The New Biographical Dictionary of Film: Completely Updated and Expanded (300 page)

There is an exception to this, just as his first Fox film was untypical of that studio.
Johnny Belinda
(at Warners) and
Road House
(at Fox) are in curiously opposite corners. The first is Jane Wyman as a deaf and mute girl, raped but loved. Its characters are rural, one-dimensional, and blatant, quite unlike the eccentric, independent sophistication of the Warners films, or of
Road House
, which has Widmark and Lupino again, as a sultry chanteuse stilling a provincial audience with her laconic delivery of moody songs. It speaks of the aplomb of the lady, and the harking back to dark cabarets, that she made Widmark seem young.

But Fox soon dragged Negulesco down, more through the intrinsic sentimentality of the story department than the devitalizing elements of wide screen and De Luxe Color, surely the least happy process for a world of supposedly intense daydream.
How to Marry a Millionaire
is good Monroe, with a nice airplane meeting with David Wayne, and
Three Coins in the Fountain
was very big at the box office. Otherwise, Negulesco illustrates the power of the studios over minor talents.

Marshall Neilan
(1891–1958), b. San Bernardino, California
1916:
The Cycle of Fate; The Prince Chap; The Country that God Forgot
. 1917:
Those Without Sin; The Bottle Imp; The Tides of Barnegat; The Girl at Home; The Silent Partner; Freckles; The Jaguar’s Claws; Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm; The Little Princess
. 1918:
Stella Maris; Amarilly of Clothes-Line Alley; M’liss; Hit-the-Trail Holliday; Heart of the Wilds
. 1919:
Three Men and a Girl; Daddy Long Legs
. 1920:
In Old Kentucky; Her Kingdom of Dreams; Go and Get It
(codirected with Henry Symonds);
Don’t Ever Marry
(codirected with Victor Heerman);
Dinty
(codirected with John MacDermott). 1921:
Bits of Life; Bob Hampton of Placer; The Lotus Eater
. 1922:
Fools First; Minnie
(codirected with Frank Urson);
Penrod; The Stranger’s Banquet
. 1923:
The Eternal Three
(codirected with Urson);
The Rendezvous
. 1924:
Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall; Tess of the D’Urbervilles
. 1925:
The Great Love; The Sporting Venus
. 1926:
Diplomacy; Everybody’s Acting; Mike; The Skyrocket; Wild Oats Lane
. 1927:
Her Wild Oat; Venus of Venice
. 1928:
His Last Haul; Take Me Home; Taxi 13; Three-Ring Marriage
. 1929:
The Awful Truth; Tanned Legs; The Vagabond Lover
. 1930:
Sweethearts on Parade
. 1931:
Black Waters; Catch as Catch Can
. 1934:
Chloe, Love Is Calling You; Social Register; The Lemon Drop Kid
. 1935:
This Is the Life
. 1937:
Sing While You’re Able; Swing It, Professor
.

American directors illustrate the sustaining powers of hard work and regular habits. Very few sank from eminence as dramatically as Neilan or with such vague legends of drunken promise. Some say he loathed sound, because of its initial restriction of camera mobility; some that he was outspoken enough to give lasting offense to Louis B. Mayer. But Allan Dwan, who provided Neilan’s first chance, believed that his promise sank with the level in the bottle: “Well, he ruined himself with liquor and indifference and bitterness. He became a humorous cynic. But liquor did it.”

Dwan also acknowledged Neilan’s Irish ancestry—he was usually known as “Mickey”—which may have contributed to his boasting fondness for casual methods on set. Inclined to make things up as he went along—or to extend that widespread approach into the era of producers and accountancy—he was also a famous womanizer, and not always punctual. There is a story of Mary Pickford being forced to direct one of her own films because of his absence and of Neilan arriving during the day, as one of the watching crowd, to see how she was doing. Years later, however, in 1933, Pickford fired Neilan from
Secrets
when he was too drunk to work.

