Edgar G. Ulmer
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Edgar Georg Ulmer (September 17, 1904 – September 30, 1972) was an Austrian-American film director. He is best remembered for the movies The Black Cat (1934) and Detour (1945). These stylish and eccentric works have achieved cult status, whereas Ulmer's other films remain relatively unknown.
The first feature he directed in North America, Damaged Lives (1933), was a low-budget exploitation film exposing the horrors of venereal disease. His next film, The Black Cat (1934), starring Béla Lugosi and Boris Karloff, was made for a major studio, Universal Pictures. Demonstrating the striking visual style that would be Ulmer's hallmark, the film was Universal's biggest hit of the season. Ulmer, however, had begun an affair with Shirley Beatrice Kassler, who had been married since 1933 to independent producer Max Alexander, nephew of Universal studio head Carl Laemmle. Kassler's divorce in 1936 and her marriage to Ulmer later the same year led to his being exiled from the major Hollywood studios. Ulmer was relegated to making B movies at Poverty Row production houses. His wife, now Shirley Ulmer, acted as script supervisor on nearly all of these films, and she wrote the screenplays for several. Their daughter, Arianne, appeared as an extra in several of his films.
Consigned to the fringes of the U.S. motion picture industry, Ulmer specialized first in "ethnic films," notably in Ukrainian—Natalka Poltavka (1937), Cossacks in Exile (1939)—and Yiddish—The Light Ahead (1939), Americaner Shadchen (1940). The best-known of these ethnic films is the Yiddish Green Fields (1937), co-directed with Jacob Ben-Ami. Ulmer eventually found a niche making melodramas on tiny budgets and with often unpromising scripts and actors for Producers Releasing Corporation (PRC), with Ulmer describing himself as "the Frank Capra of PRC". His PRC thriller Detour (1945) has won considerable acclaim as a prime example of low-budget film noir, and it was selected by the Library of Congress among the first group of 100 American films worthy of special preservation efforts. In 1947, Ulmer made Carnegie Hall with the help of conductor Fritz Reiner, godfather of the Ulmers' daughter, Arianné. The film features performances by many leading figures in classical music, including Reiner, Jascha Heifetz, Artur Rubinstein, Gregor Piatigorsky and Lily Pons. Ulmer did get a chance to direct two films with substantial budgets, The Strange Woman (1946) and Ruthless (1948). The former, featuring a strong performance by Hedy Lamarr, is regarded by critics as one of Ulmer's best. In 1951 he directed a low-budget science-fiction film with a noirish tone, The Man from Planet X. In 1964 he directed his last film, The Cavern, in Italy. Description above from the Wikipedia article Edgar G. Ulmer, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Photos
Movies (88)
The Astrologer
1976 · Production Sound Mixer
The Cavern
1964 · Director, Producer
The World's Greatest Sinner
1962 · Director of Photography
Journey Beneath the Desert
1961 · Set Designer, Director
Beyond the Time Barrier
1960 · Director
The Amazing Transparent Man
1960 · Director
Hannibal
1959 · Director
The Naked Venus
1959 · Director
Swiss Family Robinson: Lost in the Jungle
1958 · Adaptation, Director, Producer
Daughter of Dr. Jekyll
1957 · Director
The Perjured Farmer
1956 · Producer
The Naked Dawn
1955 · Director
Murder Is My Beat
1955 · Director
Loves of Three Queens
1954 · Director
The Fate of Two Queens
1954 · Director
Babes in Bagdad
1952 · Director, Production Design
St. Benny the Dip
1951 · Director
The Man from Planet X
1951 · Director
So Young, So Bad
1950 · Director
The Pirates of Capri
1949 · Director
Ruthless
1948 · Director
Carnegie Hall
1947 · Director
The Strange Woman
1946 · Writer, Director
Her Sister's Secret
1946 · Director
The Wife of Monte Cristo
1946 · Director, Adaptation
Detour
1945 · Director
Club Havana
1945 · Director
Strange Illusion
1945 · Director
Bluebeard
1944 · Director
Minstrel Man
1944 · Second Unit Director, Director, Production Design
Jive Junction
1943 · Director
Danger! Women at Work
1943 · Story
Isle of Forgotten Sins
1943 · Director, Screenplay
Hitler's Madman
1943 · Writer, Production Design
Girls in Chains
1943 · Story, Director
My Son, The Hero
1943 · Director, Writer
Corregidor
1943 · Story, Screenplay
Turbosupercharger: Flight Operation
1943 · Director
The Turbosupercharger - Master of the sky
1943 · Director
Tomorrow We Live
1942 · Director
Prisoner of Japan
1942 · Story
Another to Conquer
1941 · Director
Goodbye, Mr. Germ
1940 · Director, Producer
Diagnostic Procedures in Tuberculosis
1940 · Director
They Do Come Back
1940 · Director
Cloud in the Sky
1940 · Director, Screenplay, Producer
American Matchmaker
1940 · Director, Producer
Way Down South
1939 · Art Direction
The Light Ahead
1939 · Director, Screenplay, Production Design
Moon Over Harlem
1939 · Producer, Director
Let My People Live
1939 · Writer, Director
Cossacks in Exile
1939 · Director
The Singing Blacksmith
1938 · Director
Natalka Poltavka
1937 · Director
Green Fields
1937 · Director
From Nine to Nine
1936 · Director, Original Story
We Live Again
1934 · Writer
Thunder Over Texas
1934 · Director
I Can't Escape
1934 · Second Unit
The Black Cat
1934 · Story, Director, Costume Design, Set Designer
Queen Christina
1934 · Production Design
Damaged Lives
1933 · Director, Writer
Kleiner Mann – was nun?
1933 · Set Designer
Afraid to Talk
1932 · Art Direction
Tabu: A Story of the South Seas
1931 · Production Manager, Screenplay, Supervising Editor
M
1931 · Set Designer
Aloha
1931 · Assistant Director
The Secret Six
1931 · Production Design
People on Sunday
1930 · Director, Executive Producer
City Girl
1930 · Assistant Art Director
Spiel um den Mann
1929 · Art Direction
Flucht in die Fremdenlegion
1929 · Art Direction, Line Producer
4 Devils
1928 · Assistant Art Director
The Street of Sin
1928 · Set Designer
Spies
1928 · Set Designer
Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
1927 · Assistant Art Director
Metropolis
1927 · Set Designer
The Border Sheriff
1926 · Assistant Director
Lady Windermere's Fan
1925 · Art Direction
Joyless Street
1925 · Set Designer
The Last Laugh
1924 · Assistant Director, Production Design
Die Nibelungen: Kriemhild's Revenge
1924 · Set Designer
The Saga of Gösta Berling
1924 · Set Designer
Die Nibelungen: Siegfried
1924 · Set Designer
The Finances of the Grand Duke
1924 · Production Design, Assistant Director
Merry-Go-Round
1923 · Art Direction
Sodom and Gomorrah
1922 · Production Design
The Golem: How He Came into the World
1920 · Set Designer
TV shows (0)
No credits available.