To the Last Man

Victor Lonzo Fleming was an American film director, cinematographer, and producer. His most popular films were The Wizard of Oz , and Gone with the Wind , for which he won an Academy Award for Best Director. Fleming was born in La Canada, California, the son of Elizabeth Evaleen and William... Alonzo "Lon" Fleming, who worked in the water industry in Pasadena. His mother was of part German descent. Fleming served in the photographic section during World War I, and acted as chief photographer for President Woodrow Wilson in Versailles, France. He showed a mechanical aptitude early in life; while working as a car mechanic he met the director Allan Dwan, who took him on as a camera assistant. Fleming soon rose to the rank of cinematographer, working with both Dwan and D. W. Griffith, and directed his first film in 1919. Many of Fleming's silent films were action movies, often starring Douglas Fairbanks, or Westerns, and with his robust attitude and love of outdoor sports he became known as a "man's director". But he also proved an effective director of women.
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Henry Hathaway was an American film director and producer. He is best known as a director of Westerns, especially starring Randolph Scott and John Wayne. Born Henri Leonard de Fiennes in Sacramento, California, he was the son of an American actor and stage manager, Rhody Hathaway , and a... Hungarian-born Belgian aristocrat, Marquise Lillie de Fiennes , who acted under the name Jean Hathaway. This branch of the de Fiennes family came to America in the 19th century on behalf of King Leopold I of Belgium and was part of the negotiations with the Belgian Prime Minister, Charles Rogier , to secure the 1862 treaty between Belgium and what was then known as the Sandwich Islands and is now called Hawaii. In 1925, Hathaway began working in silent films as an assistant to notable directors such as Victor Fleming and Josef von Sternberg and made the transition to sound with them. He was the assistant director to Fred Niblo in the 1925 version of Ben-Hur starring Francis X. Bushman and Ramon Novarro.
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