Samuel Fuller was born to be outside the studio system. His films, the low-budget B-pictures that studios added to their inexpensive productions for a cheap buck, have turned out to be some of the more acclaimed pictures in retrospect. While the Production Code was still in effect, Fuller wrote themes that were too dark and controversial for major studios to produce, thus, was never given a major award in his life. Yet, his career lasted almost sixty years, and important names like Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, and Jim Jarmusch cited his works as influential to them.

He was born on August 12, 1912, in Worcester, Massachusetts. As a young child, he had a speech impediment problem and did not say his words until he was five years old. According to Fuller, the first word he said was, “hammer.” At age 11, his father died, and the family moved to New York City. His first jobs were in the newspaper business, something that would play a major influence in his own stories, first, as a copyboy, then as a crime reporter by age 17. The biggest story he broke was the sudden death of actress Jeanne Eagels, who would become the first posthumous Oscar nominee for her performance in The Letter. Fuller would also write pulp novels at this time and would continue to write them for the rest of his career.

In the 30s, Fuller would transition into screenwriting, receiving his first writing credit in the musical comedy Hats Off. He continued to write a steady stream of films, even as Fuller went into the Army for World War II. He fought in North Africa, France, and Belgium before going into Germany and liberating the Flossenbürg concentration camp when an estimated 30,000 people died. Fuller filmed the area that would be used in tribunals against Nazi officers and be selected by the U.S. National Film Registry in 2014. He would co-write a book about the history of his unit, the 16th Infantry Regiment, later on. By the end of the war, Fuller was a Corporal and was awarded multiple times for his service before returning to Hollywood, taking the war with him in his future works.

Tired of seeing films he wrote getting butchered by the directors, Fuller sought to be one himself with his scripts, I Shot Jesse James and The Barron of Arizona. Like Preston Sturges who became a director by accepting a fee of just $1, Fuller convinced the producer to let him try without any extra payment besides his writing. Both films were made with low budgets and tight shooting schedules, but Fuller got them done on time and under budget with good results. It was his third film, The Steel Helmet, a Korean War drama that made Fuller into a recognized director. Shot for $104,000, it grossed $2 million and was recognized for speaking about racism (opposing the word ‘gook’) and reference to the country interning Japanese-Americans during the Second World War, ruffling some feathers with the Army. It took ten days to film, using Griffth Park for exteriors and hiring students from UCLA as extras.

Darryl F. Zanuck would sign Fuller to make seven films for 20th Century Fox, all under Fuller’s own production company, and made on low budgets. This included Park Row, a film noir surrounding the New York newspaper business, Pickup On South Street, which received an Oscar nod for Thelma Ritter’s performance, and the Cold War submarine thriller Hell And High Water, which Zanuck assigned him to with the use of CinemaScope and Technicolor. Park Row was Fuller’s favorite film he made because of how much he knew of the life and is made in the same mood as Sweet Smell Of Success, another story about the newspaper business that came out years later. In Pickup, J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI, met Zanuck and Fuller, saying he hated the film because of the depiction of an agent committing bribery. Zanuck agreed to take out FBI references in its advertising but backed Fuller’s film completely. Fuller was released from his contract one film short as he sought to direct another war drama, Verboten!, which became the final film produced by RKO Radio Pictures in 1959.

Fuller would continue on his dark, independent streak in the 60s with two films later picked up by the Criterion Collection: Shock Corridor and The Naked Kiss. In the former, Peter Breck plays a reporter who wants to win a Pulitzer Prize, and solving a mysterious murder in a psychiatric institution will win it for him. To get inside, he fakes a mental illness and tries to speak to any witnesses, but the behavior they exhibit is far more dangerous than the reporter expects. The film references the threat of nuclear annihilation, communist indoctrination (like The Manchurian Candidate), and the ongoing Civil Rights Movement between pro-integration and the white supremacists who wanted to stop them. In the latter film, Constance Towers plays a prostitute trying to leave it all behind by running away into the next town, trying to prove she has reformed herself. As she seems to find love and someone who believes her, the scandal that surrounded her before comes back shockingly.

Fuller would not be noted again until the early 80s with two controversial pictures. First, there was The Big Red One, another war film Fuller planed to make in the 50s, but conflicts with Warner Brothers scrapped the project. Friend Peter Bogdonavich helped revive the project for Paramount but was also shelved before Bogdonavich brought in a third producer when he pulled out of the film and released it in 1980 for United Artists. Despite good reviews, the film was heavily cut against Fuller’s wishes; the restored version was shown in 2004 to critical acclaim. Then, came 1982’s White Dog, which he wrote with future Oscar-winner, Curtis Hanson. A film about a black dog trainer who tries to deprogram a ‘white dog,’ a dog who is programmed to attack black people, Fuller and Paramount Pictures came under fire from the NAACP who said the movie was inflammatory (without having seen it, but aware of the book it’s based on) and threatened to boycott its release. Even with some changes, Paramount gave the film an extremely limited release and shelved it. Black Dog would get its first DVD/Blu-Ray release in 2008 through Criterion.

