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Influential Filmmakers of the 1970s: Sidney Lumet

An Actors’ Director, Meticulous Craftsman, Social Commentator

Sidney Lumet was a highly regarded and prolific film director especially during the 1970s. Since his auspicious movie directorial debut in 1957, Lumet would often direct at least one film a year. He was known for being a meticulous, technical craftsman, dynamic storyteller and for taking a collaborative approach to filmmaking. He spent time rehearsing his actors and blocking his camera shots well before filming commenced. As a result, Lumet usually brought his films in under budget. He also had a reputation for being a well-respected humanitarian who instilled a sense of realism in his most noted films, which included themes of social justice and the Jewish experience in America.

^{Sidney Lumet – Festival de Cannes 2022}

Sidney Lumet believed strongly in the importance of character development to the story. He had a reputation as an actors’ director and for getting exceptional performances from his cast. Lumet directed Ingrid Bergman, Faye Dunaway, Peter Finch and Beatrice Straight in Oscar winning performances. He also directed the following performers in Oscar nominated roles: Katharine Hepburn, Rod Steiger, Al Pacino, Albert Finney, Chris Sarandon, William Holden, Ned Beatty, Peter Firth, Richard Burton, Paul Newman, James Mason, Jane Fonda and River Phoenix.

Lumet himself was nominated four times for the Best Director Oscar and once for Best Adapted Screenplay. He was awarded a honourary Oscar in 2005. He was also nominated seven times for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures by the Directors Guild of America (DGA). The organization awarded him a DGA Honorary Life Member Award in 1989 and presented him with a Lifetime Achievement Award in 1993.

Beginnings

Sidney Lumet began his directorial career directing Off-Broadway productions and later became a highly regarded director of episodic television and TV movies in the 1950s and early 1960s. His television movies included The Dybbuk (1960), The Iceman Cometh (1960) and Rashomon (1960). He also directed episodic television including the following: Playhouse 90 (1956-1961), The United States Steel Hour (1953-1963), The DuPont Show of the Month (1957-1961), Kraft Theatre (1947-1958), Studio One (1948-1958), Goodyear Playhouse (1951-1957), The Alcoa Hour (1955-1957), The Elgin Hour (1954-1955), The Best of Broadway (1954-1955), You Are There (1953-1972), and Danger (1950-1955).

Lumet made his feature film debut with 12 Angry Men (1957) featuring Henry Fonda, Martin Balsam , Lee J. Cobb, and E.G. Marshall. Lumet was nominated for his first Best Director Oscar for the movie and the film was also nominated for Best Picture and Adapted Screenplay. Other notable films in the 1960s included: The Fugitive Kind (1960) with Marlon Brando, Anna Magnani and Joanne Woodward; A View from the Bridge (1961) with Raf Vallone, Maureen Stapleton and Carol Lawrence; Long Day’s Journey into Night (1962) with Katharine Hepburn, Ralph Richardson and Jason Robards; The Pawnbroker (1964) with Rod Steiger and Geraldine Fitzgerald; Fail Safe (1964) with Henry Fonda, Walter Matthau and Fritz Weaver; The Hill (1965) with Sean Connery, Harry Andrews and Ian Bannen; The Group (1966) with Candice Bergen, Joan Hackett and Elizabeth Hartman; The Deadly Affair (1967) with James Mason, Simone Signoret and Maximilian Schell; Bye Bye Braverman (1968) with George Segal, Jack Warden and Jessica Walter; The Sea Gull (1968) with James Mason, Vanessa Redgrave and Simone Signoret; and The Appointment (1969) with Omar Sharif and Anouk Aimée. Katharine Hepburn received her ninth Best Oscar nomination for Long Day’s Journey into Night and Rod Steiger received his first Best Actor nomination for The Pawnbroker.

