Samuel Fuller
Encyclopedia
Samuel Michael Fuller was an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...

, novelist, and film director
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...

 known for low-budget genre movies with controversial themes.

Personal life

He was born Samuel Michael Fuller in Worcester, Massachusetts
Worcester, Massachusetts
Worcester is a city and the county seat of Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. Named after Worcester, England, as of the 2010 Census the city's population is 181,045, making it the second largest city in New England after Boston....

, the son of Benjamin Rabinovitch, a Jewish immigrant
Immigration
Immigration is the act of foreigners passing or coming into a country for the purpose of permanent residence...

 from Russia, and Rebecca Baum, a Jewish immigrant from Poland. After immigrating to America, the family's surname
Surname
A surname is a name added to a given name and is part of a personal name. In many cases, a surname is a family name. Many dictionaries define "surname" as a synonym of "family name"...

 was changed from Rabinovitch to "Fuller" possibly by inspiration of a Doctor
Samuel Fuller (Mayflower physician)
Samuel Fuller was an English doctor and church deacon. He is remembered as one of the Separatist Pilgrims who together formed the colony in North America at Plymouth, Massachusetts.-Early life:...

 who arrived in America on the Mayflower
Mayflower
The Mayflower was the ship that transported the English Separatists, better known as the Pilgrims, from a site near the Mayflower Steps in Plymouth, England, to Plymouth, Massachusetts, , in 1620...

. At the age of 12, he began working in journalism
Journalism
Journalism is the practice of investigation and reporting of events, issues and trends to a broad audience in a timely fashion. Though there are many variations of journalism, the ideal is to inform the intended audience. Along with covering organizations and institutions such as government and...

 as a newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...

 copyboy. He became a crime reporter in New York City at age 17, working for the New York Evening Graphic
New York Graphic
The New York Evening Graphic was a tabloid newspaper published from 1924 to 1932 by Bernarr "Bodylove" Macfadden...

.
He broke the story of Jeanne Eagels
Jeanne Eagels
Jeanne Eagels was an American actress on Broadway and in several motion pictures. She was a former Ziegfeld Follies Girl who went on to greater fame on Broadway and in the emerging medium of sound films....

' death. He wrote pulp
Pulp magazine
Pulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...

 novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

s, including The Dark Page (1944; reissued in 2007 with an introduction by Wim Wenders
Wim Wenders
Ernst Wilhelm "Wim" Wenders is a German film director, playwright, author, photographer and producer.-Early life:Wenders was born in Düsseldorf. He graduated from high school in Oberhausen in the Ruhr area. He then studied medicine and philosophy in Freiburg and Düsseldorf...

), and screenplay
Screenplay
A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...

s from the mid-1930s onwards. Fuller also became a screenplay
Screenplay
A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...

 ghostwriter
Ghostwriter
A ghostwriter is a professional writer who is paid to write books, articles, stories, reports, or other texts that are officially credited to another person. Celebrities, executives, and political leaders often hire ghostwriters to draft or edit autobiographies, magazine articles, or other written...

 but would never tell interviewers which screenplays he ghost-wrote explaining "that's what a ghost writer is for."

During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, Fuller joined the United States Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...

 infantry
Infantry
Infantrymen are soldiers who are specifically trained for the role of fighting on foot to engage the enemy face to face and have historically borne the brunt of the casualties of combat in wars. As the oldest branch of combat arms, they are the backbone of armies...

. He was assigned to the 16th Infantry Regiment
16th Infantry Regiment (United States)
The 16th Infantry Regiment is a regiment in the United States Army.-Formation:The 34th Infantry Regiment and 11th Infantry Regiment consolidated into the 16th Infantry Regiment on 3 March 1869. The 11th Infantry's history prior to the consolidation is normally included with the 16th's.-U.S...

, 1st Infantry Division, and saw heavy fighting. He was involved in landings in Africa
Operation Torch
Operation Torch was the British-American invasion of French North Africa in World War II during the North African Campaign, started on 8 November 1942....

, Sicily, and Normandy
Omaha Beach
Omaha Beach is the code name for one of the five sectors of the Allied invasion of German-occupied France in the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944, during World War II...

 and also saw action in Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

 and Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...

