Robert Wise (
September 10,
1914 –
September 14,
2005) was an
American sound effects editor, film editor, and
Academy Award-winning
American film producer and director. Among his many famous films are
The Sand Pebbles,
The Sound of Music,
West Side Story,
The Hindenburg, ,
The Day the Earth Stood Still,
Run Silent, Run Deep,
The Andromeda Strain,
The Set-Up,
The Haunting, and
The Body Snatcher. Wise's working period spanned the
1930s to the
1990s.
Often contrasted with contemporary "
auteur" directors such as
Stanley Kubrick who tended to bring a distinctive directorial "look" to a particular genre, Wise is famously viewed to have allowed his (sometimes studio assigned) story dictate style. Later critics such as
Martin Scorsese would go on to expand that characterization, insisting that despite Wise's notorious workaday concentration on stylistic perfection within the confines of genre and budget, his choice of subject matter and approach still functioned to identify Wise as an artist and not merely an artisan. Through whatever means, Wise's approach would bring him critical success as a director in many different traditional film genres: from
horror to
noir to
Western to
war films to
Science Fiction, to
musical and
drama, with many repeat hits within each genre. Wise's tendency towards professionalism led to a degree of preparedness which, though nominally motivated by studio budget constraints, nevertheless advanced the moviemaking art, with many
Academy Award-winning films the result.
Biography
Born in
Winchester,
Indiana, Wise began his movie career at RKO as a sound and music editor, but he soon grew to being nominated for the
Academy Award for Film Editing for
Citizen Kane in
1941: Wise was that film's last living crew member.
Though Wise worked only as editor on
Citizen Kane, it is likely that while working on the film he would become familiar with the optical printer techniques employed by Linwood Dunn, inventor of the practical
optical printer, to produce effects for
Citizen Kane such as the image projected in the broken
snowglobe which falls from Kane's hand as he dies. Though Wise was never known as a special-effects-driven director, echos of this 1940s high-tech special effects technology were to emerge in several of his important later films, such as
The Day the Earth Stood Still,
West Side Story, and . Wise could also make a movie special in the use of technique borrowed from one genre but applied to another genre: in his hands, a science fiction movie might acquire mood from a "haunted house" film, and vice versa. Wise sought never to waste the time (or salary) of the talented people who produced his features: the result was an impressively prolific series of films which showcase the talents of director, cast, and crew.
Wise attended Connersville High School in
Connersville, Indiana, and its auditorium, the Robert E. Wise Center for Performing Arts, is named in his honor.
In March of 1987, Wise accepted the Academy Award for Best Actor, on behalf of his absent friend,
Paul Newman, who won for his performance in
The Color of Money.
Wise becomes a director
First called as assistant director to shoot additional scenes for Welles's
The Magnificent Ambersons, Wise took his first directing job with the stylish horror film
The Curse of the Cat People in
1944, teaming with Hollywood horror producer/director
Val Lewton, a collaboration which would produce several notable horror films, among them
The Body Snatcher starring Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff, a film which in its acting direction deliberately evoked the groundbreaking horror films of the 1930s, while presenting a psychological horror film more in tune with the uncertainty of the 1940s.
In
1947, Wise directed the
Lawrence Tierney noir classic
Born to Kill and two years later directed the boxing movie
The Set-Up, where his direction of the real-time setting got him noticed. Wise's use and mention of time in this film would find echos in later
noir films such as Stanley Kubrick's
The Killing and Quentin Tarantino's
Pulp Fiction.
In the
1950s, Wise proved adept in several genres, from the
science fiction of
The Day the Earth Stood Still to the melodramatic
So Big, to Susan Hayward's Oscar winner in
I Want to Live!, for which he was nominated for
Best Director.
In
1961, teamed with
Jerome Robbins, he won the
Academy Award for Best Director for
West Side Story, which he also produced. He repeated this achievement in
1965 with
The Sound of Music.
