Ernest b schoedsack biography of michael
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However, his output diminished as World War II interrupted his career, leading to a severe eye injury sustained while testing photographic equipment during a high-altitude reconnaissance flight.[23]Schoedsack reunited with Cooper for one final major feature, co-directing Mighty Joe Young (1949) for RKO, a stop-motion adventure about a giant gorilla brought to America for entertainment, echoing the spirit of their earlier King Kong.[24] The film, with effects supervised by Willis H.
O'Brien, earned the Academy Award for Best Special Effects at the 1950 Oscars, highlighting Schoedsack's enduring influence on creature features. The special effects really suffer–for whatever reason, when Robert Armstrong and Helen Mack are added to the little Kong’s shots, it’s fine, but when little Kong is added to Armstrong and Mac...
Rose transitioned from acting to screenwriting, drawing on her expedition experiences to craft narratives that emphasized exploration and human resilience. He also collaborated with screenwriter and actress Ruth Rose, whom he later married. Following this project, deteriorating vision from his wartime injury confined him to occasional advisory positions, effectively ending his active directing career after 1949.[23]
Personal life
Marriage to Ruth Rose
Ernest B.Schoedsack met Ruth Rose during William Beebe's 1925 Arcturus expedition to the Galapagos Islands, where she served as the official historian and he worked as assistant cinematographer.[23] Rose, a former stage actress born in 1896 to playwright Edward Everett Rose, had joined the voyage as part of her growing interest in adventure and natural history documentation.[25] The two fell in love amid the expedition's challenges, leading to their marriage in 1927.[4]Their union formed the foundation of a creative partnership that blended Rose's writing talents with Schoedsack's directorial vision, particularly in adventure films.
He worked on several films with Merian C. Cooper including King Kong, Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness, and The Most Dangerous Game. Although partial recovery allowed him to resume limited professional activities, his sight remained profoundly impaired.[23]The injury significantly curtailed Schoedsack's directing career, enabling only one final credited project: the 1949 fantasy filmMighty Joe Young, which he helmed with substantial assistance due to his vision limitations.[23] Thereafter, his involvement in filmmaking shifted to uncredited advisory roles, as the persistent impairment prevented full participation in production.[7]
Death
Ernest B.Schoedsack died on December 23, 1979, in Los Angeles County, California, at the age of 86.[23][30]A private funeral was held, followed by burial at Westwood Memorial Park in Westwood, Los Angeles County, California.[31]His wife, screenwriter Ruth Rose, had predeceased him in June 1978 after 52 years of marriage.[7][4] He was survived by their son, Peter Schoedsack (1929–2004).[4]Contemporary obituaries noted his enduring impact on cinema through pioneering documentaries and adventure epics.[32]
Legacy
Cinematic influence
Schoedsack's collaborations with Merian C.Cooper on expeditionary documentaries such as Grass (1925) and Chang (1927) pioneered the genre by immersing cameras in remote, hazardous environments to capture authentic human and natural struggles, setting a standard for adventure travelogues that emphasized exploration and cultural encounters.[15][33] This approach influenced institutional documentary production in the 1930s and later formats like National Geographic's wildlife explorations, which adopted similar emphases on technological spectacle and educational immersion to blend entertainment with real-world discovery.[33]In co-directing King Kong (1933), Schoedsack oversaw the integration of pioneering stop-motion animation and optical effects, techniques that revolutionized visual storytelling and directly inspired stop-motion master Ray Harryhausen, who credited the film's innovative creature dynamics as formative to his career.[34] These methods established benchmarks for blending live-action with animated elements, influencing the evolution toward computer-generated imagery in later creature features, including the dinosaur sequences in Jurassic Park (1993), where early stop-motion principles informed realistic motion and integration.[35][36]Schoedsack's technique of merging documentary realism—drawn from on-location footage—with fictional dramatic structures, as in Chang, created hybrid narratives that highlighted human vulnerability amid untamed nature, profoundly shaping eco-adventure cinema's focus on environmental peril and survival.[37][15] This stylistic fusion affected subsequent films by portraying ecosystems as both wondrous and threatening, influencing genres that explore ecological themes through spectacle and authenticity.[38]Schoedsack's contributions are acknowledged for safeguarding early Hollywood filmmaking practices during the transition to sound and color eras, with works like Grass inducted into the National Film Registry in 1997 for their cultural and historical significance in demonstrating innovative location cinematography and narrative construction.[39] Similarly, the enduring study of King Kong's effects techniques underscores his role in maintaining analog methods as foundational references amid digital advancements.[40]
