Monte Hellman Latest Celebrity News & Gossip

Steven Gaydos Executive VP of ContentDecades ago, in his landmark “Biographical Dictionary of Film,” critic David Thomson said of filmmaking legend Francis Coppola: “No one retains so many jubilant traits of the kid moviemaker.” As Coppola approaches production on “Megalopolis,” his biggest, most creatively ambitious project of the 21st century, that description seems more apt than ever.And a quick glance at the Variety archives vividly illustrates Coppola’s explosive emergence as a veritable force of nature while still enrolled as a film student at UCLA.The wunderkind announced his arrival with his name blasted in a Variety page one headline as the winner of a student screenwriting competition.

Muhammad Ali biopic The Greatest (1977) and the spy thriller Avalanche Express (1979) – after their directors died mid-shoot; he also shot second-unit footage for RoboCop (1987). Iguana (1988) was at least a Hellman original, an eccentric meditation on power about a disfigured harpooner who appoints himself king of a remote island, though the director himself dismissed it as “terrible”.

Who was Monte Hellman? The iconic director, who passed away on April 20, never became a household name in the way that some of his contemporaries did. He never made a purely commercial career maneuver; even when he was offered the chance to direct the third film in the “Silent Night, Deadly Night” franchise, his acceptance of said assignment felt like more of a defiantly personal choice than any kind of bid for mainstream acceptance.

The Shooting and Two-Lane Blacktop among others, passed away on Tuesday (April 20).His daughter Melissa confirmed the news to the Hollywood Reporter, saying he died at Eisenhower Health hospital in Palm Desert, a week after suffering a fall in his home.“He was my best friend,” Melissa told the publication.The filmmaker had collaborated with Jack Nicholson on Back Door to Hell and Flight to Fury, and worked with Warren Oates four times and called the actor his “alter ego”.Hellman served as an

Steven Gaydos Executive VP of ContentOn the release of what was to be the late Monte Hellman’s final feature film in 2011, critic Steve Erickson noted “Monte Hellman is the ultimate outlaw filmmaker.”A decade earlier, filmmaker-critic Kent Jones wrote that “anything written in America about Monte Hellman … cinema’s most under-appreciated great director … must be a defense.”Decades before Jones’ astute assessment, film critic David Thomson had noted, “No system could digest the willful

Monte Hellman was a director whose cult classic films include “Two-Lane Blacktop.”Hellman’s directorial career began with the 1959 horror movie “Beast from Haunted Cave.” It was produced by Roger Corman and his brother, and the cult film legend helped launch Hellman’s career.

confirmed the news to the Hollywood Reporter, saying Hellman had died in hospital after a fall at his home. Hellman was born Monte Himmelman in 1929, and after studying theatre at Stanford University set up a theatre company in Los Angeles.

Monte Hellman, the maverick director and protege of Roger Corman who helmed the existential cult classics The Shooting and Two-Lane Blacktop, died Tuesday. He was 91.

Influential director Monte Hellman, whose 1971 film Two-Lane Blacktop starring musicians James Taylor and Dennis Wilson became a counterculture cult classic, died Tuesday. He was 91.

Tim Gray Senior Vice PresidentMonte Hellman, the maverick director of such films as “Two-Lane Blacktop,” “The Shooting” and “Road to Nowhere,” died April 20 at Eisenhower Medical Center in Palm Desert, Calif., following a fall in his home on April 19.