. In 1945 he was present at the liberation of the German concentration camp at Sokolov
Sokolov
-Fictional characters:*Nikolai Stephanovich Sokolov from Metal Gear Solid 3*Sokolov, a former Russian Spetsnaz in Neal Stephenson's novel REAMDE-Places:...

 and shot 16 mm footage which was used later in the documenatary Falkenau: The Impossible. For his service he was awarded the Bronze Star
Bronze Star Medal
The Bronze Star Medal is a United States Armed Forces individual military decoration that may be awarded for bravery, acts of merit, or meritorious service. As a medal it is awarded for merit, and with the "V" for valor device it is awarded for heroism. It is the fourth-highest combat award of the...

, the Silver Star
Silver Star
The Silver Star is the third-highest combat military decoration that can be awarded to a member of any branch of the United States armed forces for valor in the face of the enemy....

, and the Purple Heart
Purple Heart
The Purple Heart is a United States military decoration awarded in the name of the President to those who have been wounded or killed while serving on or after April 5, 1917 with the U.S. military. The National Purple Heart Hall of Honor is located in New Windsor, New York...

. Fuller used his wartime experiences as material in his films, especially in The Big Red One
The Big Red One
The Big Red One is a World War II war film starring Lee Marvin and Mark Hamill. Written and directed by Samuel Fuller, it was produced by Lorimar and released by United Artists in the US on July 18, 1980...

(1980), a nickname of the 1st Infantry Division.

After his controversial film "White Dog
White Dog
White Dog is a 1982 American drama film directed by Samuel Fuller using a screenplay written by Fuller and Curtis Hanson loosely based on Romain Gary's 1970 novel of the same title...

" was shelved by Paramount pictures, Fuller moved to France, and never directed another American film. Fuller eventually returned to America. He died of natural causes in his California home. In November 1997, the Directors Guild held a three hour memorial in his honor, hosted by Curtis Hanson
Curtis Hanson
Curtis Lee Hanson is an American film director, film producer and screenwriter. His directing work includes The Hand That Rocks the Cradle , L.A...

, his long time friend and co-writer on White Dog. He was survived by his wife Christa and daughter Samantha.

Writing and directing

Hats Off
Hats Off
Hats Off is a Laurel and Hardy silent comedy film. It was made in 1927 by the Hal Roach Studios. It starred Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy and is considered a lost film.- Plot :...

(1936) marked Fuller's first credit as a screenwriter. Fuller wrote many screenplays throughout his career, but he is best remembered as a director. He was unimpressed with Douglas Sirk
Douglas Sirk
Douglas Sirk was a Danish-German film director best known for his work in Hollywood melodramas in the 1950s.-Life and work:...

's direction of his Shockproof screenplay, and he accomplished the move to direction after being asked to write three films by Robert Lippert. Fuller agreed to write them if he would be allowed to direct them as well, with no extra fee for direction, to which Lippert agreed. Fuller's first film under this arrangement was I Shot Jesse James
I Shot Jesse James
I Shot Jesse James is a film directed by Samuel Fuller about the murder of Jesse James by Robert Ford and Robert Ford's life afterwards...

(1949) followed by The Baron of Arizona
The Baron of Arizona
The Baron of Arizona is a 1950 film by Samuel Fuller and starring Vincent Price. Ed Wood was a stunt double in the film.The film concerns a master forger's attempted use of false documents to lay claim to the territory of Arizona late in the 19th century, and is based on the case of James Reavis,...

with Vincent Price.

Fuller's third film, The Steel Helmet
The Steel Helmet
The Steel Helmet is a war film directed by Samuel Fuller and produced by Lippert Studios during the Korean War. It was the first film about the war, and the first of several war films by producer-director-writer Fuller.-Plot:...

, established him as a major force. One of the first films about the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...

, he wrote it based on tales from returning Korean veteran
Veteran
A veteran is a person who has had long service or experience in a particular occupation or field; " A veteran of ..."...

s and his own World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 experiences. The film was attacked by reporter Victor Riesel
Victor Riesel
Victor Riesel was an American newspaper journalist and columnist who specialized in news related to labor unions. At the height of his career, his column on labor union issues was syndicated to 356 newspapers in the United States...

 for being pro-communist and anti-American while another critc Westford Pedravy wrote that he was secretly financed by the Reds. Fuller had a major argument with the US Army that provided stock footage
Stock footage
Stock footage, and similarly, archive footage, library pictures and file footage are film or video footage that may or may not be custom shot for use in a specific film or television program. Stock footage is of beneficial use to filmmakers as it is sometimes less expensive than shooting new...

 for the film. When army officials objected to his American characters executing a prisoner of war
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...