Recognition
Ernest B.Schoedsack received significant recognition for his collaborative work with Merian C. Cooper on early adventure films. Cyclops, his only solo directorial effort in the genre during this period, is a Technicolor tale of a reclusive physicist (Albert Dekker) in the Peruvian jungle who uses a radium-powered device to shrink a group of visiting scientists to doll size, forcing them to fight for survival against his growing madness and the hostile environment.[22][55]Schoedsack co-directed the 1949 fantasy adventure Mighty Joe Young with Cooper, which centers on a young African woman (Terry Moore) who raises a massive gorilla named Joe from infancy, only for promoter Max O'Hara (Robert Armstrong) to bring them to America for nightclub performances, leading to a climactic rescue amid a hotel fire.[24]Schoedsack's final directorial credit was on the 1952 widescreen documentary This Is Cinerama, co-directed with Cooper and others, showcasing travelogue footage in the innovative three-panel Cinerama process to demonstrate immersive cinema.[56]
Cinematography and other credits
Schoedsack's early career in film centered on cinematography, beginning with work on short comedies produced by Mack Sennett from 1914 to 1917, where he honed his skills in capturing fast-paced action under rudimentary conditions.[23] During World War I, he served in the U.S.Army Signal Corps as a cameraman, filming combat footage on the front lines in France, including scenes from the aftermath of battles like Château-Thierry with the 77th Division.[23] This experience influenced his approach to documentary filmmaking, emphasizing raw, on-location shooting amid extreme hazards.A pivotal non-directing credit came with the 1925 ethnographic documentary Grass: A Nation's Battle for Life, for which Schoedsack served as principal cinematographer alongside Merian C.
Cooper, documenting the arduous annual migration of the Bakhtiari tribe across Persia's Zardeh Kuh Mountains and Karun River.[57] His camera work, conducted with limited equipment in remote and perilous terrain, captured the tribe's 500-mile journey of over 50,000 people and livestock, earning acclaim for its vivid portrayal of human endurance and natural spectacle.[57] Similar cinematographic contributions extended to other early projects, such as The Four Feathers (1929), where he handled principal photography for key sequences.[58]In the 1930s, Schoedsack took on production and technical supervisory roles at RKO Radio Pictures, including oversight on projects like The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935), where he contributed location footage shot in India.[23] Additional behind-the-scenes work included directing background location shooting in India for King Kong (1933) to enhance the film's exotic atmospheres.[58]Following World War II service, during which Schoedsack tested aerial photography equipment for the U.S.
military—resulting in partial blindness that limited his hands-on involvement—his contributions shifted to advisory capacities.[42] This transition from active directing to technical support due to health issues marked his later career, with roles focused on guidance rather than primary execution.
| 1932 |
He immigrated to Montreal, Quebec, Canada in 1941 and lived in Pottawattamie, Iowa, United States in 1895 and Kane Township, Pottawattamie, Iowa, United States in 1900.
The rush shows. Their 1927 documentary Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness, which Schoedsack co-directed and co-produced, earned a nomination for Unique and Artistic Picture at the 1st Academy Awards in 1929, a category presented only once by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.[16]In 1949, Schoedsack co-directed Mighty Joe Young with Cooper, a film that won the Academy Award for Special Effects at the 22nd Academy Awards in 1950; producer Merian C.
Cooper accepted the Oscar on behalf of the production but presented it to effects supervisor Willis O'Brien in recognition of the groundbreaking stop-motion animation.Additionally, Schoedsack's 1940 science fiction film Dr.
He worked as a cameraman in World War I, where he served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps.
