The Giant of Marathon

Jacques Tourneur was a French-American film director. Born in Paris, France, he was the son of film director Maurice Tourneur. At age 10, Jacques moved to the United States with his father. He started a career in cinema while still attending high school as an extra and later as a script clerk in... various silent films. Both Maurice and Jacques returned to France after his father worked on the film The Mysterious Island in 1925. Tourneur died in 1977 in Bergerac, Dordogne, France. Jacques began work as an editor and assistant director. He made his debut as a director on French short film Tout ca ne vaut pas l'amour in 1931. Jacques Tourneur went back to Hollywood in 1934 where he had a contract with MGM Studios. While working as the second unit director on the film A Tale of Two Cities he met film producer Val Lewton. Tourneur made his feature debut as director in the 1939 film They All Come Out in 1939. After Tourneur was dropped by MGM in 1941, he was picked up by Lewton to film several acclaimed low-budget horror films for RKO Studios including Cat People and I Walked with a Zombie.
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Mario Bava was an Italian director, screenwriter, special effects artist, and cinematographer remembered as one of the greatest names from the "golden age" of Italian horror films. Mario Bava was born in Sanremo, Liguria, Italy. The son of Eugenio Bava, a sculptor who became a pioneer of special... effects photography and subsequently one of the great cameramen of Italian silent pictures, Mario Bava's first ambition was to become a painter. Unable to turn out paintings at a profitable rate, he went into his father's business, working as an assistant to other Italian cinematographers like Massimo Terzano, while also offering assistance to his father who headed the special effects department at Benito Mussolini's film factory, the Istituto LUCE. Bava became a cinematographer in his own right in 1939, shooting two short films with Roberto Rossellini. He made his feature debut in the early 1940s. Bava's camerawork was an instrumental factor in developing the screen personas of such stars of the period as Gina Lollobrigida, Steve Reeves and Aldo Fabrizi.
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