Director John Huston lit up the screen with riveting adaptations of genres ranging from modern epic ("Moby Dick") to Southern Gothic ("Reflections in a Golden Eye," "Night of the Iguana") and pulp fiction ("The Maltese Falcon"). Fiercely independent and uncompromising in...
[more]Director John Huston lit up the screen with riveting adaptations of genres ranging from modern epic ("Moby Dick") to Southern Gothic ("Reflections in a Golden Eye," "Night of the Iguana") and pulp fiction ("The Maltese Falcon"). Fiercely independent and uncompromising in his cinematic style, John Huston had an immense hunger for life that spilled across the boundary between fiction and reality. With a Hemingway-esque flair, he collected daring careers and macho hobbies: he was a blue-ribbon horseman, big game hunter, champion boxer, stage actor, painter, journalist, and lieutenant in the Mexican cavalry.
The rapid-fire verbal volleys and hard-boiled psychology of "The Maltese Falcon," Huston's splashy directorial debut, reflect his hard-edged take on life. The film was nominated for best picture at the 1941 Academy Awards. Other classics in which Huston directed Bogart include "Key Largo" (1948), "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" (1949), and "The African Queen" (1952).
Huston's love of the grand statement inspired epic-length monologues that sometimes marred the tautness of his scripts. His favorite dramatic scenario was the undermining of ambitious plans by human weakness, as in "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" (1949), "The Asphalt Jungle" (1950), and "Beat the Devil" (1954).
As Huston cultivated a more aristocratic persona off-screen, his film lexicon gradually underwent a tonal face-lift, shifting from earthy pessimism to arty pretense. Lofty aspirations interfered with his mastery of material in "Moulin Rouge" (1953), "Moby Dick" (1956), and "Freud" (1963). From the mid-1950s on, Huston's career went into decline, ending with slick formula entertainments like "The Mackintosh Man" and "Annie." Huston redeemed himself in his later films -- "The Man Who Would Be King" (1975); "Prizzi's Honor" (1985), which earned his daughter, Anjelica Huston, a best supporting actress Oscar; and "The Dead" (1987), filmed just before his death. In his best films, Huston used his psychological and emotional insights, blustering vitality, and eccentric wit to breathe cinematic life into literary genres.
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