Films of the Early 1970s

Sidney Lumet began with the 1970s with directing the black comedy The Last of the Mobile Hot Shots (1970) starring James Coburn, Lynn Redgrave and Robert Hooks. Based on a play by Tennessee Williams, the movie centres around a couple (Coburn and Redgrave) who marry on a game show and use the money to save the husband’s family planation in New Orleans. The movie was poorly received at the time by audiences and critics.

Lumet’s next film was the crime thriller The Anderson Tapes (1971) with Sean Connery, Dyan Cannon and Martin Balsam. Based on the best-selling novel by Lawrence Sanders, the film tells the story of a newly released criminal (Connery) who devises a robbery plan with the help of the mafia and while unknowingly being under electronic surveillance. The film did well at the box office and received mostly good reviews.

Lumet then directed the psychological thriller Child’s Play (1972) with James Mason, Robert Preston and Beau Bridges. Based on the play by Robert Marasco, a young gym teacher (Bridges) at a posh boys’ academy is caught in the middle of a dark, twisted and deadly feud between a popular English teacher (Preston) and a despised Instructor of classical languages (Mason). The film received mixed reviews when it was first released. James Mason’s performance was uniformly praised and he was nominated for Best Actor by the New York Film Critics Circle.

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Lumet’s next project was the British crime neo noir crime drama The Offence (1973) with Sean Connery, Trevor Howard, Vivien Merchant and, Ian Bannen. The film focuses on the consequences of a deadly interrogation of a suspected child molester (Bannen) by a stressed out police detective (Connery). Ian Bannen received a Best Supporting Actor BAFTA Film Award nomination for his role in the film.

Lumet had a huge critical and commercial hit with the biopic Serpico (1973) with Al Pacino, John Randolph and Jack Kehoe. Based on a true story, the film covers the life of an undercover New York City police officer (Pacino) who is working to blow the whistle on the corruption within his own police force. The movie received two Academy Award nominations for Best Adapted Screenplay and Al Pacino was nominated for Best Actor. The film was also nominated for a Best Motion Picture – Drama Golden Globe and Al Pacino won the Golden Globe for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama. The film won Best Drama Adapted from Another Medium by the Writers Guild of America (WGA). Sidney Lumet received BAFTA and DGA nominations for Best Director for the movie and Al Pacino received BAFTA, National Society of Film Critics, and New York Film Critics Circle nominations for Best Actor. He was awarded Best Actor by the National Board of Review in a tie with Robert Ryan for The Iceman Cometh (1973).

Films of the Mid 1970s

Lumet next directed the drama Lovin’ Molly (1974) with Anthony Perkins, Beau Bridges, Blythe Danner, and Susan Sarandon. Based on the novel by Larry McMurtry, the film tells the 40-year tale of the ongoing rivalry between two Texans (Perkins and Bridges) as they compete for the affections of a beautiful and independent woman (Danner) who refuses to marry them both.

Lumet had another commercial and critical hit with Murder on the Orient Express (1974) featuring an all-star cast that included Albert Finney, Lauren Bacall, Martin Balsam, Ingrid Bergman, Jacqueline Bisset, Jean-Pierre Cassel, Sean Connery, John Gielgud, Wendy Hiller, Anthony Perkins, Vanessa Redgrave, Rachel Roberts, Richard Widmark, Michael York, and Colin Blakely. Based on the novel by Agatha Christie, Hercule Poirot (Finney), a renowned Belgian detective, is stuck with other passengers on a snowbound train and ends up solving the murder of a wealthy American businessman (Widmark). The movie was nominated for six Academy awards including Best Actor (Finney), Adapted Screenplay, Cinematography, Costume Design and Original Dramatic Score. Ingrid Bergman won her third Oscar, this time for Best Supporting Actress, for the movie. Sidney Lumet received BAFTA and DGA nominations for Best Director. The movie was nominated for nine BAFTA Film Awards including Best Picture, Actor (Finney), Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design and Film Editing. Ingrid Bergman won for Best Supporting Actress and John Gielgud won for Best Supporting Actor. The film also received a Writers’ Guild of Great Britain nomination for Best British Screenplay.

