John Cassavetes
American filmmaker and actor (1929–1989)
John Nicholas Cassavetes (December 9, 1929 – February 3, 1989) was an American filmmaker and actor. He began as an actor in film and television before helping to pioneer modern American independent cinema as a writer and director, often self-financing, producing, and distributing his own films. He received nominations for three Academy Awards, two BAFTA Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, and an Emmy Award.
After studying at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, Cassavetes started his career in television acting in numerous network dramas. From 1959 to 1960 he played the title role in the NBC detective series "Johnny Staccato". He acted in notable films, such as Martin Ritt's film noir "Edge of the City" (1957), Robert Aldrich's war film "The Dirty Dozen" (1967), Roman Polanski's horror film "Rosemary's Baby" (1968) and Elaine May's crime drama "Mikey and Nicky" (1976). For "The Dirty Dozen", he earned a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.
As a director, Cassavetes became known for a string of critically acclaimed independent dramas including "Shadows" (1959), "Faces" (1968), "Husbands" (1970), "A Woman Under the Influence" (1974), "Opening Night" (1977), and "Love Streams" (1984). His films employed an actor-centered approach which prioritized raw character relationships and "small feelings" while rejecting traditional Hollywood storytelling, method acting, and stylization. His films became associated with an improvisational aesthetic and a cinéma vérité feel. He received Academy Award nominations for Best Original Screenplay ("Faces") and Best Director ("A Woman Under the Influence").
He frequently collaborated with American actress Gena Rowlands (to whom he was married from 1954 until his death in 1989) and friends Peter Falk, Ben Gazzara, and Seymour Cassel. Many of his films were shot and edited in his and Rowlands' own Los Angeles home.
He and Rowlands had a son named Nick and two daughters, named Alexandra and Zoe, all of whom followed them into acting and filmmaking.
Early life and education.
John Nicholas Cassavetes was born in New York City on December 9, 1929, the son of Greek-American actress Katherine Cassavetes (née Demetriou), who was later featured in some of his films, and Greek immigrant Nicholas John Cassavetes. His early years were spent with his family in Greece; when he returned to New York at the age of seven, he spoke no English. He was then raised on Long Island, where he attended Paul D. Schreiber Senior High School (then known as Port Washington High School) from 1945 to 1947 and participated in "Port Weekly" (the school paper), "Red Domino" (interclass play), football, and the "Port Light" (yearbook).
Cassavetes attended Blair Academy in New Jersey and spent a semester at Champlain College in Burlington, Vermont, but was expelled due to his failing grades. He spent a few weeks hitchhiking to Florida and then transferred to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, encouraged by recently enrolled friends who told him the school was "packed with girls". He graduated in 1950 and met his future wife Gena Rowlands at her audition to enter the Academy in 1953. They were married four months later in 1954. He continued acting in the theater, took small parts in films, and began working on television in anthology series such as "Alcoa Theatre".
Career.
Acting workshop.
By 1956, Cassavetes had begun teaching an alternative to method acting in his own workshop—co-founded with friend Burt Lane in New York City—in which performance would be based on character creation rather than back-story or narrative requirements. Cassavetes particularly scorned Lee Strasberg's Method-based Actors Studio, and the Cassavetes-Lane approach held that acting should be an expression of creative joy rather than the "moody, broody anguish" associated with Strasberg's teaching.
Shortly after opening the workshop, Cassavetes was invited to audition at the Actors Studio, and he and Lane devised a prank: they claimed to be performing a scene from a recent stage production but in fact improvised a performance on the spot, fooling an impressed Strasberg. Cassavetes then fabricated a story about his financial troubles, prompting Strasberg to offer him a full scholarship to the Studio; Cassavetes immediately rejected it, feeling that Strasberg did not know anything about acting if he had been so easily fooled by the two ruses.
An improvisation exercise in the workshop inspired the idea for his writing and directorial debut, "Shadows" (1959; first version 1957). Cassavetes raised the funds for the production from friends and family, as well as listeners to Jean Shepherd's late-night radio talk-show "Night People". His stated purpose was to make a film about modest-income “little people”, unlike Hollywood studio productions, which focused on stories about wealthy people. Cassavetes was unable to gain American distribution of "Shadows", but it won the Critics Award at the Venice Film Festival. European distributors later released the movie in the United States as an import. Although the box-office returns of "Shadows" in the United States were slight, it did gain attention from the Hollywood studios.
Television and acting jobs.
Cassavetes played bit-parts in B pictures and in television serials, until gaining notoriety in 1955 as a vicious killer in "The Night Holds Terror," and as a juvenile delinquent in the live TV drama "Crime in the Streets". Cassavetes would repeat this performance credited as an “introducing” lead in the 1956 film version, which also included another future director, Mark Rydell, as his gang mate. His first starring role in a feature film was "Edge of the City" (1957), which co-starred Sidney Poitier. He was briefly under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and co-starred with Robert Taylor in the western "Saddle the Wind", written by Rod Serling. In the late 1950s, Cassavetes guest-starred in Beverly Garland's groundbreaking crime drama, "Decoy", about a New York City woman police undercover detective. Thereafter, he played Johnny Staccato, the title character in a television series about a jazz pianist who also worked as a private detective. In total he directed five episodes of the series, which also features a guest appearance by his wife Gena Rowlands. It was broadcast on NBC between September 1959 and March 1960, and then acquired by ABC; although critically acclaimed, the series was cancelled in September 1960. Cassavetes would appear on the NBC interview program, "Here's Hollywood".
1960s.
In 1961 Cassavetes signed a seven-year deal with Paramount. Cassavetes directed two movies for Hollywood in the early 1960s: "Too Late Blues" (1961); "A Child Is Waiting (1963)" starring Burt Lancaster and Judy Garland. He starred in the CBS western series "Rawhide" in the episode "Incident Near Gloomy River" (1961). In the 1963–1964 season he was cast in the ABC medical drama about psychiatry, "Breaking Point". In 1964, he again co-starred with his wife, this time in an episode of "The Alfred Hitchcock Hour" anthology program, and in 1965, he appeared on ABC's western series, "The Legend of Jesse James". In the same year, he also guest-starred in the World War II series "Combat!", in the episode "S.I.W.", and as the insane nuclear scientist Everett Lang in "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea", season 2, episode "The Peacemaker".
With payment for his work on television, as well as a handful of film acting jobs, he was able to relocate to California and to make his subsequent films independent of any studio, as "Shadows" had been made. The films in which he acted with this intention include Don Siegel's "The Killers" (1964), the motorcycle gang movie "Devil's Angels" (1967), "The Dirty Dozen" (1967), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, the Guy Woodhouse lead (originally intended for Robert Redford) in Roman Polanski's "Rosemary's Baby" (1968), and "The Fury" (1978). Cassavetes portrayed the murderer in a 1972 episode of the TV crime series "Columbo", titled "Étude in Black". Cassavetes and series star Peter Falk had previously starred together in the 1969 mob action thriller "Machine Gun McCain". The two later starred in Elaine May's film "Mikey and Nicky" (1976).