Neilan began his movie career as an actor. He was in
Judith of Bethulia
(13, D. W. Griffith) and a number of Dwan’s early pictures before Dwan gave him a chance to direct. Neilan went to the Selig company and by 1920 he was directing for his own production company. He was among the most perceptive of Mary Pickford’s directors, showing a sense of comedy as well as the necessary melodramatic flourish on
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, The Little Princess, Stella Maris
—in which Pickford played two parts, rich girl and waif
—Amarilly of Clothes-Line Alley, M’Liss, Daddy Long Legs
, and
Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall
. Otherwise, Neilan moved from Goldwyn, to MGM, to First National, and then to the nomadic career of someone famed for being unreliable and frowned upon by Louis B. Mayer.
The Lotus Eater
was John Barrymore and Colleen Moore;
Tess of the D’Urbervilles
starred Conrad Nagel and Blanche Sweet, Neilan’s wife; Peggy Hopkins Joyce made one of her appearances in
The Skyrocket;
Bebe Daniels was in
Take Me Home;
Ina Claire in
The Awful Truth
. Neilan was in decline from 1930 onward, although he had a writer’s credit that year on
Hell’s Angels
(Howard Hughes). Impoverished during the 1940s, his last appearance was in 1957 in a small role in
A Face in the Crowd
(Elia Kazan).

Sam
(Nigel)
Neill
, b. Omagh, Northern Ireland, 1947
There’s a Sam Neill who seems always there in large films, watching Meryl Streep or the dinosaur with the basic common sense that knows all stars are alike. That actor has been a patient, loyal servant to great ladies, even having his bodily fluids (well, one of them) conjured up by Sigourney Weaver in
Snow White
(97, Michael Cohn). Then look again, and see what a wry, watchful actor he is. If you doubt his considerable intelligence, then track down
Cinema of Unease
, the documentary he wrote and directed (with Judy Ryner) on the history of movies (and himself) in New Zealand.

His family emigrated across the ocean when he was a small boy (with mumps). He attended the University of Christchurch and was thinking of being a filmmaker before being encouraged to act. For he had a handsome, English look—worthy of that original “Nigel”—and one should recall his dashing BBC-TV series,
Reilly: Ace of Spies
, as well as the fact that he was considered for James Bond before Pierce Brosnan got the part. But Neill, apparently, knew he was too interesting to be a 007.

His earliest big picture was
Sleeping Dogs
(77, Roger Donaldson), followed by his first work with Judy Davis in
My Brilliant Career
(79, Gillian Armstrong). After
Attack Force Z
(81, Tim Burstall), he appeared with Isabelle Adjani in
Possession
(81, Andrzej Zulawski); in the third “Omen” film,
The Final Conflict
(81; Graham Baker); a Russian in
Enigma
(82, Jeannot Szwarc); a Norman in
Ivanhoe
(82, Douglas Camfield); on French TV in
The Blood of Others
(84, Claude Chabrol); as the Australian outlaw, Captain Starlight, in
Robbery Under Arms
(85, Ken Hannam); as the resistance fighter who makes love to Meryl Streep in
Plenty
(85, Fred Schepisi).

By now, he could be found working in Australasia, Europe, or America:
For Love Alone
(86, Stephen Wallace), from the Christina Stead novel;
The Good Wife
(86, Ken Cameron); as Streep’s husband in
A Cry in the Dark
(88, Schepisi);
Dead Calm
(89, Phillip Noyce); a Russian officer in
The Hunt for Red October
(90, John McTiernan); with Judy Davis again in
One Against the Wind
(91, Larry Elikann);
Until the End of the World
(91, Wim Wenders);
Hostage
(92, Robert Young);
Memoirs of an Invisible Man
(92, John Carpenter);
Family Pictures
(93, Philip Saville), with Anjelica Huston.

He was the voice of informed reason in
Jurassic Park
(93, Steven Spielberg); happily back in New Zealand for
The Piano
(93, Jane Campion);
Rainbow Warrior
(94, Michael Tuchner); as the artist Norman Lindsay—the figure James Mason played in
Age of Consent
—in
Sirens
(94, John Duigan);
Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book
(94, Stephen Sommers); outstanding in
In the Mouth of Madness
(95, Carpenter); doing Chekhov in
Country Life
(95, Michael Blakemore); as Charles II in
Restoration
(95, Michael Hoffman); with Judy Davis once more in
Children of the Revolution
(96, Peter Duncan);
Event Horizon
(97, Paul Anderson); on TV as
Merlin
(98, Steve Barron); the husband at home in
The Horse Whisperer
(98, Robert Redford);
The Revengers’ Comedies/Sweet Revenge
(98, Malcolm Mowbray);
Molokai: The Story of Father Damien
(99, Paul Cox);
Bicentennial Man
(99, Chris Columbus).

