Biography for
Samuel Fuller

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Date of Birth

12 August 1912, Worcester, Massachusetts, USA

Date of Death

30 October 1997, Hollywood, California, USA (natural causes)

Birth Name

Samuel Michael Fuller

Apodo

Sammy

Mini Biography

At age 17, Samuel Fuller was the youngest reporter ever to be in charge of the events section of the New York Journal. After having participated in the European battle theater in World War II, he directed some minor action productions for which he mostly wrote the scripts himself and which he also produced (e.g. The Baron of Arizona (1950)). His masterpiece was Pickup on South Street (1953) for 20th Century Fox, but at the end of the 1950s, he regained his independence from the production company and filmed many other movies of note, including the controversial White Dog (1982).

IMDb Mini Biography By: Volker Boehm

Esposo/a

Christa Lang	(25 July 1967 - 30 October 1997) (his death) 1 child
Martha Downes Fuller	(? - 1959) (divorced)

Trivialidades

He was the guest of honor at the first annual film festival in Sodankylä, Finland, in 1986 (accompanied by such younger directors as Jonathan Demme and Bertrand Tavernier). Therefore, part of a street in Sodankylä was later renamed Samuel Fullerin Katu (Samuel Fuller Street).

As a young crime reporter with the New York Evening Graphic, the veteran crime reporter who "showed him the ropes" when he first started out was Rhea Gore, the wife of actor Walter Huston and the mother of John Huston. Fuller's first big "scoop" was when he became the first journalist to report the death of Jeanne Eagels.

Father of Samantha Fuller.

Biography in John Wakeman, editor, "World Film Directors, Volume Two, 1945-1985," pp. 375-382. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1988.

Served as a rifleman in the U.S. 1st Infantry Division during World War II. Fuller saw action in North Africa, Sicily, Omaha Beach on D-Day, and then on through Europe to Czechoslovakia. He was awarded the Silver Star, Bronze Star, and Purple Heart. He later used many of his war experiences in The Big Red One (1980).

Interviewed in "The Director's Event: Interviews with Five American Filmmakers" by Eric Sherman and Martin Rubin.

Personal Quotes

"Film is a battleground. Love, hate, violence, action, death...In a word, emotion."

"Am I a cult director? Yeah, I love all that. I want to join the cult of the 100 to 200 million grossers and still make an artistic picture."

"Ninety-five per cent of films are born of frustration, of self despair, of ambition for survival, for money, for fattening bank accounts. Five per cent, maybe less, are made because a man has an idea, an idea which he must express."

"Van Gogh was a great inspiration for me, a guy for whom life was work and work was life. I wanted to be like him, except I didn't want to go nuts and cut off my ear."

"I hate violence. That has never prevented me from using it in my films."

[Fuller, a WW II combat veteran, writing to director Lewis Milestone, expressing his displeasure at what he considered the phony heroics of Milestone's film A Walk in the Sun (1945)] "Why a man of your calibre should resort to a colonel's technical advice [the film's technical advisor was a US Army colonel] on what happens in a platoon is something I'll never figure out . . . When colonels are back in their garrison hutments where they belong I'll come out with a yarn that won't make any doggie that was ever on the line retch with disgust."

[About Run of the Arrow (1957)] "The Confederate in that scene who sang the song against the Constitution was played by a Southerner, whose hobby was collecting folklore and ballads. He loved it, being a Southerner and against the damn Yankees. My art director on the picture was a very virulent Yankee I'm only telling you this because there's an evil streak in me that I like. I thought it would be wonderful to get them together in my office. I'll never forget it; it was the most wonderful moment of my life to introduce these two men who despised each other. They immediately got into a tremendous argument. I heard the whole Civil War fought all over again in my office."

Salario

A Return to Salem's Lot (1987)	$38,000
Confirm or Deny (1941)	$25,000

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