"Faces" (1968) was the second film to be both directed and independently financed by Cassavetes. The film starred his wife Gena Rowlands—whom he had married during his struggling actor days—John Marley, Seymour Cassel and Val Avery, as well as several first-time actors, such as lead actress Lynn Carlin and industry fringies like Vince Barbi. It depicts the slow disintegration of a contemporary marriage. The film reportedly took three years to make, and was made largely in the Cassavetes home. "Faces" was nominated for three Academy Awards: Best Original Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Supporting Actress. Around this time, Cassavetes formed "Faces International" as a distribution company to handle all of his films.
1970s.
In 1970, Cassavetes directed and acted in "Husbands", with actors Peter Falk and Ben Gazzara. They played a trio of married men on a spree in New York and London after the funeral of one of their best friends. Cassavetes stated that this was a personal film for him; his elder brother had died at the age of 30.
"Minnie and Moskowitz" (1971), about two unlikely lovers, featured Rowlands and Cassel. "A Woman Under the Influence" (1974) stars Rowlands as an increasingly troubled housewife. Rowlands received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, while Cassavetes was nominated for Best Director. In "The Killing of a Chinese Bookie" (1976), Gazzara plays a small-time strip-club owner with an out-of-control gambling habit, pressured by mobsters to commit a murder to pay off his debt.
In "Opening Night" (1977), Rowlands plays the lead alongside Cassavetes; the film also stars Gazzara and Joan Blondell. Rowlands portrays an aging film star named Myrtle Gordon, who is working in the theater and suffering a personal crisis. Alone and unloved by her colleagues, afraid of aging and always removed from others due to her stardom, she succumbs to alcohol and hallucinations after witnessing a young fan accidentally die. Ultimately, Gordon fights through it all, delivering the performance of her life in a play. Rowlands won the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the 28th Berlin International Film Festival for her performance.
1980s.
Cassavetes directed the film "Gloria" (1980), featuring Rowlands as a Mob moll who tries to protect an orphan boy whom the Mob wants to kill, which earned her another Best Actress nomination. In 1982, Cassavetes starred in Paul Mazursky's "Tempest," which co-starred Rowlands, Susan Sarandon, Molly Ringwald, Raúl Juliá and Vittorio Gassman.
Cassavetes penned the stage play "Knives", the earliest version of which he allowed to be published in the 1978 premiere issue of "On Stage", the quarterly magazine of the American Community Theatre Association, a division of the American Theatre Association. The play was produced and directed as one of his "Three Plays of Love and Hate" at Hollywood, California's Center Theater in 1981. The trio of plays included versions of Canadian playwright Ted Allan's "The Third Day Comes" and "Love Streams," the latter of which served as the blueprint for Cassavetes' 1984 film of the same name.
Cassavetes made the Cannon Films-financed "Love Streams" (1984), which featured him as an aging playboy who suffers the overbearing affection of his recently divorced sister. It was entered into the 34th Berlin International Film Festival where it won the Golden Bear. The film is often considered Cassavetes' "last film" in that it brought together many aspects of his previous films. He despised the film "Big Trouble" (1986), which he took over during filming from Andrew Bergman, who wrote the original screenplay. Cassavetes came to refer to the film as "The aptly titled 'Big Trouble,'" since the studio vetoed many of his decisions for the film and eventually edited most of it in a way with which Cassavetes disagreed.
In January 1987, Cassavetes was facing health problems, but he wrote the three-act play "Woman of Mystery" and brought it to the stage in May and June at the Court Theatre, Los Angeles.
Cassavetes worked during the last year of his life to produce a last film that was to be titled "She's Delovely". He was in talks with Sean Penn to star, though legal and financial hurdles proved insurmountable and the project was forgotten about until after Cassavetes' death, when his son Nick finally directed it as "She's So Lovely" (1997).
Filmmaking style.
Cassavetes spent the majority of his directing career working 'off the grid' and in a communal atmosphere "unfettered by the commercial concerns of Hollywood." His films aim to capture "small feelings" often repressed by Hollywood filmmaking, emphasizing intimate character examination and relationships rather than plot, backstory, or stylization. He often presented difficult characters whose behaviors were not easily understood, rejecting simplistic psychological or narrative explanations for their actions. Cassavetes also disregarded the "impressionistic cinematography, linear editing, and star-centred scene making" fashionable in Hollywood and art films. Often unable to interest Hollywood studios in financing his work, Cassavetes typically worked with small but dedicated crew of friends and technicians. He said: "The hardest thing for a film-maker, or a person like me, is to find people … who really want to do something."
Cassavetes worked to create a comfortable and informal environment where actors could freely experiment with their performances and go beyond acting clichés or "programmed behaviors." He dismissed Method acting as "more a form of psychotherapy than of acting" which resulted in sentimental cliches and self-indulgent emotion. Instead, he held that acting should be an expression of creative joy and exuberance, with emphasis put on the character's creation of "masks" in the process of interacting with other people. Cassavetes also said that he strove "to put [actors] in a position where they may make asses of themselves without feeling they're revealing things that will eventually be used against them." He frequently filmed scenes in long, uninterrupted takes, explaining that:The drama of the scenes comes naturally from the real passage of time lived by the actors [...] The camera isn't content to just follow the characters' words and actions. I focus in on specific gestures and mannerisms. It's from focusing on these little things—the moods, silences, pauses, or anxious moments—that the form arises.
Cassavetes also rejected the dominance of the director's singular vision, instead believing each character must be the actor's "individual creation" and refusing to explain the characters to his actors in any significant detail. He claimed that "stylistic unity drains the humanity out of a text [...] The stories of many different and potentially inarticulate people are more interesting than a contrived narrative that exists only in one articulate man's imagination." The manner in which Cassavetes employed improvisation is frequently misunderstood: with the exception of the original version of "Shadows", his films were tightly scripted. However, he allowed actors to interpret characters in their own way, and often rewrote scripts based on the results of rehearsals and performances. He explained that "I believe in improvising on the basis of the written word and not on undisciplined creativity."
Cassavetes worked with jazz musicians Charles Mingus and Shafi Hadi to provide the score for "Shadows". Mingus's friend, Diane Dorr-Dorynek, described Cassavetes' approach to film-making in jazz terms:
The script formed the skeleton around which the actors might change or ad lib lines according to their response to the situation at the moment, so that each performance was slightly different. A jazz musician works in this way, using a given musical skeleton and creating out of it, building a musical whole related to a particular moment by listening to and interacting with his fellow musicians. Jazz musicians working with actors could conceivably provide audiences with some of the most moving and alive theater they have ever experienced.
When asked by André S. Labarthe during the making of "Faces" whether he had the desire to make a musical film, Cassavetes responded he wanted to make only one musical, Dostoyevsky's "Crime and Punishment". Cassavetes was passionate about a wide range of music, from jazz to classical to rock, saying "I like all music. It makes you feel like living. Silence is death."
Cassavetes worked with composer Bo Harwood from 1970 to 1984 on six films in several different capacities, even though Harwood had initially only signed on to do "a little editing" for "Husbands", and "a little sound editing" for "Minnie and Moskowitz". Harwood composed poignant music for Cassavetes' following three films, and was also credited as "Sound" for two of them. During these projects Harwood wrote several songs, some with Cassavetes contributing lyrics and rudimentary tunes. During his work with Cassavetes, Harwood claimed the notoriously unpredictable director preferred to use the "scratch track" version of his compositions, rather than to let Harwood refine and re-record them with an orchestra. Some of these scratch tracks were recorded in Cassavetes' office, with piano or guitar, as demos, and then eventually ended up in the final film. While this matched the raw, unpolished feel that marks most of Cassavetes' films, Harwood was sometimes surprised and embarrassed.
