Career
Tourneur began work as an editor and assistant director. He made his debut as a director on French short film Tout ca ne vaut pas l'amour in 1931.
Tourneur went back to Hollywood in 1934 where he had a contract with MGM Studios. While working as the second unit director on the film A Tale of Two Cities he met film producer Val Lewton. Tourneur made his feature debut as director in the 1939 film They All Come Out in 1939. After Tourneur was dropped by MGM in 1941, he was picked up by Lewton to film several acclaimed low-budget horror films for RKO Studios including Cat People and I Walked with a Zombie. Cat People was considered to be a B movie and didn’t have a very big budget, yet the style of lighting and cinematography gave it an edge that has been imitated countless times.Tourneur was promoted to the A-list at RKO, directing films including Out of the Past and Berlin Express. In the 1950s, Tourneur became a freelance director, filming various genre films including The Flame and the Arrow, Stars In My Crown and Night of the Demon. His last films both starred Vincent Price, with The Comedy of Terrors (1963) and War-Gods of the Deep (1965) for American International Pictures.
After his final days working for film, Tourneur began directing television episodes. Tourneur filmed episodes of The Barbara Stanwyck Show, Bonanza, The Twilight Zone and The Alaskans. Tourneur's final director credit was for an episode of T.H.E. Cat in 1966. Tourneur then retired and returned to France.
Read more about this topic: Jacques Tourneur
Famous quotes containing the word career:
“I restore myself when I’m alone. A career is born in public—talent in privacy.”
—Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962)
“A black boxer’s career is the perfect metaphor for the career of a black male. Every day is like being in the gym, sparring with impersonal opponents as one faces the rudeness and hostility that a black male must confront in the United States, where he is the object of both fear and fascination.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)
“Clearly, society has a tremendous stake in insisting on a woman’s natural fitness for the career of mother: the alternatives are all too expensive.”
—Ann Oakley (b. 1944)