, Fuller replied he had seen it done during his own military duty. A compromise was reached when the Lieutenant
Lieutenant
A lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer in many nations' armed forces. Typically, the rank of lieutenant in naval usage, while still a junior officer rank, is senior to the army rank...

 threatens the Sergeant with a court martial.

Fuller was sought by the major studios to join them. He asked each of them what they did with the profits from their films. All of them gave advice on tax shelter
Tax shelter
Tax shelters are any method of reducing taxable income resulting in a reduction of the payments to tax collecting entities, including state and federal governments...

s, except for Darryl F. Zanuck
Darryl F. Zanuck
Darryl Francis Zanuck was an American producer, writer, actor, director and studio executive who played a major part in the Hollywood studio system as one of its longest survivors...

 of 20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...

, who replied "we make better movies", the answer Fuller was seeking. Zanuck signed Fuller for a contract for seven films, the first being another Korean War film, Fixed Bayonets!
Fixed Bayonets!
Fixed Bayonets! is a war film written and directed by Samuel Fuller and produced by Twentieth Century-Fox during the Korean War. It is Fuller's second film about the Korean War. In his motion picture debut, James Dean appears briefly in the film....

, in order to head off other studio competition copying The Steel Helmet
The Steel Helmet
The Steel Helmet is a war film directed by Samuel Fuller and produced by Lippert Studios during the Korean War. It was the first film about the war, and the first of several war films by producer-director-writer Fuller.-Plot:...

. The US Army assigned Medal of Honor
Medal of Honor
The Medal of Honor is the highest military decoration awarded by the United States government. It is bestowed by the President, in the name of Congress, upon members of the United States Armed Forces who distinguish themselves through "conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his or her...

 recipient Raymond Harvey
Raymond Harvey
Raymond Harvey was a lieutenant colonel in the United States Army who served during World War II and the Korean War. He received the Medal of Honor for his actions on March 9, 1951.-Early years and military service:...

 as Fuller's technical advisor
Technical advisor
A technical advisor is an individual who is expert in a particular field of knowledge, hired to provide detailed information and advice to people working in that field...

.

The proposed seventh film Tigrero, based on a book by Sasha Siemel
Sasha Siemel
Alexander “Sasha” Siemel[Aleksandrs Ziemelis] was an adventurer, hunter, guide, actor, writer, photographer, and lecturer. He spoke seven languages. He had more adventures in one year of his life than most men have in an entire lifetime...

, is the subject of 1994 a documentary by Mika Kaurismäki
Mika Kaurismäki
Mika Juhani Kaurismäki is a Finnish film director.He is the elder brother of Aki Kaurismäki, and the father of Maria Kaurismäki who graduated from Tampere School of Art and Media in 2008 with her movie Sideline.Mika Kaurismäki has lived in Brazil since approximately 1992 and has made several...

, Tigrero: A Film That Was Never Made, that featured Fuller and Jim Jarmusch
Jim Jarmusch
James R. "Jim" Jarmusch is an American independent film director, screenwriter, actor, producer, editor and composer. Jarmusch has been a major proponent of independent cinema, particularly during the 1980s and 1990s.-Early life:...

 visiting the proposed Amazon locations of the film. Film Fuller shot on that location at the time was featured in his Shock Corridor
Shock Corridor
Shock Corridor is a 1963 film, directed and written by Samuel Fuller. The film tells the story of a journalist who gets himself committed to a mental hospital in order to track an unsolved murder.-Plot:...

.

Fuller's favourite film was Park Row
Park Row (film)
Park Row is a 1952 drama film directed by Samuel Fuller. It stars Gene Evans and Mary Welch.-Cast:*Gene Evans as Phinneas Mitchell*Mary Welch as Charity Hackett*Bela Kovacs as Ottmar Mergenthaler*Herbert Heyes as Josiah Davenport...

, a story of American journalism. Zanuck had wanted to adapt it into a musical but Fuller refused. Instead he started his own production company with his profits to make the film on his own. Park Row was a labor of love and served as a tribute to the journalists he knew as a newsboy. His flourishes of style on a very low budget led many critics to call the film Fuller's version of Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane is a 1941 American drama film, directed by and starring Orson Welles. Many critics consider it the greatest American film of all time, especially for its innovative cinematography, music and narrative structure. Citizen Kane was Welles' first feature film...

.

Fuller followed this with Pickup on South Street
Pickup on South Street
Pickup on South Street is writer-director Samuel Fuller's film noir released by the 20th Century Fox studio. The film stars Richard Widmark, Jean Peters and Thelma Ritter....