The relationship between Harwood and Cassavetes ended amicably. When asked by documentarian Michael Ventura during the making of Cassavetes' last film "Love Streams", what he had learned from working with Cassavetes, Harwood replied:
I learned a lot through John. I've done a lot of editing for him. Picture editing, sound editing, music editing, shot sound, composed score, and I've learned a lot about integrity ... I think you know what I mean. You know, thirty years from now, I can say I rode with Billy the Kid.
Personal life.
Marriage.
Cassavetes was married to American actress Gena Rowlands from 1954 until his death in 1989. Many of his films were shot and edited in his and Rowlands' own Los Angeles home. He and Rowlands had a son named Nick and two daughters named Alexandra and Zoe, all of whom followed them into acting and filmmaking.
Death.
A long-time alcoholic, Cassavetes died in Los Angeles from complications of cirrhosis at the age of 59 on February 3, 1989. He is buried at Westwood Village Memorial Park cemetery in Los Angeles.
At the time of his death, Cassavetes had amassed a collection of more than 40 unproduced screenplays, as well as a novel, "Husbands". He also left three unproduced plays: "Sweet Talk", "Entrances and Exits", and "Begin the Beguine", the last of which, in German translation, was co-produced by Needcompany of Belgium and Burgtheater of Vienna, and premiered on stage at Vienna's Akademietheater in 2014.
Legacy and reception.
Cassavetes is the subject of several biographies. "Cassavetes on Cassavetes" is a collection of interviews collected or conducted by Boston University film scholar Ray Carney, in which the filmmaker recalled his experiences, influences, and outlook on the film industry. In the 2005 Hollywood issue of "Vanity Fair", one article features a tribute to Cassavetes by three members of his stock company, Rowlands, Gazzara, and Falk.
Many of Cassavetes' films are owned by Faces Distribution, a company overseen by Gena Rowlands and Julian Schlossberg, distributed by Jumer Films (Schlossberg's own company), with additional sales and distribution by Janus Films. In September 2004, The Criterion Collection produced a Region 1 DVD box set of his five independent films: "Shadows", "Faces", "A Woman Under the Influence", "The Killing of a Chinese Bookie" and "Opening Night". Also featured in the set is a documentary about the life and works of Cassavetes, "A Constant Forge", a booklet featuring critical assessments of the director's work and tributes by old friends. Criterion released a Blu-ray version of the set in October 2013. In 2005, a box set of the same films was released in Region 2 by Optimum Releasing. The Optimum DVD of "Shadows" has a voice-over commentary by Seymour Cassel. Then, in 2014, the Faces/Jumer library became the property of Shout! Factory, which acquired the films' holding parent company, Westchester Films.
Cassavetes' son Nick followed in his father's footsteps as an actor and director, adapting the "She's Delovely" screenplay his father had written into the 1997 film "She's So Lovely", which starred Sean Penn, as John Cassavetes had wanted. Alexandra Cassavetes directed the documentary "" in 2004, and in 2006 served as 2nd Unit Director on her brother Nick's film, "Alpha Dog". Cassavetes' younger daughter Zoe wrote and directed the 2007 film "Broken English", featuring Rowlands and Parker Posey.
"The New Yorker" wrote that Cassavetes "may be the most influential American director of the last half century"—this in announcing that all the films he directed, plus others he acted in, were being screened in a retrospective tribute at the Brooklyn Academy of Music throughout July 2013. AllMovie called Cassavetes "an iconoclastic maverick".
The Independent Spirit Awards named one of their categories after Cassavetes, the Independent Spirit John Cassavetes Award. A one-person show about John Cassavetes titled "Independent" premiered at Essential Theatre in Atlanta in August 2017. The play was written by John D. Babcock III and starred actor Dan Triandiflou as Cassavetes. The song "What's Yr Take on Cassavetes?" by the band Le Tigre is about misogynistic themes within John Cassavetes' films and whether they can still be praised after those themes are identified. The song "Cassavetes" by the band Fugazi parallels John Cassavetes' independence from the film industry with the band's own independence from the record industry. In concert, singer Guy Picciotto introduced it as "a song about making your own road."
Filmography.
As director
Awards and nominations.
As a filmmaker, he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for "Faces" (1968) and the Academy Award for Best Director for "A Woman Under the Influence" (1974). The Independent Spirit Awards named the John Cassavetes Award in his honor.
References.
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External links.
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Shadows (1959 film)
1959 film by John Cassavetes
Shadows is a 1959 American independent drama film directed by John Cassavetes about race relations during the Beat Generation years in New York City. The film stars Ben Carruthers, Lelia Goldoni, and Hugh Hurd as three black siblings, though only one of them is dark-skinned enough to be considered African American. The film was initially shot in 1957 and shown in 1958, but a poor reception prompted Cassavetes to rework it in 1959. Promoted as a completely improvisational film, it was intensively rehearsed in 1957, and in 1959 it was fully scripted.
The film depicts two weeks in the lives of three siblings on the margins of society: two brothers who are struggling jazz musicians and their light-skinned younger sister who goes through three relationships, one with an older white writer, one with a shallow white lover, and finally one with a gentle young black admirer.
Film scholars consider "Shadows" a milestone of American independent cinema. In 1960, the film won the Critics Award at the Venice Film Festival.
In 1993, "Shadows" was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Plot.
Light-skinned Ben, diffident and awkward, wants to be a jazz trumpeter, but spends most of his time drinking in Manhattan bars and trying to pick up girls with two fellow-idlers, Dennis and Tom. He is supported by his darker-skinned brother Hugh, a jazz singer who is unable to find much work because of his old-fashioned vocal style. Hugh's career is managed by Rupert.
Ben and Hugh live with their fair-skinned younger sister Lelia, who wants to be an artist. Recently, she has been under the wing of an older boyfriend, the intellectual David, who encourages her to write and attempts to be helpfully critical of her efforts. At a party, Lelia abandons David for a younger man, Tony, who coaxes her back to his apartment. Tony professes his love for Lelia, and, despite her apparent apprehension, he takes her virginity. Afterward, she is filled with ambivalence and regret about Tony and about her first sexual encounter, but they agree to continue dating. Seeing her home, he is shocked to discover that her family is black. Sensing his racial animosity, Hugh kicks Tony out of the apartment, as he does not want his sister dating a perceived bigot.
Hugh has some guests over, and a friend urges Lelia to flirt with a gentlemanly black man named Davey. She is distant and contrary, but she and Davey arrange to go on a date. When Davey comes to pick Lelia up, she makes him wait for hours while she gets ready. As they are walking out the door, Tony arrives. He is disappointed to see her already dating another man, and she exits past him without a word. Hugh and Tony nearly come to blows, but Ben intervenes and listens to an apologetic message that he promises to relay to Lelia, though, after Tony leaves, Ben laughs at Tony with Hugh and Rupert. Lelia and Davey go dancing, and she continues to be rude, but softens after Davey asserts himself.
At the train station, Rupert informs Hugh that one of the two bookings of Hugh's upcoming tour has been canceled. He vents his frustration about their state of affairs, and, for once, it is Hugh who says some encouraging words to lift Rupert's spirits, instead of the other way around. Smiling, the friends get on the train for a week's billing in Chicago.