On TV, he was Jefferson in
Sally Hemings: An American Scandal
(00, Charles Haid);
The Dish
(00, Rob Sitch); on TV in
Submerged
(01, James Keach);
Jurassic Park III
(01, Joe Johnston);
The Zookeeper
(01, Ralph Ziman);
Framed
(01, Daniel Petrie Jr.);
Dirty Deeds
(02, David Caesar); as Victor in a TV
Doctor Zhivago
(03, Giacomo Campiottii);
Perfect Strangers
(03, Gaylene Preston); in the TV series
Jessica
(03, Peter Andrikidis);
Yes
(04, Sally Potter);
Wimbledon
(04, Richard Loncraine);
Little Fish
(05, Rowan Woods);
Angel
(07, François Ozon);
Dean Spanley
(07, Toa Fraser); as Wolsey in
The Tudors
(07); on TV in
Iron Road
(08, David Wu) and
Crusoe
(08, Stephen Gallagher);
In Her Skin
(09, Simone North).

Ralph Nelson
(1916–87), b. New York
1962:
Requiem for a Heavyweight
. 1963:
Lilies of the Field; Soldier in the Rain
. 1964:
Fate Is the
Hunter; Father Goose
. 1965:
Once a Thief
. 1966:
Duel at Diablo
. 1967:
Counterpoint
. 1968:
Charly
. 1969:
Tick … Tick … Tick; Soldier Blue
. 1971:
Flight of the Doves
. 1972:
The Wrath of God
. 1974:
The Wilby Conspiracy
. 1976:
Embryo
. 1978:
A Hero Ain’t Nothin’ But a Sandwich
.

Although well into middle age before he directed a movie, Nelson must presumably be dealt with as typical of the new type of commercial director, desperate for novelty and managing to string a few successful films together. He was prepared to compromise with sentimentality or savagery and, seemingly, there are those not disturbed by the lack of moral or intelligent focus in his films. Thus, although his pictures are all overemphatic—whether in the oozing self-pity of Anthony Quinn in
Requiem for a Heavyweight;
the prettiness of Sidney Poitier won over by a chorus of German nuns; the slick irony with which idiot becomes genius in
Charly;
or the gratuitous violence in
Soldier Blue
—the human content seems always reduced or bowdlerized. That such a director should thrive, let alone work, is one of those ghastly cracks in the ground that the world has to school itself to step over. His only passable movie,
Soldier in the Rain
, owes its merit to the script by Blake Edwards and to Tuesday Weld.

Nelson had a career of thirty years as a stage actor, a dramatist and theatrical producer, and a TV director—all with some success. His first film came after he had won an Emmy for the TV production of Rod Serling’s play,
Requiem for a Heavyweight
. Twice—for Sidney Poitier, and for Cliff Robertson in
Charly
—Nelson’s special vulgarization led to Oscars. And in
Duel at Diablo
and
Soldier Blue
he has an unenviable place in the continuing history of gruesome, picturesque bloodletting, at the cost of emotional or dramatic significance.
The Wrath of God
is an odious use of Robert Mitchum as a gun-toting bogus priest, as disrespectful to the memory of
Night of the Hunter
as to Nelson’s cozy gathering of nuns in
Lilies of the Field
.

Mike Newell
, b. St. Albans, England, 1942
1976:
The Man in the Iron Mask
. 1980:
The Awakening
. 1981:
Bad Blood
. 1984:
Dance with a Stranger
. 1986:
The Good Father
. 1987:
Amazing Grace and Chuck
. 1988:
Soursweet
. 1991:
Enchanted April
. 1992:
Into the West
. 1993:
Four Weddings and a Funeral
. 1995:
An Awfully Big Adventure
. 1997:
Donnie Brasco
. 1999:
Pushing Tin
. 2003:
Mona Lisa Smile
. 2005:
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
. 2007:
Love in the Time of Cholera
. 2010:
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
.

Mike Newell is solidly professional, and represents that generation that learned its craft in British television doing just about anything, and sees no reason why it shouldn’t be able to grasp both England in the 1950s and Mafia lowlife in the 1990s. “One reason I don’t claim to perceive any particular shape in the overall work,” he says, “is that I think people go wrong through self-importance and pomposity.” You don’t have to add much to that modesty to see why
Four Weddings and a Funeral
had true charm, yearning romance, and a canny head-fake on the real world—while
Notting Hill
doesn’t. In other words, to learn craft can be a way of thinking about life and plausibility—as well as what plays.