(1953), a film noir
Film noir
Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...

 starring Richard Widmark
Richard Widmark
Richard Weedt Widmark was an American film, stage and television actor.He was nominated for an Academy Award for his role as the villainous Tommy Udo in his debut film, Kiss of Death...

, which became one of his best-known films. Other films Fuller directed in the 1950s include House of Bamboo
House of Bamboo
House of Bamboo is an American color film noir shot in CinemaScope format. The film was directed by Samuel Fuller.The film is a loose remake of The Street with No Name , by the same screenwriter and cinematographer as in the original.-Plot:In 1954, a military train guarded by American soldiers...

, Forty Guns
Forty Guns
Forty Guns is a 1957 CinemaScope western film written and directed by Samuel Fuller and released by the 20th Century Fox studio. The film stars Barbara Stanwyck, Barry Sullivan and Gene Barry.-Plot:...

, and China Gate
China Gate (1957 film)
China Gate is a 1957 Hollywood Cinemascope war film written, produced and directed by Samuel Fuller and released through 20th Century Fox.-Plot:...

, which led to protests from the French government and a friendship with Romain Gary
Romain Gary
Romain Gary was a French diplomat, novelist, film director, World War II aviator. He is the only author to have won the Prix Goncourt twice .- Early life :Gary was born in Vilnius under the name Roman Kacew...

. After leaving Fox, Fuller made Run of the Arrow
Run of the Arrow
Run of the Arrow is a 1957 western film starring Rod Steiger, Brian Keith, Ralph Meeker, Jay C. Flippen and a young Charles Bronson. Set at the end of the American Civil War, the movie was directed by Samuel Fuller and filmed in Technicolor.-Plot:...

, Verboten!
Verboten!
Verboten! is a 1959 film written, produced and directed by Samuel Fuller. It was the last film of the influential but troubled RKO studio, which co-produced it with Fuller's own Globe Enterprises. It was filmed at the RKO Forty Acres backlot...

, and Merrill's Marauders
Merrill's Marauders (film)
Merrill's Marauders is a 1962 Cinemascope war film directed and co-written by Samuel Fuller based on the exploits of the jungle warfare unit of the same name in the Burma Campaign. The source is the non-fiction book The Marauders, written by Charlton Ogburn Jr., a communications officer who served...

. In 1959 he wrote and directed the The Crimson Kimono
The Crimson Kimono
The Crimson Kimono is a 1959 film noir directed by Samuel Fuller. The film stars James Shigeta, Glenn Corbett and Victoria Shaw.It featured several ahead-of-its-time ideas about race and society's perception of race, a thematic and stylistic trademark of Fuller.-Plot:The film is essentially about...

.


Fuller's films throughout the 1950s and early 1960s generally were lower-budget genre movies that explored controversial subjects. Shock Corridor
Shock Corridor
Shock Corridor is a 1963 film, directed and written by Samuel Fuller. The film tells the story of a journalist who gets himself committed to a mental hospital in order to track an unsolved murder.-Plot:...

(1963) is set in a psychiatric hospital
Psychiatric hospital
Psychiatric hospitals, also known as mental hospitals, are hospitals specializing in the treatment of serious mental disorders. Psychiatric hospitals vary widely in their size and grading. Some hospitals may specialise only in short-term or outpatient therapy for low-risk patients...

, while The Naked Kiss
The Naked Kiss
The Naked Kiss is a 1964 neo-noir film written and directed by Samuel Fuller, starring Constance Towers as Kelly, Anthony Eisley as Captain Griff and Michael Dante as J.L. Grant.-Plot:...

(1964) features a prostitute attempting to change her life by working in a pediatric ward.

Between 1967 and 1980, Fuller directed only two films, the Mexican-produced Shark (1969) and Dead Pigeon on Beethoven Street (1972), which featured his wife Christa Lang. Fuller asked the Director's Guild to remove his name from the credits of Shark. He returned in 1980 with the epic The Big Red One
The Big Red One
The Big Red One is a World War II war film starring Lee Marvin and Mark Hamill. Written and directed by Samuel Fuller, it was produced by Lorimar and released by United Artists in the US on July 18, 1980...

, the semi-autobiographical story of a platoon of soldiers and their harrowing experiences during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. The film won critical praise but failed at the box office
Box office
A box office is a place where tickets are sold to the public for admission to an event. Patrons may perform the transaction at a countertop, through an unblocked hole through a wall or window, or at a wicket....