Ben, Dennis, and Tom drunkenly clown around with some girls in a bar. When the girls' tough male dates come out of the bathroom, tensions flare, and the two sides take their argument outside, where Ben, Dennis and Tom are badly beaten up. Over a drink, Ben tells his friends that he is tired of their way of living. Tom heads home, and, while Dennis goes to buy some cigarettes, Ben wanders off alone down the nighttime New York City streets.
Production.
The idea for the film came from a classroom exercise. With acting coach Burt Lane (later the father of Diane Lane), Cassavetes was conducting classes for aspiring actors at the off-Broadway Variety Arts Theatre in Manhattan's Union Square neighborhood. The classes, listed as "The Cassavetes-Lane Drama Workshop", were Cassavetes' attempt to counter method acting, which was ascendant in New York theatre and film. A particular exercise became the core of the film: A young African-American woman who was very light-skinned dated a young white man, but he was repulsed when he discovered she had a black brother. Cassavetes determined to put the scene on film, so he began looking for funding. While ostensibly promoting the film "Edge of the City" on Jean Shepherd's "Night People" radio show on WOR in February 1957, Cassavetes said he could make a better film than could director Martin Ritt. He pitched the drama workshop idea to Shepherd's radio audience. Cassavetes was surprised when listeners sent about $2,000 to start the project. Money also came from Cassavetes' friends, including Hedda Hopper, William Wyler, Joshua Logan, Robert Rossen, José Quintero, and Cassavetes' agent Charlie Feldman. Cassavetes hired German cinematographer Erich Kollmar as cameraman, the only crew member except Cassavetes with any experience in film.
Using student actors from the Cassavetes-Lane Drama Workshop, shooting started in February 1957 in a largely improvised form. Cassavetes composed an outline for the film, but not a script. Cassavetes and assistant director/producer Maurice McEndree gave detailed instructions to the actors, constraining the situation to guide the story, with the words and the movements improvised by the actors. Cassavetes intended the story to evolve from the characters rather than vice versa. Three initial weeks of work was thrown out, the first week because of technical problems with quality, and the next two weeks because Cassavetes felt that the actors were talking too much. After they had developed their characters to the point at which they could portray emotion in silence, the actors improvised with more clarity and with a level of truth that Cassavetes found revealing. He was a demanding director who required a critical romantic scene to be performed more than 50 times before he was satisfied with the results. About 30 hours of film was exposed during several months of off-and-on shooting.
Filming took place in various locations, including inside the apartment that Cassavetes shared with his wife Gena Rowlands, and on the streets of New York. Using a 16 mm camera borrowed from Shirley Clarke, and monochrome film stock, Kollmar was forced to shoot scenes in which the actors could move in any direction they wished, making for unpredictable zoom and focus requirements. No filming permits were obtained, so the cast and crew were necessarily ready to pack quickly and leave a location. The lighting was a general wash rather than specific effects. The microphone was placed by Jay Crecco (who was also an actor in the film), and dialogue was recorded to tape with street noises intruding. Even though Cassavetes said "print it!" after he was satisfied with a scene, there was nobody on the crew keeping track of the film takes, so all of the exposed film had to be printed. The editing of the film was made much more difficult by the lack of notes taken during shooting, and by the sound recorded "wild" on tape, not synchronized with the film. The microphone failed to pick up some of the dialogue, requiring lip-readers to watch the footage and write down what had been said so that the actors could re-record their dialogue. Editors Len Appelson, Maurice McEndree and Wray Bevins began work while shooting was still under way, editing the film in an office next door to the Variety Arts Theatre, the office that is seen hosting a rock 'n roll party in the film. Primary photography was finished by mid-May 1957, with of film exposed, but the editing took more than a year. Cassavetes was not available during much of this time; starting in June, he was on location working as an actor first in "Saddle the Wind", then in "Virgin Island" (both 1958). At the end of 1957, the editors moved to a professional editing suite to complete the task.
Cassavetes intended to have the jazz music of Charles Mingus on the soundtrack, but Mingus composed a number of songs that could stand on their own rather than impressionistic film music to follow the story. Three hours of Mingus and his band were recorded, and much of this material was placed in the first version of "Shadows", screened in 1958, but almost all of it was removed during the 1959 reworking of the film. Two of Mingus' compositions for the film were subsequently included on the 1959 album "".
1958 screening.
The film was finished late in 1958, printed onto 16 mm stock, and three free screenings were announced by Shepherd on his radio show. Cassavetes overestimated the audience; only about 100 people showed up for each of the midnight showings at Manhattan's Paris Theater, which could hold almost 600 people. At the first showing, there were initial problems with the sound, which were remedied. Some of the audience members were friends and colleagues of Cassavetes; he later said that 90% of them disliked the film. A number of people walked out before the film ended, including Burt Lane, who had coached most of the cast. Assistant cameraman Al Ruban told Cassavetes that the film was "okay in a kind of naive way". Cassavetes' father told him it was a "pure" film, not a good film. Cassavetes thought it was "totally intellectual" and thus "less than human". The poor reception made him decide that the film should be radically reworked.
However, avant-garde film critic Jonas Mekas highly praised the film, writing in the January 1959 issue of "Film Culture" that "Shadows" "presents contemporary reality in a fresh and unconventional manner... The improvisation, spontaneity, and free inspiration that are almost entirely lost in most films from an excess of professionalism are fully used in this film." The magazine, founded by Mekas and his brother, bestowed upon "Shadows" its first "Independent Film Award". Mekas then arranged to have the film shown six more times at the Young Men's Hebrew Association.
1959 reworking.
Cassavetes shot new scenes in 1959 using a script that he co-wrote with Robert Alan Aurthur. The racial prejudice angle was reduced, and the three main characters were given more complications, as well as more time exploring their connectedness. With financing from Nikos Papatakis and others, Cassavetes reassembled the required members of the cast and crew. Half to two-thirds of the original footage was replaced, which angered those whose work was diminished. A 16 mm print was struck, and the new version was shown on November 11, 1959, at Amos Vogel's avant-garde Cinema 16, on a double bill with the 30-minute beat poetry film "Pull My Daisy".
The first version was an ensemble performance, while the second version put more emphasis on Lelia. The revelation that she was African-American came much earlier in the second version. The first version had more of a conventional narrative, but its pace was slow in sections. It also contained a number of technical flaws, such as lip-sync errors. Lelia's date with Tony was greatly altered: in the first version, she only talks with him, but in the second version, she loses her virginity to him. The first version had more scenes of Ben and his friends hanging around Times Square. Actor Anthony Ray, the son of famous director Nicholas Ray, had top billing in the first version, playing the part of Lelia's date Tony, but in the second version, this billing was reduced to reflect his diminished screen time. His character was given greater dignity in the second version.
A major difference between the two versions was that Mingus' music was featured more in the first version, but the music was incongruously paired with the visuals, according to film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum. For the second version, Cassavetes replaced almost all of the Mingus recordings. For example, he removed a section in which a muted trumpet replaces the speech of character Tony on the phone, the sound mocking him. Another removed part involves the Mingus band shouting out a snatch of the gospel song "Leaning on the Everlasting Arms" during a scene in which Ben and his friends are recovering from a brutal fight. The first version also uses two Frank Sinatra songs that are not in the second version because Cassavetes could not obtain the rights. Mingus's saxophonist Shafi Hadi, previously known as Curtis Porter, provided most of the second version's soundtrack, expanding on a short passage that Mingus had written. Hadi was directed in his improvisation by Cassavetes, who acted out all the parts for him in the recording studio.
