George Pollock (director)

George Henry Pollock (born March 27, 1907 in Leicester , † December 22, 1979 in Thanet , Kent ) was a British director and assistant director .

Life

Pollock came to film in 1933 and worked regularly as an assistant director until 1961. During this time he was also the right hand man of the star director David Lean , to whom he assisted , especially in the 1940s, in his early films Wonderful Times , Ghost Comedy , Encounter , Mysterious Inheritance , Oliver Twist , The Great Passion and Madeleine . He also assisted Anthony Asquith in a number of productions ( The Demi-Paradise , The Way to the Stars and Conflict of the Heart ). Most of these A-productions, which have received excellent reviews throughout, are based on literary sources.

In the fall of 1948, Pollock came to Vienna to there with Carol Reed entstandenem local thriller The Third Man as a second-unit work director.

Pollock made his debut as a director at the end of 1956 with the 73-minute cheap crime thriller Stranger in Town , the story of an American reporter who tries to uncover the violent death of a blackmailer. Pollock's follow-up productions also had B-film status throughout and he shot several times in Ireland ( Rooney , Sally's Irish Rogue , Broth of a Boy ) and Italy ( Don't Panic Chaps ! , Village of Daughters ). Most of them were comedies.

Pollock's career received a surprising boost in 1961 when the British branch of the US production company MGM commissioned him to film an Agatha Christie story: the Miss Marple crime thriller, shot in black and white, at 4:50 p.m. from Paddington with the then almost 70-year-old actress Margaret Rutherford in the lead role was a huge success, whereupon Pollock was allowed to stage the next three Marple cases.

Right after the last Marple fabric Killer ahoy! Pollock was also awarded the contract to remake another Christie original, Ten Little Niggers . The result of the prominently cast - Marianne Hoppe and Mario Adorf were hired as servants from Germany - the crime film Secret in the Blue Castle was not overly convincing despite the picturesque locations (castle and interior in County Dublin , exterior shots in the Zillertal in Tyrol ) and ended Pollock's cinema career .

George Pollock also directed a number of episodes for several television series before retiring to Kent , southeast London , at the age of 60 .

Filmography (cinema director only)

• 1956: Stranger in Town
• 1957: Rooney
• 1958: Sally's Irish Rogue
• 1958: Broth of a Boy
• 1959: Don't Panic Chaps!
• 1959: And the Same to You
• 1961: 4:50 p.m. from Paddington ( Murder She Said ): Miss Marple film
• 1961: Village of Daughters
• 1962: Kill or Cure
• 1962: The Gallop ( Murder at the Gallop ): Miss Marple film
• 1963: Four Women and One Murder ( Murder Most Foul ): Miss Marple film
• 1964: killer ahoy! ( Murder Ahoy ): Miss Marple movie
• 1965: Secret in the Blue Castle ( Ten Little Indians )

Web links

• George Pollock in the Internet Movie Database (English)