.
In 1981, he was selected to direct the film White Dog
White Dog
White Dog is a 1982 American drama film directed by Samuel Fuller using a screenplay written by Fuller and Curtis Hanson loosely based on Romain Gary's 1970 novel of the same title...

, based on a novel by Romain Gary
Romain Gary
Romain Gary was a French diplomat, novelist, film director, World War II aviator. He is the only author to have won the Prix Goncourt twice .- Early life :Gary was born in Vilnius under the name Roman Kacew...

. The controversial film depicts the struggle of a black dog trainer trying to deprogram a "white dog," a stray that was programmed to viciously attack any black person. He readily agreed to work on the film, having focused much of his career on racial issues. Already familiar with the novel and with the concept of "white dogs," he was tasked with "reconceptualizing" the film to have the conflict depicted in the book occur within the dog rather than the people. He used the film as a platform to deliver an anti-racial message through the film's examination of the question of whether racism is a treatable problem or an incurable disease.

During filming, Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...

 grew increasingly concerned that the film would offend African-American viewers and brought in two consultants to review the work and offer their approval on the way black characters were depicted. One felt the film had no racist connotations, while the other, Willis Edwards, vice president of the Hollywood NAACP chapter, felt the film was inflammatory and should never have been made. The two men provided a write-up of their views for the studio executives, which were passed to producer Jon Davison
Jon Davison
Jon Davison is a film producer.-Biography:His producing credits include Airplane! , RoboCop , RoboCop 2 , Starship Troopers , The 6th Day and Phasma ex Machina ....

 along with warnings that the studio was afraid the film would be boycotted. Fuller was not told of these discussions nor given the notes until two weeks before filming was slated to conclude. Known for being a staunch integrationist and for his regularly giving black actors non-stereotypical roles, Fuller was furious, finding the studio's actions insulting. He reportedly had both representatives banned from the set afterwards, though he did integrate some of the suggested changes into the film. After the film's completion, Paramount refused to release it, declaring that it didn't have enough earnings potential to go against the threatened NAACP boycotts and possible bad publicity.

After Fuller's move to France, he never directed another American film. He directed two theatrical French Films, Les Voleurs de la nuit
Thieves After Dark
Thieves After Dark is a 1984 drama film directed by Samuel Fuller. It stars Véronique Jannot and Bobby Di Cicco. The film was entered into the 34th Berlin International Film Festival.-Cast:*Véronique Jannot as Isabelle*Bobby Di Cicco as Francois...

in 1984 and Street of No Return
Street of No Return
Street of No Return is a 1989 crime film directed by Samuel Fuller. It stars Keith Carradine and Valentina Vargas, based on the 1954 novel with the same title written by David Goodis.-Cast:*Keith Carradine as Michael*Valentina Vargas as Celia...

in 1989. Les Voleurs de la nuit was entered into the 34th Berlin International Film Festival
34th Berlin International Film Festival
The 34th annual Berlin International Film Festival was held from February 17 to February 28, 1984.-Jury:* Liv Ullmann * Jules Dassin* Edward Bennett* Manuela Cernat-Gheorghiu* Lana Gogoberidze* Tullio Kezich* Steffen Kuchenreuther...

. He directed his last film, Madonne et le dragon, in 1990, and he wrote his last screenplay, Girls in Prison, in 1994.

With his wife, Christa Lang, and Jerry Rudes, Fuller wrote an autobiography A Third Face (published in 2002). But this was only the culmination of a long career as an author. Among his books are the novels Test Tube Baby (1936), Make Up and Kiss (1938) and The Dark Page (1944); novelization
Novelization
A novelization is a novel that is written based on some other media story form rather than as an original work.Novelizations of films usually add background material not found in the original work to flesh out the story, because novels are generally longer than screenplays...

s of his films The Naked Kiss (1964) and The Big Red One (1980; reissued 2005); and 144 Piccadilly (1971) and Quint's World (1988). A book-length interview of Fuller by Jean Narboni and Noel Simsolo, Il etait une fois ... Samuel Fuller (with a preface by Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...

) appeared in 1986.

Acting

Fuller made a cameo appearance in Jean-Luc Godard
Jean-Luc Godard
Jean-Luc Godard is a French-Swiss film director, screenwriter and film critic. He is often identified with the 1960s French film movement, French Nouvelle Vague, or "New Wave"....