Another difference between the versions is that Ben's statement "I've learned a lesson" comes at the end of the second version, conveying to the viewer that Ben will improve himself after receiving such a cruel beating. This brings a sense of moral closure to the film. In the first version, the fight and Ben's statement appear halfway through the film, following which he is shown doing the same things again, having failed to learn his lesson. Thus, Ben is portrayed as unlikely ever to change his ways in the first version.
Reception.
In his December 1959 manifesto "A Call for a New Generation of Film Makers", Mekas said that "Shadows" was the start of a new movement that would inspire independent filmmakers, energize the flagging avant-garde film scene, and triumph over the commercial Hollywood film industry. Even so, he was upset that the film had been reworked. In January 1960, he wrote in his movie-review column in "The Village Voice" that the 1959 version was commercialized, "just another Hollywood film", and that everything he had praised in the first version had been "completely destroyed". Later in his life, he said that the first version should have never been remade, but that the second version was a better indication of the direction in which Cassavetes was going as a filmmaker.
"Shadows" was given the Critics Award at the Venice Film Festival. Cassavetes obtained distribution through British Lion in 1961.
Legacy.
The film was shocking to American audiences in the late 1950s and early 1960s because it turned the "concept of race upside down". Two of the principal actors portraying African-Americans were not actually black: Goldoni was born in the U.S. to Sicilian parents, fully European in heritage, and Carruthers was only one-sixteenth black. Carruthers used a sunlamp to darken his skin during the 1957 shooting of the film, but in 1959 for the new scenes, he abandoned this effort. Carruthers and Goldoni were married in 1960, but quickly divorced.
After "Shadows" was honored by the Venice Film Festival, the international publicity helped it become the first American film to see success outside of the Hollywood system. It joined "Pull My Daisy" and Shirley Clarke's "The Connection" to establish a new wave of American independent films.
In 1994, film critic Leonard Maltin said the film "was considered a watershed in the birth of American independent cinema".
2003 rediscovery.
The second version of the film, the result of the reshooting and reworking Cassavetes did in 1959, is the one that Cassavetes considered to be the final product, and he refused to show the 1958 version. In time, he lost track of the first version's only print, and for decades it was believed to have been lost or destroyed. In the 1980s, Cassavetes said he may have donated the film to a school far away. In fact, the 16 mm print of the first version had been left on a New York City subway train, taken to the subway's lost-and-found department, and then purchased by a second-hand-goods shop owner as part of a box of unclaimed items. The shop owner saw "Shadows" scratched into the leader on the first reel, but he did not recognize the film's name. The shop eventually went out of business, and the owner retired. The reels of film were stored in an attic in Florida, and, in November 2003, they were given by the shop owner's daughter to film professor Ray Carney, who had been searching for the print of the first version of "Shadows" since the 1980s. A digital copy was shown at the International Film Festival Rotterdam in late January 2004. Since then, few people have seen this version, as Rowlands and the Cassavetes estate have been involved in a legal dispute regarding Carney's use of the film.
References.
Notes
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Further reading

Mother of the Shadows
Mother of the Shadows is a 1914 American short silent drama film directed by George Osborne and featuring Tsuru Aoki, Sessue Hayakawa, John Keller, Joe Goodboy and J. Barney Sherry in important roles.
References.
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Shadows (1931 film)
1931 film
Shadows (also known as Press Gang and My Wife's Family) is a 1931 British crime film directed by Alexander Esway and starring Jacqueline Logan, Bernard Nedell and Gordon Harker. The screenplay involves the estranged son of a newspaper owner, who returns to his father's good favour by unmasking a gang of criminals.

In the Shadows (2001 film)
2001 film by Ric Roman Waugh
In the Shadows is a 2001 American thriller film written and directed by Ric Roman Waugh and starring Matthew Modine, James Caan, Joey Lauren Adams, Lillo Brancato and Cuba Gooding Jr. It was released in the United States on June 22, 2001. In the film, Modine plays hit man Eric O'Bryne, who is sent to kill veteran Hollywood stuntman Lance Huston (Caan), falls in love with the target's daughter (Adams) and then decides to become a stuntman himself.
Plot.
Hit man Eric O'Byrne has orders from the mob: kill Hollywood stunt coordinator Lance Huston. In order to make the hit, Eric travels to Miami and ingratiates himself into Lance's world as a stuntman. He also slips into a dangerous romance with Lance's daughter, Clarissa. As time draws near for O'Byrne to perform his deadly act, he starts to grow a conscience, a development that could be his greatest asset or his fatal weakness (or both).
Reception.
DVD Talk rated the film favorably, writing that "Ric Roman Waugh is competent behind the camera for his directorial debut, and the film benefits from a strong cast." "TV Guide" was more negative, as they felt that "This overly complicated wise-guy adventure makes good use of the stunt work background. But it falters in the areas of characterization, plot resolution and general narrative credibility."
References.
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Shadows in the Night (1950 film)
1950 film
Shadows in the Night () is a 1950 West German drama film directed by Eugen York and starring Hilde Krahl, Willy Fritsch and Carl Raddatz. It was made at the Wandsbek Studios by the Hamburg-based Real Film. The film's sets were designed by the art director Herbert Kirchhoff.
Synopsis.
A happily married woman is blackmailed by a former lover.
References.
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Shadows (1953 film)
Shadows () is a 1953 Soviet romantic drama film directed by Nikolay Akimov and Nadezhda Kosheverova and starring Valentin Lebedev, Vladimir Petrov and Galina Korotkevich. On the eponymous play by Saltykov-Shchedrin.
Plot.
In the 1860s, from the province of St. Petersburg comes the liberal-minded young officer Bobyrev. He hopes under the protection of his schoolmate Klaverova, who became a general, to make a career. Gen. happily defines Bobyrev in his office, and already builds plans, both through the beautiful Sophia, wife Bobyrev will wage a successful struggle with opponents and influence voluptuous Minister Tarakanov.

Shadows in the Sun (2009 film)
Shadows in the Sun is a 2009 British independent film directed by David Rocksavage and starring James Wilby, Jean Simmons, Jamie Dornan and Ophelia Lovibond.
Plot.
A mysterious stranger brings together a family that has lost its way.
Hannah (Jean Simmons) is suffering from a chronic illness, smoking cannabis for respite, and has formed an unlikely friendship with a much younger man, Joe (Jamie Dornan). She lives perfectly happily with her poetry, garden and friend Joe but when Hannah's son Robert (James Wilby) arrives with his teenage daughter Kate (Ophelia Lovibond) and younger son, Sam (Toby Marlow), he is discomfited by his mother's arrangements.
Production.
Set in the coastal region of north Norfolk the film saw the return of Jean Simmons to the screen after a decade away. It was her last film. The film is set in the 1960s and made use of locations at Walsingham, Holkham and Brancaster.
Poetry extracts heard in the film include "The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam" from a translation by Edward FitzGerald, "The Character of a Happy Life" by Henry Wotton, W. B. Yeats, "When You Are Old", and "Variations" by Conrad Aiken.