Lumet had another commercial and critical hit with his next project Dog Day Afternoon (1975) with Al Pacino, John Cazale, Charles Durning, Chris Sarandon, Penelope Allen, James Broderick, Lance Henriksen, and Carol Kane. Based on a Life magazine article about a real-life crime in Brooklyn, a pair of would-be robbers (Pacino and Cazale) holds a group of bank employees hostage when their bank holdup attempt goes awry. Sidney Lumet received a Best Director Oscar nomination for the movie, as well as BAFTA, Golden Globe and DGA Best Director nominations. Lumet won the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Director. The film itself received a total of six Academy Award nominations including Best Picture, Actor (Pacino), Supporting Actor (Sarandon) and Film Editing. It won for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. The movie was also nominated for six BAFTA Film Award nominations, including Best Picture, Screenplay and Soundtrack, and winning Best Actor (Pacino) and Film Editing. In addition, it was nominated for seven Golden Globes including Best Motion Picture – Drama, Actor – Motion Picture Drama (Pacino), Supporting Actor (Cazale and Durning), Screenplay and New Star of the Year – Actor (Sarandon). The movie won the WGA for Best Drama Written Directly for the Screen.

Lumet scored an even bigger commercial and critical hit with his next movie Network (1976) with Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch, Robert Duvall, Wesley Addy, Ned Beatty, and Beatrice Straight. The film is a dark satirical dramedy about a struggling television network that the exploits the antics of its mentally unhinged news anchorman (Finch), promoting him to cult-like status in order to gain ratings. Sidney Lumet received a Best Director Oscar nomination for the movie, as well as BAFTA and DGA nominations. He won Best Director honours from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (Golden Globes) and Los Angeles Film Critics Association. The film itself was nominated for a total of ten Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Actor (Holden), Supporting Actor (Beatty), Cinematography and Film Editing. It won Oscars for Best Actor (Finch), Actress (Dunaway), Supporting Actress (Straight) and Original Screenplay. The film was also nominated for nine BAFTA Film Awards, including Best Picture, Actor (Holden), Actress (Dunaway), Supporting Actor (Duvall), Screenplay, Film Editing and Soundtrack, and winning Best Actor (Finch). In addition, it was nominated for five Golden Globes, winning Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama (Finch), Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama (Dunaway) and Screenplay. It was nominated for Best Motion Picture – Drama but did not win in that category. The movie won the WGA for Best Drama Written Directly for the Screen.

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Films of the Late 1970s

Lumet followed the success of Network by directed the psychological drama Equus (1977) with Richard Burton, Peter Firth, Colin Blakely, Joan Plowright, Harry Andrews, Eileen Atkins, Jenny Agutter, and Kate Reid. Based on the play by Peter Shaffer, a psychiatrist (Burton) works to uncover the dark truth behind a disturbed and troubled young man (Firth)’s obsessive worship of horses. The movie received positive reviews and was nominated for three Academy Awards for Best Actor (Burton), Supporting Actor (Firth) and Adapted Screenplay. The film won two Golden Globes for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama (Burton) and Supporting Actor (Firth). It was also nominated for five BAFTA Film Awards, including Best Supporting Actor (Blakely), Actress (Plowright), Screenplay and Music, and winning Best Supporting Actress (Agutter).

Lumet’s last movie of the 1970s was musical The Wiz (1978) with Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, Nipsey Russell, Ted Ross, Mabel King, Lena Horne, and Richard Pryor. Based on the hit Broadway musical, the film is a re-visioning of The Wizard of Oz with an all-African American cast. Upon its initial release, the movie did not do well with critics and audiences, but has since become a cult classic. The Wiz was nominated for four Academy Awards for Best Cinematography, Art Direction-Set Decoration, Costume Design, and Music, Original Song Score and Its Adaptation or Best Adaptation Score.