's Pierrot le fou
Pierrot le fou
Pierrot le fou is a 1965 French film directed by Jean-Luc Godard, starring Anna Karina and Jean-Paul Belmondo. The film is based on Obsession, a novel by Lionel White. It was Jean-Luc Godard's tenth feature film, released between Alphaville and Masculin, féminin...

(1965), where he famously intones: Film is like a battleground... Love, hate, action, violence, death. In one word, emotion! He also made a cameo appearance in Luc Moullet
Luc Moullet
Luc Moullet is a French film critic and filmmaker, and a member of the Nouvelle Vague or French New Wave. Moullet's films are known for their humor, anti-authoritarian leanings and rigorously primitive aesthetic, which is heavily influenced by his love of American B-movies.Though such influential...

's Brigitte et Brigitte
Brigitte et Brigitte
Brigitte et Brigitte is a 1966 French feature-length film written and directed by Cahiers du cinéma film critic Luc Moullet. Moullet's debut film, Brigitte et Brigitte was praised upon release by one-time colleague Jean-Luc Godard as being a "revolutionary film."...

 (1966) with Claude Chabrol
Claude Chabrol
Claude Chabrol was a French film director, a member of the French New Wave group of filmmakers who first came to prominence at the end of the 1950s...

 and Eric Rohmer
Éric Rohmer
Éric Rohmer was a French film director, film critic, journalist, novelist, screenwriter and teacher. A figure in the post-war New Wave cinema, he was a former editor of Cahiers du cinéma....

. He plays a film director in Dennis Hopper
Dennis Hopper
Dennis Lee Hopper was an American actor, filmmaker and artist. As a young man, Hopper became interested in acting and eventually became a student of the Actors' Studio. He made his first television appearance in 1954 and appeared in two films featuring James Dean, Rebel Without a Cause and Giant...

's ill-fated The Last Movie
The Last Movie
The Last Movie is a 1971 drama film from Universal Pictures. It was written and directed by Dennis Hopper, who also played a horse wrangler named after the state of Kansas. It also starred Peter Fonda, Henry Jaglom and Michelle Phillips...

(1971); an Army colonel in Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg
Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...

's 1941
1941 (film)
1941 is a 1979 period comedy film directed by Steven Spielberg, written by Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale, and featuring an ensemble cast including John Belushi, Ned Beatty, John Candy, Toshiro Mifune, Christopher Lee and Dan Aykroyd...

(1979); a war correspondent in his own The Big Red One (scene deleted in the original release, restored in the reconstructed version), a talent agent in his film White Dog
White Dog
White Dog is a 1982 American drama film directed by Samuel Fuller using a screenplay written by Fuller and Curtis Hanson loosely based on Romain Gary's 1970 novel of the same title...

(1981), and a cameraman in Wim Wenders
Wim Wenders
Ernst Wilhelm "Wim" Wenders is a German film director, playwright, author, photographer and producer.-Early life:Wenders was born in Düsseldorf. He graduated from high school in Oberhausen in the Ruhr area. He then studied medicine and philosophy in Freiburg and Düsseldorf...

' The State of Things
The State of Things (film)
The State of Things is a 1982 road movie directed by Wim Wenders. It tells the story of a film director travelling from Portugal to Los Angeles in search of his missing producer....

(1982). He portrays an American gangster in two films set in Germany: The American Friend
The American Friend
The American Friend is a 1977 film by Wim Wenders, loosely adapted from the novel Ripley's Game by Patricia Highsmith. The film is of the neo-noir genre, and features Dennis Hopper as career criminal Tom Ripley and Bruno Ganz as Jonathan Zimmermann, a terminally ill picture framer whom Ripley...

by Wenders and Helsinki Napoli All Night Long by Mika Kaurismäki
Mika Kaurismäki
Mika Juhani Kaurismäki is a Finnish film director.He is the elder brother of Aki Kaurismäki, and the father of Maria Kaurismäki who graduated from Tampere School of Art and Media in 2008 with her movie Sideline.Mika Kaurismäki has lived in Brazil since approximately 1992 and has made several...

. He also appeared in Larry Cohen
Larry Cohen
Lawrence G. "Larry" Cohen is an American film producer, director, and screenwriter. He is best known as a B-Movie auteur of horror and science fiction films - often containing a police procedural element - during 1970s and 1980s...

's A Return to Salem's Lot
A Return to Salem's Lot
A Return to Salem's Lot is a 1987 horror film written and directed by Larry Cohen.-Plot:Michael Moriarty plays an amoral anthropologist who has been lumbered with his dysfunctional adolescent son and who returns to Salem's Lot, the town of his birth, to find that it has been taken over by the undead...