References.
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Electric Shadows
Electric Shadows is a 2004 Chinese film directed by Xiao Jiang. The English title of the film is the literal translation for the Chinese term for movies or "dian ying" (電影).
"Electric Shadows" is the debut film of director Xiao Jiang, one of the few active female directors in China. Xiao and Cheng Qingsong wrote the screenplay. The film was produced by mainland China's Beijing Dadi Century and Hong Kong's Happy Pictures Culture Communication Company.
The film begins when a young woman mysteriously attacks a stranger and then asks him to care for her fish while she is being arrested. When he enters her apartment he discovers an apparent shrine to the 1930s actress Zhou Xuan and that they share a love of the cinema and more. The film's reverent attitude towards the power of film and particularly classic film has brought it comparison to, or at least reference to Italy's "Cinema Paradiso".
Plot.
Mao Xiaobing (Xia Yu), a water bottle delivery boy in Beijing, loves to watch movies. One day, however, while riding his bike, he is attacked by Ling-Ling (Qi Zhongyang), a disturbed young woman, that lands him in the hospital. Ling-Ling is promptly arrested, but refuses to say why she attacked Mao Xiaobing, asking him only to feed her fish. Upon entering her apartment, however, Mao Xiaobing finds that Ling-Ling has created a veritable shrine to the 1930s film star, Zhou Xuan. When he stumbles upon her diary and begins reading, the film flashes back to Ling-Ling's mother as a young woman in Ningxia.
Her mother had been working in radio when she became pregnant and subsequently abandoned by her lover. Branded a counter-revolutionary, she travels to the countryside where she befriends Pan, a movie-projectionist where the two eventually marry. Ling-Ling meanwhile, thinks that her real father is a movie star of Zhou Xuan's era. Mao Xiaobing had been hit by his father, and so Ling-Ling's mother took care of him for some days. When Ling-Ling's mother and Pan marry, Mao Xiaobing had been sent away to live with relatives by his father because Mao had been a troublemaker. Ling-Ling later recalls the time they were apart as miserable, saying also that the arrival of her younger brother was "disgusting." Despite that, it is later revealed that Ling-Ling learns to accept her younger brother, but the acceptance is short lived. Mao Xiaobing later realizes that she has been watching over her parents, and after tracking down the old couple, he asks why Ling-Ling is now deaf. Recalling the events, Pan explains that Bing-Bing (Ling-Ling's younger brother) had lied to their mother to get Ling-Ling out of the house. Both of them then went up to the rooftop where she and Mao Xiaobing would watch the movies through his binoculars. After saying she would leave, Bing-Bing begs her not to leave, but then falls to the ground. Pan then hits Ling-Ling for her brother's death, leaving her deaf in both ears.
The event severely traumatizes Ling-Ling, and she runs away not too long after. Living alone for so long in the city, she looks around and finds both her parents have moved to the same place, not too far from where she lives now. She finds a puppy and decides to name it after Bing Bing, but she leaves the puppy with her parents to help ease their loneliness. When Mao Xiaobing had accidentally knocked over a pile of bricks, consequently killing the puppy, it triggered Ling-Ling's memories of losing her brother; hence she attacked Mao Xiaobing.
Finding out where the mental institution is, Mao Xiaobing pays Ling-Ling a visit. He reveals his identity by giving back her film strip, and she is reunited with her parents watching an old movie on the same screen she grew up watching.
Reception.
The film was well received in the international press, garnering an 80% fresh rating from Rotten Tomatoes and a 70% "generally favorable reviews" rating from Metacritic. Many of the critics who found the film praiseworthy pointed to the film's earnestness. One critic praises that the film "Refreshingly... doesn't adopt a patronizing tone toward either the period or the movies, nor become embroiled in the politics." "The Hollywood Reporter" provides a similar analysis, and ends its review by stating that the film is "sweet and accomplished." On the other hand, the film's detractors often point to the same aspects that others found charming, and criticize the film's sentimentality and its melodrama. Stephen Holden of "The New York Times" while giving the film a generally favorable review, nevertheless also refers to the film as an "implausible Asian soap opera." In a less forgiving critic's words, however, the film was as "Ripe and mushy as an October peach."
The film was screened at the 2004 Toronto International Film Festival as well as at the Marrakech, Vancouver and Pusan festivals.
DVD release.
"Electric Shadows" was released in the United States and Canada on July 25, 2006 on Region 1 DVD by First Run Features. The film features the original Mandarin dialogue and English subtitles. The DVD's extras are sparse, with a photo gallery, director notes, and director Xiao Jiang's biography.
Notes.
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Shadows (2007 film)
Shadows (Macedonian: "Сенки", Transliteration: "Senki") is a 2007 Macedonian horror-drama film by the Academy-award nominated director Milcho Manchevski. It was filmed on location in Skopje, Ohrid and several other locations in the Republic of Macedonia.
Plot.
Lazar Perkov is the one man who’s got everything going for him. He’s young, good-looking, has a beautiful wife, lovely little boy, great house and a good job as a hospital physician. In fact, everyone calls him “Lucky.” Nothing’s missing – except maybe Lucky himself, who’s always trying to live up to the expectations of others. Like his bored wife and roguish colleagues. And, above all, his famous physician mother, a driven woman who rose from obscurity to renown with an iron will that crushed all resistance, whether from the living or the dead…
When Lucky is involved in a disastrous car crash and mysteriously saved from a sure death, his life begins to change. He meets strange people: an old man with a baby, an ancient lady speaking a forgotten dialect, a beautiful young woman with a sad secret. Their only message is: “Return what’s not yours. Have respect.” He gradually becomes aware that it is a message from the afterlife, from tormented souls who seem to die over and over again.
But why have they chosen him?
To answer this question, Lucky must finally grow up and become the man he wants to be.
The action begins at Lazar's home where he has a fight with his wife about how messed up his life was. Pissed off from the fight, he goes for a drive. When trying to light a cigarette in his car, without having the seatbelt on, his phone rings — it is his mother. Then the cigarette falls from his mouth in the desperate attempt to grab his mobile phone on the seat next to him, burning him on the arm. Now he loses control over the car, but meanwhile a woman is crossing the road. Lazar's attempt to avoid hitting her is fatal. His car flips, and crashes until he is found hanging off the car's window whose glass had broken in the crash. The slow movement on the car resting off a building's wall is threatening to crush his dangling head. As all of the people on the streets watch in despair, something moves him away from the car.
Production.
The film was written and directed by Milcho Manchevski, and produced by Mariela Besuievsky, Nermin Gladers, Dimitar Gochev, Gerardo Herrero, and Martin Husmann, Milcho Manchevski, Robert Jazadziski, Corinna Meaner, Elena Melamed, Amedeo Pagani, and Thomas Woodrow. Fabio Cianchetti was the director of photography, David Munns was the production designer, Marty Levenstein and David Ray edited the film, and the music was composed by Ryan Shore and Kiril Džajkovski. Principal photography took place in Ohrid, Saramzalino and Skopje, Macedonia.
Soundtrack.
The music was composed by Ryan Shore.
Critical reception.
