Monte Hellman
Professional stuntman Gary Kent has made a hard-earned name for himself in over 50 years of falling, burning, jumping, fighting and breaking himself for some of the most cherished independent and B-movies of the 20th Century. This is his story, from the anything goes days of the drive-in era, including his run in with Charles Manson and his infamous family, to his personal battles and triumphs with health, alcoholism, and love. Features interviews with Monte Hellman, Duane Eddy, Richard Rush, Marc Singer and more.
Made for the Venice Film Festival's 70th anniversary, seventy filmmakers made a short film between 60 and 90 seconds long on their interpretation of the future of cinema.
A passionate filmmaker creating a film based upon a true crime casts an unknown mysterious young woman bearing a disturbing resemblance to the femme fatale in the story. Unsuspectingly, he finds himself drawn into a complex web of haunting intrigue: he becomes obsessed with the woman, the crime, her possibly notorious past, and the disturbing complexity between art and truth. From the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina to Verona, Rome, and London, new truths are revealed and clues to other crimes and passions, darker and even more complex, are uncovered.
Documentary by Luc Lagier exploring Godard's career as a filmmaker, the production of Breathless and his influence and his relationship with American cinema.
A retrospective documentary on the making of Monte Hellman's 1971 film TWO-LANE BLACKTOP.
An interview with the producers of Monte Hellman's 1971 film TWO-LANE BLACKTOP.
After not having seen each other in thirty-five years, Monte Hellman and James Taylor sat down for this conversation, recorded in the fall of 2007 in Massachusetts.
This interview features director Monte Hellman and singer-songwriter-actor Kris Kristofferson. It was filmed in Los Angeles in the summer of 2007.
Set in 1950's Hollywood, two filmmakers become unlikely friends: Leo, who writes violent B-movies, and Stanley, a promising director. Nothing can come between them, until the day Stanley shows up with a mysterious girlfriend, Nina.
A look at the mystique of road movies, combining interviews, film clips, music, photography, literature and a narrative storyline featuring Paul Rudd and Tom McCarthy.
Trapped in a house of horror, seven people discover that the only way they'll get out alive is to tell their scariest stories.
An aspiring Hollywood actress, on a visit to a charming North England town, has a brief fling with the town undertaker, who also writes obituaries for the local paper. Returning home, where she works as a waitress at a Japanese restaurant, she tells everyone about the handsome "writer" she met on her trip. Unfortunately, he decides to follow her back to Hollywood, setting up the expected light romantic comedy with asides as the newcomer gains experience about the goings on in Hollywood.
This straight-talking program seeks to understand the enigmatic and controversial Sam Peckinpah, whose violent films such as The Wild Bunch and Straw Dogs had a telling effect on the cinema of the 1970s and 80s. Those who knew and worked with him, including actor James Coburn, actress Ali MacGraw, his associate Katherine Haber, his cousin Bob Peckinpah, and several screenwriters and producers, examine his life in an attempt to separate the man from the persona. Clips from key films reinforce this detailed discussion of Peckinpah's art and a fixation on violence that still permeates Hollywood today.
A botched robbery indicates a police informant, and the pressure mounts in the aftermath at a warehouse. Crime begets violence as the survivors -- veteran Mr. White, newcomer Mr. Orange, psychopathic parolee Mr. Blonde, bickering weasel Mr. Pink and Nice Guy Eddie -- unravel.
Ricky Caldwell, the notorious 'Killer Santa Claus', awakens from a six-year coma after being kept alive on life-support by a slightly crazed doctor experimenting with ESP and other special abilities. Ricky targets a young, clairvoyant blind woman, named Laura, whom is traveling with her brother Chris, and his girlfriend Jerri to their grandmother's house for Christmas Eve, and Ricky decides to go after her, leaving a trail of dead bodies in his wake.
A grotesquely disfigured harpooner called Iguana is severely mistreated by his fellow sailors on a whaling ship in the 19th century. One night he escapes and takes up residence on a remote island. He makes himself ruler of the island and declares war on mankind. Anyone unfortunate enough to wind up on the island with Iguana is subjected to his cruel tyranny.
During a party at movie director Danny's home, a group of friends and actors people are reunited to converse about love and relationship. Orson Welles is the "judge" of these conversations.
Monte Hellman was born in 1932. By 1986 he made eight features, but had not directed for six years. I had made as many documentaries, but had not turned a foot of film through a camera for two years. I decided to break the silence by spending a day with him. Nine rolls were loaded into the camera. We talked until either we or the camera ran out.
Monte Hellman's short portrait of Francis Ford Coppola discussing business and craft at home and on the set of his Zoetrope Studios.
CIA agent Harry Wargrave is sent to aid Gen. Marenkov, a senior Russian official, who is defecting to the west. Wargrave decides they should travel to safety on a train across Europe, the "Atlantic Express". During the journey they must survive attacks by terrorists and an avalanche, all planned by Russian spy-catcher Nikolai Bunin.
