TMI (Today’s Movie Info)
February: Director’s Month
ROBERT WISE (1914-2005) got his start as a sound effects editor, and his big break (and first Oscar nomination) as Orson Welles’ editor on Citizen Kane (1941). Wise also directed two of the most beloved film musicals: West Side Story (co-director with Jerome Robbins, 1961), The Sound of Music (1965). Wise directed his first film at age 29 and his final (TV) film at age 86. During that span, he was nominated for seven Academy Awards … winning for: Best Picture and Best Director, West Side Story; and Best Picture and Best Director, The Sound of Music. He is also remembered for directing The Body Snatcher (1945), which was based on a Robert Louis Stevenson short story and starred Boris Karloff and Bela Legosi; the sci-fi thriller The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951); I Want to Live! (1958); The Sand Pebbles (1966, 7 Oscar nominations); The Andromeda Strain (1977); Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979). Wise is one of the very few directors to have had success across so many film genres: drama, film noir, horror, musical, science fiction, war, westerns.
Movie Reviews from the Dark 