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| Douglas
Sirk |
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| Director |
| 1900 - 1987 |
| Born April 26,
Hamburg, Germany |
| Key
Production Country: USA
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Key Genres: Drama,
Melodrama, Romance, Family Drama, Adventure, War Drama |
| Key
Collaborators: Alexander
Golitzen (Production Designer), Ross Hunter (Producer), Russell Metty
(Cinematographer), Rock Hudson (Leading Player), Frank Skinner
(Composer), Russell Schoengarth (Editor), Joseph Gershenson (Composer), Bernard Herzbrun (Production Designer), Milton
Carruth (Editor), William Reynolds (Leading
Character Player) |
| Highly
Recommended: Sleep
My Love (1948), Magnificent
Obsession (1954), All That Heaven Allows (1955), There's Always Tomorrow
(1956), Written on the Wind (1956), The Tarnished Angels (1957),
Imitation of Life (1959) |
| Recommended:
Shockproof (1949), Thunder
on the Hill (1951), Has Anybody Seen My Gal? (1952), All I Desire
(1953), Interlude (1957) |
| Links: [
IMDB ] [
TCMDB ] [ All-Movie
Guide ] [ Senses
of Cinema: Great Directors ] [
Film Reference ]
[ Bright
Lights Feature on Sirks' Imitation of Life ] [ Images
Feature ] [ Henry
Sheehan Essay ] [ Bright
Lights Film Journal Feature (2005) ] [
Boston Phoenix Article ] [
Chicago Reader
Article (2006) ] [
Screening the Past Article (2007) ] |
| Books: [
Melodrama
and Meaning: History, Culture and the Films of Douglas Sirk ] [
Sirk
on Sirk ] [
Imitation of Life ] |
| DVD's:
[ Amazon
] |
| 1,000
Greatest Films: All That Heaven Allows (1955), There's Always
Tomorrow (1956), Written on the Wind (1956), The Tarnished Angels
(1957), Imitation of Life (1959) |
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"Most of
the projects assigned to him were unpromising in content and
miniscule in budget. He was often forced to contend with
ridiculous scripts, ranging in genre from thriller to maudlin
soap operas. That he managed to overcome the handicap and end up
with a good number of thoroughly enjoyable films is a tribute to
his personal taste and the formal excellence of his visual style." -
(The
MacMillan International Film Encyclopedia, 1994) |
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"Time,
if nothing else, will vindicate Douglas Sirk as it has already
vindicated Josef von Sternberg.
Formal excellence and visual wit are seldom as appreciated at
first glance as are the topical sensations of the hour. One big
obstacle to an appreciation of his oeuvre is an inbred
prejudice to what Raymond Durgnat has called the genre of the
female weepies as opposed to the male weepies. - Andrew
Sarris (The American Cinema, 1968) |
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"Though
the erudite Sirk worked in the intellectually disreputable realm
of the melodrama, his alertness to the injustices underlying the
American Dream and his commitment to underdog characters made
for heart-rending, thought-provoking cinema." - Geoff
Andrew (The Director's Vision, 1999) |
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"Stylish melodramas form the core of Sirk's reputation, but he
lensed suspense films, costume dramas, comedies, and even
Westerns with flair." -
William R. Meyer (The Film Buff's Catalog, 1978) |
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"So slowly
in my mind formed the idea of melodrama, a form I found to
perfection in American pictures. They were naive, they were that
something completely different. They were completely Art-less."
- Douglas Sirk |
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"If I can
say one thing for my pictures, it is a certain craftsmanship. A
thought which has gone into every angle. There is nothing there
without an optical reason." -
Douglas Sirk |
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