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Later Years

In the 1980s, Lumet continued to be a prolific film director and was nominated for two more Academy Awards for Best Adapted Screenplay for Prince of the City (1981), starring Treat Williams and Jerry Orbach, and for Best Director for The Verdict (1982) with Paul Newman, Charlotte Rampling, Jack Warden, and James Mason. The Verdict was nominated for a total of five Oscars including Best Picture, Actor (Newman), Supporting Actor (Mason) and Adapted Screenplay.

Other 1980s films that Lumet directed included: Deathtrap (1982) with Michael Caine, Christopher Reeve and Dyan Cannon; Daniel (1983) with Timothy Hutton, Mandy Patinkin and Lindsay Crouse; Garbo Talks (1984) with Anne Bancroft, Ron Silver and Carrie Fisher; The Morning After (1986) with Jane Fonda, Jeff Bridges and Raul Julia; Power (1986) with Richard Gere, Julie Christie and Gene Hackman; Running on Empty (1988) with Christine Lahti, River Phoenix and Judd Hirsch; and Family Business (1989) with Sean Connery, Dustin Hoffman and Matthew Broderick. Jane Fonda received her sixth Best Actress Oscar nomination for The Morning After. River Phoenix received his only Oscar nomination for Running on Empty and the film was also nominated for Best Original Screenplay.

Lumet continued to direct movies in the 1990s to the mid 2000s. His last film was Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (2007) with Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Marisa Tomei, and Albert Finney.

In his personal life, Sidney Lumet was married four times including to heiress and entrepreneur Gloria Vanderbilt. He had two daughters two daughters. Lumet died at the age of 86 on April 9, 2011 in Manhattan from lymphoma.

Legacy

Lumet’s influence on filmmaking continues to be recognized today with his movies 12 Angry Men (1957), The Pawnbroker (1964), Dog Day Afternoon (1975) and Network (1976), as well as his documentary King: A Filmed Record… Montgomery to Memphis (1970), being selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”

~Terry Gale

Influential Filmmakers of the 1970s: Robert Altman

Robert Altman was a pioneer in the 1970s filmmaking. He was highly prolific during this decade often directing one to two films a year. His unique style included making films with multiple interwoven storylines in an episodic television-like format. His large ensemble casts often improvised their performances, which included overlapping dialogue. This process created a naturalistic and quirky feel to his films. He also took traditional genres, skewing and reworking their narrative structures, and producing ambiguous endings to many of his films. In addition, a number of his movies included his own strong social commentaries on the events of the day.

_{Source: Indiewire ‘Robert Altman’s Top 15 Films’ October 13, 2014}

Altman was very much an actor’s director, directing Sally Kellerman, Julie Christie, Ronee Blakley, Lily Tomlin, Helen Mirren and Maggie Smith in Oscar nominated performances. Altman himself was nominated five times for the Best Director Oscar and was awarded a honourary Oscar in 2006. He won a Primetime Emmy award in 1989 for Outstanding Directing in a Drama Series for the mini-series Tanner ‘88 (1988).

Altman began his filmmaking career directing documentaries, as well as employee training, industrial and educational films. He later moved into television in the 1950s and 1960s, directing TV movies and episodes of shows such as Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955-62), The Millionaire (1955-60), Whirlybirds (1957-60), Maverick (1957-62), Lawman (1958-62), Surfside 6 (1960-62), Peter Gunn (1958-61), Bonanza (1959-73), Route 66 (1960-64), Bus Stop (1960-61) and Kraft Mystery Theater (1960-63).

He made his feature film debut with Countdown (1967) with James Caan and Robert Duvall. He was fired during the editing process, as he refused to comply with studio demands. His next film That Cold Day in the Park (1969) was a critical and commercial failure.