The Sound of Music was an interim film for Wise, produced to mollify the studio while he developed the difficult film
The Sand Pebbles, starring
Steve McQueen,
Richard Attenborough and
Candice Bergen. Set in the late 1920s in
China, this was Wise's entry in a spate of
Vietnam war era films (
Catch-22,
M*A*S*H), which, though set in other periods of wartime, nevertheless sounded with its depictions of
gunboat diplomacy what would come to be recognized as
timeless themes. Wise would later speak of
The Sand Pebbles as the film he most wanted to direct, though he had earlier explored such anti-war themes in movies such as
The Day the Earth Stood Still.
In the 1970s he directed such films as
The Andromeda Strain,
The Hindenburg, the horror film
Audrey Rose, and the first
Star Trek film, . In 1989 he directed
Rooftops, his last theatrical feature film.
Even in his twilight years, Wise continued to be active in productions of DVD versions of his films, even making public appearances promoting those films.
Wise was a past president of both the
Directors Guild of America and the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He has a star on the
Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6338 Hollywood Blvd.
After suffering a
heart attack at home, Wise was rushed to
UCLA Medical Center, where he died from heart failure. He died on
14 September 2005, four days after his birthday.
Academy Awards and nominations
Filmography
As director / producer
As editor / assistant editor
External links
Robert Wise is the name of:
- Robert Wise (1914-2005), Academy Award-winning American film producer and director
- Bob Wise (born 1948), U.S. Governor of West Virginia
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West Side Story is a 1961 film directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins.
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All Movie Guide profile
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Rodgers and Hammerstein's The Sound of Music is a 1965 film directed by Robert Wise and starring Julie Andrews in the lead role.
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The Academy Award for Best Motion Picture is one of the Academy Awards, awards given to people working in the motion picture industry by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which are voted on by others within the industry.
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Official website
All Movie Guide profile
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West Side Story is a 1961 film directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins.
..... Click the link for more information.
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile
Rodgers and Hammerstein's The Sound of Music is a 1965 film directed by Robert Wise and starring Julie Andrews in the lead role.
..... Click the link for more information.
The Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award is awarded periodically at the Academy Awards ceremonies to "Creative producers, whose bodies of work reflect a consistently high quality of motion picture production.
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The AFI Life Achievement Award (not to be confused with the Honorary Academy Award) was established by the Board of Directors of the American Film Institute on February 26, 1973 to honor a single individual for his or her lifetime contribution to enriching American culture through
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September 10 is the 1st day of the year (2nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 0 days remaining.
Events
- 506 - The bishops of Visigothic Gaul meet in the Council of Agde.
..... Click the link for more information. 19th century - 20th century - 21st century
1880s 1890s 1900s - 1910s - 1920s 1930s 1940s
1911 1912 1913 - 1914 - 1915 1916 1917
Year 1914 (MCMXIV
..... Click the link for more information.
September 14 is the 1st day of the year (2nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 0 days remaining.
Events
- 786 - Harun al-Rashid becomes the Abbasid caliph upon the death of his brother al-Hadi.
..... Click the link for more information. 20th century - 21st century - 22nd century
1970s 1980s 1990s - 2000s - 2010s 2020s 2030s
2002 2003 2004 - 2005 - 2006 2007 2008
2005 by topic:
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Motto
"In God We Trust" (since 1956)
"E Pluribus Unum" ("From Many, One"; Latin, traditional)
Anthem
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Academy Award
Awarded for Excellence in cinematic achievements
Presented by Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
Country United States
First awarded May 16, 1929 to honor achievements of 1927/1928
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"In God We Trust" (since 1956)
"E Pluribus Unum" ("From Many, One"; Latin, traditional)
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IMDb profile
The Sand Pebbles (1966), directed by Robert Wise, is a period war story of an independent, rebellious U.S. Navy machinist sailor aboard the USS San Pablo gunboat on flag-waving river patrols in 1920s China.
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All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile
Rodgers and Hammerstein's The Sound of Music is a 1965 film directed by Robert Wise and starring Julie Andrews in the lead role.
..... Click the link for more information.
Official website
All Movie Guide profile
|/ IMDb profile
West Side Story is a 1961 film directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins.
..... Click the link for more information.