Today, we take a look at Best Director. By now, you should be somewhat familiar with the films involved: the actor-goes-nuts drama
A Double Life, the anti-anti-Semitism polemic
Gentleman's Agreement, its B-picture equivalent
Crossfire. The only ones we have not gone into detail about so far are
The Bishop's Wife, in which an angel comes to Earth to help a disillusioned bishop and his wife, and
Great Expectations, which I assume most of us know from our Dickens. If you
don't, it's about a poor boy who becomes a well-off young man thanks to a mysterious benefactor; the most famous element is a wealthy woman forever encased in the wedding dress she wore when she was jilted many many many years ago.
The nominees should be familiar to us all. George Cukor was a favorite of Katharine Hepburn's and was one of the initial directors of
Gone with the Wind.
A Double Life was his third of five nominations, and he
eventually won for My Fair Lady. Edward Dmytryk helmed many a noir, but this would be his first and only nod; better known is his status as one of the original Hollywood Ten held in contempt of Congress during the red scare, who saved himself from the Blacklist by later naming names. Elia Kazan received his first nomination for his fourth film - and won!
He went on to four more Best Director nods, one of which resulted in a second win, but more importantly, he became known as one of the great directors of the 1950s - and, yes, all time. He was unapologetic about naming names to the House Un-American Activities Committee, something that caused a bit of a rift in the audience of the 71st Academy Awards, where he received an Honorary Oscar.
Henry Koster did great and acclaimed films like
Harvey,
My Cousin Rachel,
The Robe,
Flower Drum Song...those all came after his nomination for
The Bishop's Wife, his first and only. And David Lean would become known for his epics, winning Oscars for
The Bridge on the River Kwai and
Lawrence of Arabia. In all, he received
eleven Academy Award nominations.
But let's talk about their work in
these movies. Let's do that after the jump.