Altman hit his stride as a notable film director with the breakthrough, dark comic-satire M*A*S*H (1970). The movie tells the story of the outrageous antics of a field hospital’s eccentric staff during the Korean War. Altman received his first Best Director Oscar nomination for the film. He was also nominated for a Best Director Golden Globe and a Directors Guild of America (DGA) Award. In addition, Altman won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. The movie itself was nominated for five Oscars, including Best Picture, Supporting Actress (Sally Kellerman) and Film Editing. It won one Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. It was also nominated for six Golden Globes (1970), including Best Actors in a Comedy or Musical (Elliot Gould & Donald Sutherland), Supporting Actress (Kellerman) and Screenplay. The movie won the Best Motion Picture Comedy or Musical Golden Globe that year. It also won a Writers Guild of America (WGA) Award for Best Comedy Adapted from Another Medium.

That same year, he directed the off-beat, surrealistic comedy Brewster McCloud (1970) about a reclusive young man (Bud Cort) living in the Huston Astrodome who is fashioning a pair of wings to help him fly.

Altman’s next major work was the acclaimed revisionist western McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971). Set in the late 1800s, a gambler (Warren Beatty) and a prostitute (Julie Christie) run a high-class brothel and experience problems when competitors try to purchase the business. Christie received her second Best Actress Oscar nomination for the movie. The movie was also nominated for a WGA Award for Best Drama Adapted from Another Medium. The film initially received poor reviews upon its release and did not do well at the box office. It achieved critical acclaim and recognition in later years.

The next year, Altman directed Images (1972) a psychological thriller about a vacationing, mentally unbalanced children’s books author (Susannah York) who becomes increasingly caught up in her delusions and fantasies with dire consequences. Altman was nominated for a Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival and York took home the Best Actress Prize. Altman was also nominated for a WGA award for Best Drama Written Directly for the Screen. The film itself was nominated for a Best English-Language Foreign Film Golden Globe and was nominated for one Academy Award for Best Original Dramatic Score (John Williams).

Altman followed that film with the acclaimed, re-fashioned film noir The Long Goodbye (1973) about a private detective (Elliott Gould) who gets involved in a complicated murder investigation after helping a friend flee the country for Mexico.

The next year, Altman directed two movies Thieves Like Us (1974) and California Split (1974). A re-imagined, depression-era caper movie, Thieves Like Us tells story of two men (Keith Carradine and John Schuck) who, after escaping from prison, go back to robbing banks with the help of a new accomplice (Bert Remsen). The National Board of Review selected the movie as one of the Top Ten Films of 1974.

California Split (1974) was a buddy comedy about two gamblers (Elliott Gould and George Segal) who get involved in increasingly dark misadventures as they win and lose large amounts of money together.

Altman’s next movie Nashville (1975) is considered by many as his masterpiece.It is a dark satirical comedy, which skews the American way of life and its obsessions with fame and commercialism. Shot under 45 days, the film follows multiple storylines featuring various people involved in the country music industry and a political fundraiser. Altman received his second Best Director Oscar nomination for the movie. He was also nominated for a Best Director Golden Globe. The film itself was nominated for five Oscars, including Best Picture and Supporting Actresses (Ronee Blakley & Lily Tomlin) and winning for Best Original Song (I’m Easy). The movie was also nominated for eleven Golden Globes and won for Best Original Song. The film’s other Golden Globe nominations were for Best Motion Picture Drama, Supporting Actor (Henry Gibson), Supporting Actresses (Blakley, Tomlin, Geraldine Chaplin and Barbara Harris), Screenplay and Acting Debuts (Blakley and Tomlin). In addition, the movie was nominated for a WGA Award for Best Drama Written Directly for the Screen and for five Best Actress British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Film Awards.

Altman followed the success of Nashville with the satirical, comedic, revisionist western Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson (1976) which was poorly received by both critics and audiences. The movie’s story focuses on a fictional account of Buffalo Bill (Paul Newman)’s attempt to enlist Sitting Bull (Frank Kaquitts) to participate in Bill’s Wild West Show, which features negative portrayals of Indigenous Americans. Despite the film’s largely negative reception, the movie won the Golden Bear at the 26th Berlin International Film Festival.