Fuller, hurt by Paramount’s self-censorship on what many critics said was an anti-racist movie, moved to France and never worked on a Hollywood film again. He would make three more films, his last being 1990’s The Madonna And The Dragon with Jennifer Beals, and his final credit being co-writer of the film Girls In Prison. After a serious stroke, Fuller moved back to the States where died in 1997, aged 85. His legacy was by then cemented as an outsider who produced top-quality works with half of the budget other films had. Younger filmmakers visited the elder Fuller in appreciation of his career and his movies are at the Academy Film Archive, even though he was never nominated personally. Fuller’s autobiography, A Third Face: My Tale of Writing, Fighting, and Filmmaking, was published posthumously in 2002. And, even today, his gritty pictures are be viewed by new students and still respected by the cinephile community.

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After producing his magnum opus, The Rules Of The Game, Jean Renoir, and his later wife, Dido Freire, fled from France to Hollywood to escape the Nazis. While he became a naturalized American citizen, Renoir could not have the same freedom as he did in editing his works, nor the influence to make whatever he wanted in the Hollywood system. While they were fairly successful, they did not fully come to his satisfaction and decided to make his future works outside of the United States. Because of the viciousness he received after making The Rules Of The Game, Renoir was reluctant to return home, but he was given the resources from there and other producers in different countries to make his own projects in his respected vision. It would be the first of a string of noted films that Renoir finally made in gorgeous Technicolor.

The River (1951)

The first colored film was shot on location in India and is very pretty. The story deals with a young girl, Harriet, who comes from an affluent English background who lives with her siblings on the edges of the Ganges River. It’s a coming-of-age story with the theme of first love and heartbreak. The river and its various shades of light is a symbol of life and the dreams that India produces for its beauty. It serves as a bridge of the cultures and a representative of Hinduism to Christianity. People are born along the holy river and in death find their remains scattered in. There is no biting satire as in Renoir’s 30s works but instead gives us the romantic but bitterly truthful and authentic touch of expressive love. The River is one of Martin Scorsese’s all-time favorites (note the video above) and played a role in Wes Anderson’s directing of The Darjeeling Limited. 

The Golden Coach (1953)

In 18th-century Peru, the viceroy of Peru buys a pretty horse buggy (hence the title) for the headliner of a touring theatre instead of his mistress. When it is discovered, the viceroy is threatened with expulsion for buying an expensive gift with public money to impress the lead singer, Camilla. The buggy becomes the centerpiece in a comedy about the corruption of a misled love. Anna Magnani, who plays Camilla, made her breakthrough in the Italian neorealist Rome Open City. Her presence is full of energy and she is clearly a gorgeous woman who was the foreign Rita Hayworth in terms of being a bombshell for the time. As seen in his next film, music becomes the rhythm of the mood, here by the composer Antonio Vivaldi. The theme to this, as in The River, is regular life is not suited for everyone. The government official cannot force his love onto others and Camilla cannot simply walk out on the stage life; her total happiness is constricted to the stage.

French Cancan (1955)

In nineteenth-century Paris, a stage director (Jean Gabin, who starred in Renoir’s Grand Illusion and La Bête Humaine) works on recreating an old dance that is a sensual tease. However, the director finds himself attracted to a new dancer even as he sets the performance for his girlfriend. It was another rich colorful film and one Francois Truffaut proclaimed it as a major turning point for French color films, saying, “Every scene is a cartoon in movement.” This was his father’s Paris, reflecting the era of impressionist art that was the popular form as seen in the backgrounds. The music is lively, the audience is international, and life, even with the sudden complications of love and what Paris can do, is celebrated in grandiose style. French Cancan was a commercial success, the last one he would ever have.

Elena and Her Men (1956)

What is really the last good film by Renoir is a free-spirited romantic comedy about a Polish princess (Ingrid Bergman) who is engaged to a wealthy man but finds herself in love with the officer Count de Chevincourt (Mel Ferrer, who later married another fictional princess, Audrey Hepburn) For the Count, he is used in influencing a military coup as the princess is known for her blessings of good luck. It becomes a love triangle of loyalty to country, honoring commitments, and political intrigue. The story is a farce type of romance, albeit a “cynical” one, as said by Christopher Faulkner. However, the social criticism that could be slightly interpreted is one of light and certainly a happier ending than his previous works. For the princess, she uses her power as an attractive woman to play the strings of her men’s desires.

Unlike his work in the 30s, this was a more fun time and one where Renoir slowly got reacquainted with French cinema because of his bitter split from the country. He transferred into modern times with Technicolor and permits it to flourish the screen on all corners to capture the exotic scenery. Renoir’s modernism came right before the French New Wave began, making this his last hoorah as a captivating filmmaker before being relegated to a respected legend that was outdated for the current times. Yet, those directors who would surpass him and future students would look at his latter half as pure Renoirean as his masterpieces from three decades before.