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Howard Greene. Cyclops received a posthumous nomination for the Retro Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form, at the 2016 Hugo Awards.[41]Schoedsack was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in the Motion Pictures category on February 8, 1960, located at 6270 Hollywood Boulevard.[42]Following his death in 1979, Schoedsack's legacy endured through posthumous tributes to his films, notably the 1933 classic King Kong, which he co-directed with Cooper and was inducted into the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 1991 for its cultural, historic, and aesthetic significance.[39]
Filmography
Directed films
Schoedsack's directorial debut was the 1925 ethnographic documentary Grass: A Nation's Battle for Life, co-directed with Merian C.Cooper, which chronicles the arduous annual migration of the Bakhtiari tribe and their livestock across the mountains of Persia to reach summer pastures.[43][44]In 1927, Schoedsack and Cooper co-directed Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness, a semi-documentary set in the jungles of Siam (modern-day Thailand) that follows a farming family's perilous struggle against wildlife, including tigers and elephants, blending staged drama with authentic footage to depict human resilience in the wilderness.[45][46]Schoedsack co-directed the 1932 survival thriller The Most Dangerous Game with Irving Pichel, adapting Richard Connell's short story about a shipwrecked big-game hunter (Joel McCrea) who becomes the prey of a deranged Russian count (Leslie Banks) on a remote island stocked with exotic animals.[17][47]Schoedsack solely directed the 1934 drama Long Lost Father, a story of a down-on-his-luck former attorney (John Barrymore) reuniting with his estranged son in Paris amid personal redemption.[48]In 1935, Schoedsack co-directed the historical epic The Last Days of Pompeii with Cooper, adapting Edward Bulwer-Lytton's novel about a gladiator (Preston Foster) in ancient Pompeii whose life intersects with biblical themes, culminating in the city's destruction by Mount Vesuvius.[49])The landmark 1933 monster adventure King Kong, co-directed with Cooper, follows filmmaker Carl Denham (Robert Armstrong) leading an expedition to Skull Island, where they capture a colossal ape named Kong, who is then transported to New York City, resulting in chaotic destruction before a tragic climax atop the Empire State Building.[19][50]Later that year, Schoedsack solely directed The Son of Kong (also known as Son of Kong), a quicker, lower-budget sequel to King Kong reuniting Denham with a remorseful crew on a return voyage to Skull Island, where they encounter Kong's albino son, a smaller but gentle giant ape, amid encounters with sea monsters and treasure hunters.[51][52]Schoedsack directed the 1937 adventure film Outlaws of the Orient, a spy thriller involving American agents combating Japanese intrigue in China during the lead-up to war.[53]That same year, he directed Trouble in Morocco, a foreign legionaction film about a sergeant (George Sanders) leading troops against rebels in North Africa.[54]Schoedsack's 1940 science-fiction film Dr.
There?s a nice establishing shot of an Africa plantation, with some great matte work, then little White girl on the plantation Lora Lee Michel sees a couple African men passing with a basket. Schoedsack
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Ernest Beaumont Schoedsack (1893 - 1979)
Biography
Ernest Schoedsack is Notable.
Ernest Beaumont Schoedsack was born on 8 June 1893, in Council Bluffs, Pottawattamie, Iowa, United States, his father, Gustav Adolph Schoedasck, was 37 and his mother, Ruth Ann Beaumont, was 36.
At the conclusion of the war, he stayed in Europe to further his career. She wants what?s in the basket, so there?s a nice leng...
Sources
- "United States Census, 1910," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MG9H-QWG : accessed 6 December 2020), Ernest B Schoedsack in household of Constance Schoedsack, Council Bluffs Ward 3, Pottawattamie, Iowa, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) ED 137, sheet 2B, family 43, NARA microfilm publication T624 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1982), roll 421; FHL microfilm 1,374,434.
His WWII tests further advanced military film documentation standards, influencing protocols for combat and reconnaissance cinematography.[42]
Ernest B. Schoedsack
Mighty Joe Young (1949, )
on Apr 13, 2020 From The Stop ButtonFrom the first scene, Mighty Joe Young is concerning.
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Blind Adventure (1933, )
on Jun 25, 2012 From The Stop ButtonBlind Adventure is a genial, nearly successful comedy thriller.