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From: reiher@ucla-cs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.movies
Subject: Re: Regarding the (virtually) unknown director, J. Lee Thompson
Message-ID: <4691@ucla-cs.ARPA>
Date: Sun, 7-Apr-85 02:04:57 EST
Article-I.D.: ucla-cs.4691
Posted: Sun Apr  7 02:04:57 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 10-Apr-85 03:12:36 EST
References: <556@cornell.UUCP> <1315@yale.ARPA> <220@spock.UUCP>
Reply-To: reiher@ucla-cs.UUCP (Peter Reiher)
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department
Lines: 37
Summary: 

In article <220@spock.UUCP> thrush@spock.UUCP (Patricia White '88 cc) writes:
>
>Has anyone besides me heard of J. Lee Thompson ?
>He directed a few great Gregory Peck films such as _The Guns of
>Navarone_ and _Cape Fear_ (a virtually unknown picture, but stupendous).

If Thompson is unknown, he has earned his obscurity.  Thompson was a solid
action/suspense director in the late fifties and early sixties, but, for
the last two decades, he's been responsible for some terrible films:
"John Goldfarb Please Come Home", "Mackenna's Gold", "Conquest of the
Planet of the Apes", "Battle for the Planet of the Apes", "The White Buffalo",
"The Greek Tycoon", and "The Passage".  He has also produced a few average
films in that period, but when your high point over a two decade period is
"Eye of the Cat", you must be doing something wrong.  He does not even have the
knack of producing popular bad movies, so I guess he must work quickly and
cheaply to keep getting films after so many flops.

>He also directed last year's box office flop _The Ambassadors_ (or was
>it just _The Ambassador_ ?  I forget.) starring Rock Hudson and Robert
>Mitchum.  

This one must be really obscure.  I've never heard of it, which essentially
means it didn't get an LA release, unusual for a film with two big name
stars.  I'd bet it must be really bad or really offbeat.

>What else has he done ?

Well, the other stuff worth mentioning is: "Desert Attack", "Tiger Bay",
"Northwest Frontier" (aka "Flame Over India", an excellent film), "I Aim
at the Stars" (a biography of Werner von Braun which apparently sends
knowledgeable folks into hysterics), "Taras Bulba", "Kings of the Sun" 
(Mayans migrate to Florida), "Huckleberry Finn" (1974), "The Reincarnation
of Peter Proud", and "St. Ives".
-- 
        			Peter Reiher
        			reiher@ucla-cs.arpa
        			{...ihnp4,ucbvax,sdcrdcf}!ucla-cs!reiher