(1987). His last work in film was as an actor in The End of Violence
The End of Violence
The End of Violence is a 1997 film by the German director Wim Wenders. The film's cast includes Bill Pullman, Gabriel Byrne, Traci Lind, Rosalind Chao, Andie MacDowell, and Loren Dean, among others. It also features a soundtrack marked with the signature sounds of Wenders regulars Jon Hassell, Ry...

(1997).

Style and theme

Fuller's work has been described as primitive by Luc Moullet and by the influential American critics Manny Farber
Manny Farber
Emanuel "Manny" Farber was an American painter, film critic and writer. Often described as "iconoclastic" , Farber developed a distinctive prose style and set of theoretical stances which have had a large influence on later generations of film critics; Susan Sontag considered him to be "the...

 and Andrew Sarris
Andrew Sarris
Andrew Sarris is an American film critic and a leading proponent of the auteur theory of criticism.-Career:Sarris is generally credited with popularizing the auteur theory in the U.S...

. Grant Tracey has used the term "narrative tabloid" to refer to Fuller's style of filmmaking. This was the result of his often lower budgets, but also reflected Fuller's pulp-inspired writing. The dialogue
Dialogue
Dialogue is a literary and theatrical form consisting of a written or spoken conversational exchange between two or more people....

 in his films has been criticized by some as heavy-handed or over-the-top. Directors Quentin Tarrantino, Jim Jarmusch, and Martin Scorsese have a lot of Fuller's influence in their work.

Fuller often featured marginalized
Marginalization
In sociology, marginalisation , or marginalization , is the social process of becoming or being made marginal or relegated to the fringe of society e.g.; "the marginalization of the underclass", "marginalisation of intellect", etc.-Individual:Marginalization at the individual level results in an...

 characters in his films. The protagonist
Protagonist
A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...

 of Pickup on South Street is a pickpocket who keeps his beer in the East River
East River
The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland...

 instead of a refrigerator
Refrigerator
A refrigerator is a common household appliance that consists of a thermally insulated compartment and a heat pump that transfers heat from the inside of the fridge to its external environment so that the inside of the fridge is cooled to a temperature below the ambient temperature of the room...

. Shock Corridor concerns the patients of a mental hospital
Mental Hospital
Mental hospital may refer to:*Psychiatric hospital*hospital in Nepal named Mental Hospital...

. Underworld U.S.A.
Underworld U.S.A.
Underworld U.S.A. is a 1961 neo-noir film produced, written and directed by Samuel Fuller. It tells the story of a fourteen-year-old boy who goes to enormous lengths to get revenge against the mobsters who beat his father to death...

(1961) focuses on an orphan
Orphan
An orphan is a child permanently bereaved of or abandoned by his or her parents. In common usage, only a child who has lost both parents is called an orphan...

ed victim of mobsters. The leading ladies of Pickup on South Street
Pickup on South Street
Pickup on South Street is writer-director Samuel Fuller's film noir released by the 20th Century Fox studio. The film stars Richard Widmark, Jean Peters and Thelma Ritter....

, China Gate
China Gate (1957 film)
China Gate is a 1957 Hollywood Cinemascope war film written, produced and directed by Samuel Fuller and released through 20th Century Fox.-Plot:...

, and The Naked Kiss
The Naked Kiss
The Naked Kiss is a 1964 neo-noir film written and directed by Samuel Fuller, starring Constance Towers as Kelly, Anthony Eisley as Captain Griff and Michael Dante as J.L. Grant.-Plot:...

are prostitutes. These characters sometimes find retribution for the injustices against them. White Dog
White Dog
White Dog is a 1982 American drama film directed by Samuel Fuller using a screenplay written by Fuller and Curtis Hanson loosely based on Romain Gary's 1970 novel of the same title...

and The Crimson Kimono
The Crimson Kimono
The Crimson Kimono is a 1959 film noir directed by Samuel Fuller. The film stars James Shigeta, Glenn Corbett and Victoria Shaw.It featured several ahead-of-its-time ideas about race and society's perception of race, a thematic and stylistic trademark of Fuller.-Plot:The film is essentially about...

(1959) have definite anti-racist elements. The Steel Helmet
The Steel Helmet
The Steel Helmet is a war film directed by Samuel Fuller and produced by Lippert Studios during the Korean War. It was the first film about the war, and the first of several war films by producer-director-writer Fuller.-Plot:...

