John Huston
Son of actor Walter Huston,legendary director John Huston's penchant for creating entertaining, Hemingway-esque films likely stemmed from his free-wheeling upbringing on the vaudeville circuit (and legitimate thea-tah stages), his man's-man love of boxing, cussing, and hunting, and his stint in the Mexican cavalry. As one observer commented, "John wrote his life as a script when he was very young, and has played it ever since." Huston began in filmmaking as a screenwriter, contributing to such successful screenplays as Jezebel (1938) and High Sierra (1941) under a contract with Warner Bros. The studio supported Huston as both screenwriter and director in an adaptation of the novel The Maltese Falcon (1941). The film marked an astonishing directorial debut and is generally thought to be one of cinema's most influential masterpieces. Huston continued to produce an unbroken succession of important, if not always perfectly executed films. Some Huston films you don't want to miss: The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
(1948), Key Largo (1948), The African Queen and The Asphalt Jungle (both 1950), The Red Badge of Courage (1951), Beat the Devil (1953), The Misfits (1961), The Man Who Would Be King (1975), Wise Blood (1979), Prizzi's Honor (1985), and Huston's last completed film before his death in 1987, an adaptation of James Joyce's The Dead (1987).