Gunslinger Clayton Drumm (Testi) is about to be hanged when he is given a chance to live if he will agree to murder Matthew (Oates), a miner who has steadfastly refused to sell his land to the railroad company. Matthew’s refusal is a major obstacle to the railroad’s plans for expansion.
The Greatest is a 1977 film about the life of boxer Muhammad Ali, in which Ali plays himself. It was directed by Tom Gries and Monte Hellman. The song "Greatest Love of All", later remade by Whitney Houston, was written for this film and sung by George Benson. The movie follows Ali's life from the 1960 Olympics to his regaining the heavyweight crown from George Foreman in their famous "Rumble in the Jungle" fight in 1974.
When Ed Neilson's entire family is viciously murdered, he pleads with retired CIA operative Duke Smith (Robert Conrad) to investigate. He refuses, but relents after Neilson too meets an explosive death. Deception, international intrigue and a ruthless "syndicate of businessmen" intent on raping a South Pacific Islands nation of its resources keep the pace fast.
Mike Locken is one of the principle members of a group of freelance spies. A significant portion of their work is for the C.I.A. and while on a case for them one of his friends turns on him and shoots him in the elbow and knee. His assignment, to protect someone, goes down in flames. He is nearly crippled, but with braces is able to again become mobile. For revenge as much as anything else, Mike goes after his ex-friend.
Shatter, an international contract killer, has been assigned to assassinate the President of a small African country and collect his fee from a bank in the Far East. On arrival in Hong Kong his life is threatened and when the bank denies all knowledge of payment arrangements, he realises he has been drawn into a dangerous game where there are no rules. Amongst the players are the Mafia and several foreign intelligence services and the stakes being played for are deadly.
A man who trains fighting cocks vows to remain silent until one of his birds wins a championship.
A driver and a mechanic travel around the United States hopping from drag strip to drag strip in a 1955 Chevy Bel-Air coupe. They race for money, betting with their competitors. The pair gain a young and talkative female stowaway. Along the way they unintentionally attract a well-to-do drifter driving a new Pontiac GTO. This older man, looking for attention, antagonizes their efforts.
A tennis champ falls in with the Hollywood crowd, finds himself being corrupted by the life in the fast lane.
Pilot Harry Black is hired to fly a man named Carlyle to Istanbul, where he's murdered. Now, mysterious Diane Reed and a local gangster, Rashi, are after Harry believing that he has the priceless plates Carlyle used to counterfeit money.
Chicago February 14th 1929. Al Capone finally establishes himself as the city's boss of organised crime. In a north-side garage his hoods, dressed as policemen, surprise and mow down with machine-guns the key members of Bugs Moran's rival gang. The film traces the history of the incident, and the lives affected and in some cases ended by it.
Three cowboys, mistaken for members of an outlaw gang, are relentlessly pursued by a posse.
Two miners agree to guide a mysterious woman, who has appeared in their camp from nowhere, to a nearby town; but soon, because of her erratic behavior, they begin to suspect that her true purpose is quite different.
Bus Riley returns to his small town after time in the army. On his return, his ex-girlfriend wants to resume their relationship. The only problem is she has married in the mean time. Searching for fulfilment in his life, Bus decides to get a job with his gay friend who is a mortician. When the mortician makes a pass at him, Bus quickly gets out.
This adventure is set in the Philippines and chronicles the exploits of two men who survive a plane crash in the jungle. One of the men is an avaricious killer who has come to the islands to search for a fortune in diamonds. The other is an international adventurer. Now they must somehow overcome their vast personal differences and desires to survive in the steamy wilderness
During WWII, a three-man commando team places its trust in the hands of a band of Filipino resistors, as they try to knock out a Japenese communication center.
DESTROY THIS MAN and a fortune in diamonds is yours. A Filipino version of 1964's FLIGHT TO FURY, filmed back-to-back with that film.
A rebellious punk of the beat generation spends his days as an amateur dirt track driver in between partying and troublemaking. He eventually kidnaps his buddy's girlfriend, kills a few police officers and finally sees his own life end in tragedy.
In a skiing station in Dakota, a gang of criminals leaded by Alexander "Alex" Ward plans the heist of golden bars from a small bank. While the lover of Alex, Gypsy Boulet, goes to an isolated cabin with the ski instructor Gil Jackson, a time bomb explodes a cave to divert the attention of the locals and the gangsters steal the gold. But the explosion releases a spider-like monster and due to a storm, the group becomes trapped in Gil's cabin and threatened by the creepy beast.
Paul Joyce’s Out of the Blue and Into the Black is an insightful documentary surveying American independent film production post-Easy Rider and includes interviews with Peter Bogdanovich, Dennis Hopper, Monte Hellman and Roger Corman.
