Kirk Douglas
1916 - 2020During his career, Douglas appeared in more than 90 movies and was known for his explosive acting style. He became an international star for his leading role as an unscrupulous boxing hero in Champion (1949), which brought him his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. Other early films include Young Man with a Horn (1950), Ace in the Hole (1951), and Detective Story (1951), a film for which he received a Golden Globe nomination as Best Actor in a Drama. He received a second Oscar nomination for his role in The Bad and the Beautiful (1952), and his third nomination for portraying Vincent van Gogh in Lust for Life (1956), which landed him a second Golden Globe nomination.
In 1955, Douglas established Bryna Productions, which produced films as varied as Paths of Glory (1957) and Spartacus (1960). He took the lead roles in both films. Douglas has been praised for helping to break the Hollywood blacklist by having Dalton Trumbo write Spartacus with an official on-screen credit. In 1963 Douglas starred in the Broadway play One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, a story that he purchased and later gave to his son Michael Douglas, who turned it into an Oscar-winning film.
As an actor and philanthropist, Douglas received an Oscar for Lifetime Achievement, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. As an author, he wrote ten novels and memoirs. He is No. 17 on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest male screen legends of classic Hollywood cinema.
Kirk Douglas died at age 103.
FBI contre Hollywood
Xavier Villetard
Kirk Douglas, Sylvia Jarrico
Based on information from FBI cases, this documentary investigates the dark years of American cinema and attempts to discover the mechanisms leading to one of the most diabolical periods in US history.
FBI contre Hollywood
Out of the Past
Jacques Tourneur
Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer
Jeff Bailey seems to be a mundane gas station owner in remote Bridgeport, California. He is dating local girl Ann Miller and lives a quiet life. But Jeff has a secret past, and when a mysterious stranger arrives in town, Jeff is forced to return to the dark world he had tried to escape.
Out of the Past
Spartacus
Stanley Kubrick
Kirk Douglas, Laurence Olivier
The rebellious Thracian Spartacus, born and raised a slave, is sold to Gladiator trainer Batiatus. After weeks of being trained to kill for the arena, Spartacus turns on his owners and leads the other slaves in rebellion. As the rebels move from town to town, their numbers swell as escaped slaves join their ranks. Under the leadership of Spartacus, they make their way to southern Italy, where they will cross the sea and return to their homes.
Spartacus
The Bad and the Beautiful
Vincente Minnelli
Lana Turner, Kirk Douglas
Told in flashback form, the film traces the rise and fall of a tough, ambitious Hollywood producer, Jonathan Shields, as seen through the eyes of various acquaintances, including a writer, James Lee Bartlow; a star, Georgia Lorrison; and a director, Fred Amiel. He is a hard-driving, ambitious man who ruthlessly uses everyone on the way to becoming one of Hollywood's top movie makers.
The Bad and the Beautiful
Cameraman: The Life and Work of Jack Cardiff
Craig McCall
Jack Cardiff, Martin Scorsese
In 2001 Jack Cardiff (1914-2009) became the first director of photography in the history of the Academy Awards to win an Honorary Oscar. But the first time he clasped the famous statuette in his hand was a half-century earlier when his Technicolor camerawork was awarded for Powell and Pressburger's Black Narcissus. Beyond John Huston's The African Queen and King Vidor's War and Peace, the films of the British-Hungarian creative duo (The Red Shoes and A Matter of Life and Death too) guaranteed immortality for the renowned cameraman whose career spanned seventy years.
Cameraman: The Life and Work of Jack Cardiff
If You're Not In The Obit, Eat Breakfast
Daniel Gold, Danny Gold
Carl Reiner, Mel Brooks
Irrepressible writer-comedian Carl Reiner, who shows no signs of slowing down at 94, tracks down celebrated nonagenarians, and a few others over 100, to show how the twilight years can truly be the happiest and most rewarding. Among those who share their insights into what it takes to be vital and productive in older age are Mel Brooks, Dick Van Dyke, Kirk Douglas, Norman Lear, Betty White and Tony Bennett.
If You're Not In The Obit, Eat Breakfast
Detective Story
William Wyler
Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Parker
Tells the story of one day in the lives of the various people who populate a police detective squad. An embittered cop, Det. Jim McLeod, leads a precinct of characters in their grim daily battle with the city's lowlife. The characters who pass through the precinct over the course of the day include a young petty embezzler, a pair of burglars, and a naive shoplifter.
Detective Story