Altman next directed the surrealistic psychological study 3 Women (1977) about two very different physical therapists (Shelley Duvall and Sissy Spacek) who become obsessive friends and roommates in an apartment building owned by an enigmatic pregnant woman (Janice Rule) and her drunken husband. The movie was praised by critics, but did not do well at the box office. Altman was nominated for a Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival and Duvall took home the Best Actress Prize. Duvall was also nominated for a Best Actress British BAFTA Film Award and was awarded Best Actress by the Los Angeles Film Critics Association. Sissy Spacek took home the New York Film Critics Circle Awards Best Supporting Actress award for the movie.

Altman returned to the style of filmmaking he was most famous for in the satirical black comedy A Wedding (1978) with multiple storylines and a large ensemble cast. The story takes place over a single day during the wedding between a young bride (Amy Stryker) from a nouveau riche Kentucky family and the young groom (Desi Arnaz Jr.) from a wealthy Chicago family with suspected ties to the mafia. Altman was nominated for two BAFTA Film Awards for Best Director and Screenplay (sharing the latter nomination with John Considine, Patricia Resnick and Allan F. Nicholls). They also received a WGA nomination for Best Comedy Written Directly for the Screen. In addition, Altman was nominated for France’s César Award for Best Foreign Film. Carol Burnett received a Best Supporting Actress Golden Globes nomination for playing the bride’s mother. The movie marked Lillian Gish’s 100^th film.

Altman ended the decade with two very different movies: the dystopian science fiction film Quintet (1979) and the romantic comedy A Perfect Couple (1979). The negatively reviewed, box office flop Quintet presented a futuristic, post-apocalyptic vision of the earth during a new ice age where a group of surviving humans is playing a deadly version of a game called ‘Quintet.’

A Perfect Couple was also negatively received by both audiences and critics. The centers on an older, repressed man (Paul Dooley) who is romancing a younger, bohemian musician (Marta Heflin).

Altman worked directing both theatre and motion picture productions in the 1980s. His film work during this decade began with two big budget disasters: the satirical comedy HealtH (1980) and the musical Popeye (1980) with Robin Williams. Later films during this decade included filmed treatments of theatrical productions such as Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (1982) with Cher, Sandy Dennis and Karen Black, Streamers (1983) with Matthew Modine, Michael Wright and David Alan Grier, and Fool for Love (1985) with Sam Shepard, Kim Basinger, and Harry Dean Stanton. Altman was nominated for his fourth Palme d’Or for Fool for Love.

In the 1990s to the early 2000s, Altman’s filmmaking career had a revival due in particular to three critically acclaimed films: The Player (1992), Short Cuts (1993) and Gosford Park (2001). Altman received Best Director Oscar nominations for all three movies. For The Player, Altman also won a BAFTA for Best Director and was awarded the Best Director prize at the Cannes Film Festival. He was also nominated for a DGA Award and a Golden Globe for Best Director. For Short Cuts, he received a Best Screenplay Golden Globes nomination and won the Film Independent Spirit Award for Best Director. Finally for Gosford Park, he won the Best Director Golden Globe and was nominated for a David Lean Award for Direction at the BAFTAs. Julian Fellowes won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for Gosford Park.

Altman’s last film was A Prairie Home Companion (2006) with Lily Tomlin, Meryl Streep and Woody Harrelson.

In his personal life, Altman was married three times and had five children. Robert Altman died on November 20, 2006, at the age of 81 from leukemia.

Altman’s influence on filmmaking continues to be recognized today with his films M*A*S*H (1970), McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971), The Long Goodbye (1973) and Nashville (1975) being selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.” The Film Independent’s Robert Altman Award has been awarded to the ensemble cast, director and casting director of independent films since 2009.