The film has premiered at several international film festivals, the first being the Toronto International Film Festival. The film was well received with one of the festival's film critics calling it "Manchevski’s most ambitious film to date". Other critics, such as Patrick McGavin of Screen Daily, called it “ambitious and capably mounted […] (Manchevski) retains a very fine eye for composition, aided by the sensuous, beautiful work of Italian cinematographer Fabio Cianchetti. The movie's standout quality is the sexy, revealing work of the vibrant, highly alluring young actress Vesna Stanojevska, a professional musician making her film debut. She injects the film with an erotic intensity”.
Rotten Tomatoes gave "Shadows" an average score of 60%, and an audience review of 58%. It had mixed reviews as a "respectable enough ghost story.." although, it was "bogged down with cliches".
IMDb audience gave shadows a 6.8 star rating, while critics gave it a score of 49 from metacritic.com
Stephen Holden from The New York Times, who gave it a score of 60 stated, "As Shadows vacillates between the historical and the occult, you may snicker at the way hackneyed horror movie conventions are redeployed for more serious ends. But you won't be bored. The movie is well acted (especially by Ms. Stanojevska) and very sexy."
The A.V. Club talks about, "It's a very sensual film, revelling in the pleasures of voyeurism.." The A.V. Club had mixed reviews, saying it was well-crafted, although one of his slight.
References.
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Shadows (1919 film)
1919 film by Reginald Barker
Shadows is a 1919 American silent film drama produced by Samuel Goldwyn and directed by Reginald Barker. It stars opera singer Geraldine Farrar.
This is a lost film except for a one-reel fragment at the Library of Congress.
Plot.
As described in a film magazine, Muriel Barnes (Farrar) is the loving and happy wife of conservative New Yorker Judson Barnes (Sills) and the devoted mother of a child (Smith), when a promoter of a fake mining enterprise, Frank Craftley (Truesdell), gains social access to her home. Craftley has never met her before, but his side partner Jack McGoff (Santschi) has a photograph of Muriel from her previous life in Alaska under the name Cora Lamont. McGoff had deceived her by marrying her although he already had a living wife. He then forced her into the job as a dance hall girl. She escaped by shooting him in self-defense and then fleeing Alaska. Without knowing these details but guessing some general circumstances, Craftley works on her fears until she induces her husband to go out West to inspect the salted claim. McGoff stays behind and visits Muriel's home at night, and she permits him to enter her boudoir. Knowing that a policeman is courting one of the servants on the floor below, she scatters some jewels to give the appearance of a robbery, and, when McGoff attempts to embrace her, screams for help. Fleeing arrest, McGoff shoots at the policeman, and is later killed in the resulting scrimmage. His death ends the shadows in Muriel's life.
References.
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Shadows on the Stairs
1941 film by D. Ross Lederman
Shadows on the Stairs is a 1941 American mystery film directed by D. Ross Lederman and starring Frieda Inescort, Paul Cavanagh and Heather Angel. It is based on Frank Vosper's play "Murder on the Second Floor". The British subsidiary of Warner Brothers had previously produced a film adaptation of the work in 1932.
Plot.
Residents of a London boarding house come under suspicion during a string of murders.
References.
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Shadows of Desire
Shadows of Desire is a 1994 television film starring Nicollette Sheridan, Joe Lando, Adrian Pasdar, Richard Roundtree, Piper Laurie and Brandon Smith. It was directed by Sam Pillsbury and written by Joyce Eliason. The film score was composed by Mark Snow.

Shadow (1971 film)
Shadow () is a 1971 Soviet romantic fantasy comedy-drama directed by Nadezhda Kosheverova.
The film tells about the confrontation between a smart and kind scientist with his shadow.
Plot.
A scientist named Christian-Theodore arrives in a magical land where fairy tales come to life, becoming the protagonist of one himself. After meeting and falling in love with a princess, he sends his shadow to find her. However, the shadow abandons its kind and intelligent master, transforming into a deceitful and ruthless entity, calling itself Theodore-Christian. Meanwhile, Christian-Theodore becomes gravely ill without his shadow, while Theodore-Christian schemes to marry the princess and claim the throne, plotting to turn the princess against his former master.
Deceived into signing a document relinquishing his claim to the princess, Christian-Theodore watches helplessly as Theodore-Christian uses the document to convince the princess to marry him and seize power. When Christian tries to intervene at the wedding, he is arrested and brought before Theodore-Christian, who cruelly offers him the role of his shadow. Desperate, Christian reveals the truth, but no one believes him until a magical spell briefly returns Theodore-Christian to his shadow form. When the shadow reverts to its human shape, it orders Christian's execution, but in a twist of fate, both lose their heads. Terrified ministers revive Christian with water from a mystical spring, as only someone who loves him—Annunziata, the innkeeper’s daughter—can perform the act. Rejecting his shadow’s pleas for reconciliation and the throne, Christian departs the kingdom with Annunziata, choosing love and freedom over power.
References.
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Lights and Shadows (1914 film)
1914 film
Lights and Shadows is a 1914 American silent drama film directed by Joe De Grasse, starring Tom Forman, Pauline Bush and Lon Chaney. The screenplay was written by Ida May Park (De Grasse's wife). A still exists showing Lon Chaney as Bentley, just before he deserts his wife in the film. The picture is now considered to be a lost film.
Plot.
Eve, a poor flower girl, learns that her mother, a singer, had married Bentley (Lon Chaney), the son of a rich man, but Bentley's father disinherited him for marrying a stage performer. So Bentley deserted his wife the night Eve was born, leaving the young mother penniless, and their nurse Matilde raised the girl after her mother died. When the old nurse falls ill, Eve gets a job in a cafe selling flowers to raise money to help the nurse. There she meets Victor Austin who makes advances towards her, but she manages to escape from him. When she returns home, she finds the nurse dead.
Eve discovers some old letters that she thinks could aid her in locating her deadbeat father. Along the way, she is robbed of her ticket and all of her money and joins up with a theatrical troupe who feel sorry for her. The star of the company, James Gordon, falls in love with her, but she learns that he is married and runs away. Gordon later receives an important offer from the New York stage. Meanwhile Eve manages to find her father Bentley who has since come into great wealth. He plans to force Eve to marry the loutish Victor Austin, but then Eve learns that Gordon's wife, who never really loved him, has died. Gordon is now free to remarry. Eve travels to New York and finds Gordon at the New York theatre where they are happily reunited.
Reception.
"This story is slightly too complicated to make a good picture and too much time is covered. The ending is abrupt and one is left to speculate upon the final outcome."—Motion Picture News
"This offering is peculiar in construction, and while not uninteresting, contains much of a semi-morbid character. It lacks bright, attractive scenes and is brought to a very abrupt close. The acting and photography are good."—Moving Picture World
References.
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Life in Shadows
Life in Shadows (Spanish:Vida en sombras) is a 1949 Spanish drama film directed by Lorenzo Llobet Gràcia and starring Fernando Fernán Gómez, María Dolores Pradera and Isabel de Pomés. It was made in Barcelona.
Plot.
Carlos, born in a fair booth related to cinema, and author of an amateur film when he was fourteen years old, becomes a professional camera operator, since his entire life has been marked by that art .
He married Ana, to whom he proposed during a screening of "Romeo and Juliet". When the Civil War breaks out, he separates from his wife to film some shots of the conflict and she dies in a shootout. To escape his remorse, he decides to become a war reporter, and after the end of the war he falls into depression, coming to hate cinema.