, set during the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...

, contains dialogue about the internment of Japanese-Americans and the segregation of the American military in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, and features a racially mixed cast.

Legacy

Although Fuller's films were not considered great cinema in their times, they gained critical respect in the late 1960s. Fuller welcomed the new-found esteem, appearing in films of other directors and associating himself with younger filmmakers.

The French New Wave
French New Wave
The New Wave was a blanket term coined by critics for a group of French filmmakers of the late 1950s and 1960s, influenced by Italian Neorealism and classical Hollywood cinema. Although never a formally organized movement, the New Wave filmmakers were linked by their self-conscious rejection of...

 claimed Fuller as a major stylistic influence, especially Luc Moullet
Luc Moullet
Luc Moullet is a French film critic and filmmaker, and a member of the Nouvelle Vague or French New Wave. Moullet's films are known for their humor, anti-authoritarian leanings and rigorously primitive aesthetic, which is heavily influenced by his love of American B-movies.Though such influential...

. His visual style and rhythm
Rhythm
Rhythm may be generally defined as a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions." This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time may be applied to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or...

 were seen as distinctly American, and praised for their energetic simplicity. Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...

 praised Fuller's ability to capture action through camera
Camera
A camera is a device that records and stores images. These images may be still photographs or moving images such as videos or movies. The term camera comes from the camera obscura , an early mechanism for projecting images...

 movement. Recently, Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Jerome Tarantino is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and actor. In the early 1990s, he began his career as an independent filmmaker with films employing nonlinear storylines and the aestheticization of violence...

 and Jim Jarmusch
Jim Jarmusch
James R. "Jim" Jarmusch is an American independent film director, screenwriter, actor, producer, editor and composer. Jarmusch has been a major proponent of independent cinema, particularly during the 1980s and 1990s.-Early life:...

 credited Fuller as influential upon their works.

In the mid-1980s, Fuller was the first international director guest at the Midnight Sun Film Festival
Midnight Sun Film Festival
Midnight Sun Film Festival is an annual five-day film festival in Sodankylä, Finland. The festival usually takes place in the second week of June. One of the main themes of the festival is to show films without a break all day and night long, while the sun keeps on shining.The Midnight Sun Film...

. The festival's hometown, Sodankylä, Finland, named a street "Samuel Fullerin katu," Samuel Fuller's street.

Further reading

  • Amiel, Olivier. Samuel Fuller. Paris: Henri Veyrier, 1985.
    • A detailed biography of Fuller, describing his narrative
      Narrative
      A narrative is a constructive format that describes a sequence of non-fictional or fictional events. The word derives from the Latin verb narrare, "to recount", and is related to the adjective gnarus, "knowing" or "skilled"...

       style, mise en scene, production, the critical and commercial reception of his films, and his ambitions in directing and screenwriting.
  • Dombroski, Lisa, If You Die, I'll Kill You: the Films of Samuel Fuller, Wesleyan University Press, 2008.
  • Fuller, Samuel with Christa Lang Fuller and Jerome Henry Rudes. A Third Face : My Tale of Writing, Fighting and Filmmaking. New York: A. Knopf, 2002
    • Sam Fuller's autobiography
  • Server, Lee. Sam Fuller. Film Is a Battleground. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc. 1994.
    • The Subtitle describes the contents: 'A Critical Study, with Interviews, a Filmography and a Bibliography'. Includes an extended interview with Fuller himself, and shorter reminiscences of collaborators, such as Vincent Price
      Vincent Price
      Vincent Leonard Price, Jr. was an American actor, well known for his distinctive voice and serio-comic attitude in a series of horror films made in the latter part of his career.-Early life and career:Price was born in St...

      , Richard Widmark
      Richard Widmark
      Richard Weedt Widmark was an American film, stage and television actor.He was nominated for an Academy Award for his role as the villainous Tommy Udo in his debut film, Kiss of Death...

      , Constance Towers
      Constance Towers
      -Early life:Towers was born in Whitefish, Montana, the daughter of Ardath L. and Harry J. Towers. According to her official Web site, a contract from Paramount Pictures was offered to her at age 11 but was declined...

       and Robert Stack
      Robert Stack
      Robert Stack was an American actor. In addition to acting in more than 40 films, he was the star of the 1959-1963 ABC television series The Untouchables and later served as the host of Unsolved Mysteries.-Early life:...

      .

External links

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