM at the right time to direct Gone with the Wind (1939) and The
Wizard of Oz (1939)... Actors
liked working with him, and he secured inspired performances
from Gary Cooper in The Virginian (1929), Clark Gable in
Red Dust (1933), and Spencer Tracy, who won an Academy
Award for Captains Courageous (1937)." -
Ronald Bergan (Film - Eyewitness Companions, 2006)
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
"The pace of his films is normally slow, the cinematography
picturesque, and the heroes real he-men (Treasure Island,
34; Captains Courageous, 37; Gone with the Wind,
39). Nevertheless, Fleming was one of Hollywood's best directors
of fantasy (When the Clouds Roll By, 20; The Wizard of
Oz, 39; A Guy Named Joe, 43)." -
William R. Meyer (The Film Buff's Catalog, 1978) |
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Please
note that the rating given for this director (see top-right) is based
only on the films we have seen (listed above). Films by this director
that we haven't seen include When the Clouds Roll By (1919), The Way of
All Flesh (1927) [Lost Film], The Virginian (1929), Renegades (1930),
The Wet Parade (1932), The White Sister (1933), The Farmer Takes a Wife
(1935), Adventure (1945), and Joan of Arc (1948). |
|
|
|
7+ |
| |
|
"Fleming’s
work is not unified by a particular cinematic style,
although it is coherent in thematic terms. His world is one
of male camaraderie, joyous action, pride in
professionalism, and lusty love for women who are not too
ladylike to return the same sort of feelings. In this
regard, his work is not unlike that of
Howard Hawks,
but Fleming lacked
Hawks’ ability
to
refine style and content into a unified vision. Fleming’s
name is not well known today. Although he received
directorial credit for what is possibly the most famous
movie ever made in Hollywood (Gone
with the Wind),
he is not remembered as its
director. His work
stands as an example of the best done by those directors who
worked within the studio system, allowing the film to bear
the stamp of the studio rather than any personal vision."
-
Jeanine Basinger, International
Dictionary of Film and Filmmakers |
| |
 |
| |
|
●
Top 250 Directors |
|
●
Miscellany |
|
●
Jean-Pierre Melville's 64 Favourite Pre-War
American Filmmakers (Cahiers
du Cinema, October 1961) |
|
●
501 Movie Directors: A
Comprehensive Guide to the Greatest Filmmakers |
|
|
|
See Also |
|
●
Jack Conway |
|
●
Michael Curtiz |
|
●
Cecil B. DeMille |
|
●
Allan Dwan |
|
●
John Ford |
|
●
Howard Hawks |
|
●
Mervyn LeRoy |
|
●
George Stevens |
|
●
Richard Thorpe |
|
●
W.S. Van Dyke |
|
●
King Vidor |
|
●
Raoul Walsh |
| |
|
|
|
|