Shadows (1922 film)
1922 film
Shadows is a dramatic 1922 silent film starring Lon Chaney, Marguerite De La Motte, Harrison Ford and John Sainpolis. "Shadows" is a tale of a gentle Chinese immigrant trying to make a life for himself in a small New England town who comes across a vile plot to blackmail two good townspeople. It was directed by Tom Forman. The screenplay was written by Eve Unsell and Hope Loring, based on "Ching, Ching, Chinaman", a short story by Wilbur Daniel Steele. The photography was by Harry Perry, and Louis Gottschalk supplied the music score, for which Eve Unsell also wrote the lyrics. The following year, as Chaney was preparing to star in "The Hunchback of Notre Dame", he suggested Marguerite De La Motte for the role of Esmeralda, but the part went to Patsy Ruth Miller instead.
Some scenes were shot on location in Balboa, Newport Beach and Del Monte, California, and the interior scenes were shot at the Louis B. Mayer Studios. A still exists showing Chaney in his Yen Sin makeup. Two lobby cards from the film can also be seen here. Prints of the film were sold on the collectors' market for many years by Blackhawk Films. There are a number of existing prints in various collections, and the film is readily available on DVD.
Plot.
A physically abusive fisherman by the name of Daniel Gibbs (Walter Long) leaves his wife Sympathy Gibbs (De La Motte) to go on a fishing expedition with other villagers from their village of Urkey and the ship is lost in a storm. Only two men survive, one villager and a mysterious old hunchbacked Chinese stranger named Yen Sin (Chaney). Being Chinese and refusing to take part in a Christian service held on the beach for those lost, he is treated like an outcast and forced to live on a small houseboat moored in the harbor. He makes his living doing laundry from his boat, and is soon greeted by the new minister, John Malden (Ford), who tries unsuccessfully to convert him. Love blossoms between the Reverend Malden and Sympathy, and they are soon married, to the chagrin of the town's wealthy banker, Nate Snow (John Sainpolis). Sympathy soon befriends Yen Sin after she defends him against several white kids taunting him in the street. (Yen Sin later befriends one of the kids who had taunted him, whom he calls "Mr. Bad Boy", by giving the boy candy.)
Snow concocts a blackmail scheme, writing an anonymous letter to the married couple, claiming to be Sympathy's lost husband Daniel and demanding payment to keep quiet. Malden receives the letter just before going on a trip with Snow (not knowing Snow wrote the letter), and leaves the now pregnant Sympathy at home. Yen Sin tells Malden to be sure and get his laundry done while he's away on the trip by using his Asian friend in that other city named Sam Low, who is planning to act as an informant for Yen Sin. While he is away, their baby is born, and Malden now decides to pay the blackmail money in order to avoid a horrible scandal.
Malden, upon his return, is so distraught that he resigns from the ministry, and asks Snow if he can borrow money from him to pay off Daniel Gibbs. Snow does not get to enjoy the benefits of his deception however, as Yen Sin exposes the blackmail plot in order to vindicate the young couple, revealing everything he knows from his deathbed. Malden forgives Snow for all the trouble he caused him and his wife, and when Yen Sin witnesses this act of forgiveness, he agrees to convert to Christianity. He sails off in his houseboat at the end, disappearing into the sunset, wishing to die at sea. Before he leaves, he bids farewell to his young friend Mr. Bad Boy, who cries as he watches Yen Sin sail away.
Reception.
After the film, the reviews were very positive towards Lon Chaney as Yen Sin. Harrison's Reports said that "through tragedy, the sad fate of the principal characters does not leave an unpleasant feeling. On the contrary, their fate so arouses the compassion of the spectator that he feels regret for not being able to help relieve their sufferings. The acting of Mr. Chaney, who assumes the role of a Chinaman, is remarkable. Better acting he has never done in his life. Every one of the other players, too, acts well."
"Lon Chaney as 'the Heathen' assumes a role that tempts overacting; but he subdues this temptation to the extent that this Chinaman grips you with a human chain that is unbreakable. This role clinches the claim of friends of Chaney that he is the greatest character man on the screen, for his is as fine an example of realistic acting and makeup as this writer has seen reflected on the silver sheet." ---Moving Picture World
"A decidedly grim and morbid tale, directed and presented without any lighter relieving moments...Lon Chaney as the Chinaman gave a corking performance and successfully withstood the strain of dying through about 2,000 feet of film." ---Variety
"It is excellently done in the main and tells a powerful story of how a Chinaman in his bland, naive, simple way proves a better Christian than either the minister of the gospel or the deacon of the church...Lon Chaney gives probably the most superior performance of his long and important career." ---Film Daily
"Now and then a picture is produced that stands out above others. Such a one is "Shadows", a picture that stands out above others. The acting of Mr. Chaney who assumes the role of the Chinaman is remarkable. Better acting he has never done in his life." ---Harrison's Reports
Exhibitors Trade Review called Chaney's role in this film "one of unusual difficulty".
Photoplay said "The central figure, the Oriental laundry man remarkably acted by Lon Chaney, is a fine and true conception."
Film critic Robert Sherwood chose "Shadows" as one of the best films of the year, and it was voted on the year's Top Forty Pictures by the National Board of Reviews.
References.
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Shadows of the Past (1922 film)
1922 film
Shadows of the Past () is a 1922 German silent film directed by Rudolf Biebrach and starring Gertrude Welcker, Ernst Hofmann and Erich Kaiser-Titz.
References.
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Shadows (2020 film)
2020 Italian thriller drama film
Shadows is a 2020 Italian thriller drama film directed by Carlo Lavagna.
Release.
The film premiered at Rome Film Festival, as part of the "Alice nella città" section, on 21 October 2020. It was expected to be theatrically released on 16 November 2020, but it was delayed due to the second outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy. The film was released via pay-per-view channel Sky Primafila Premiere on 19 November 2020.
References.
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Shadows Run Black
Shadows Run Black is a 1984 erotic crime thriller directed by Howard Heard and starring Kevin Costner.
Plot.
The film follows a tough Los Angeles detective as he races against time to discover who is behind a string of brutal serial slayings. Costner plays the film's main suspect.
Critical reception.
Allmovie called the film "execrable" and an "exploitational slice-n-dicer masquerading as a police thriller".

Love in the Shadows (film)
1960 film
Love in the Shadows (Spanish:Amor en la sombra) is a 1960 Mexican drama film directed by Tito Davison and starring Libertad Lamarque, Yolanda Varela and Enrique Rambal.

The Shadow (2017 film)
The Shadow is a Russian drama film directed by Dmitriy Svetozarov. It stars Mikhail Porechenkov and Yuriy Stoyanov. It was released on 6 July 2017.
Plot.
Film will tell about a man who fell in love with a photo of a long-dead beautiful actress of silent cinema.
References.
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Through the Shadows
1923 film
Through the Shadows (Italian: La madre folle) is a 1923 Italian silent film directed by Carmine Gallone.
References.
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Shadows Over Naples
1951 film
Shadows Over Naples () is a 1951 German-Italian crime film directed by Hans Wolff and starring Maria Montez, Massimo Serato, and Hans Söhnker. A separate Italian version, "Love and Blood", was also released.
Cast.
<templatestyles src="Div col/styles.css"/>* Maria Montez as Dolores
References.
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