Kirk Douglas died at the age of 103, perfectly ending his legendary life. Born into a poor Russian Jewish immigrant family, this story itself became a generation of superstars by his own struggles, and the story itself is a good film theme, perfectly interpreting the "American Dream". >>> Hollywood legend Kirk Douglas died at the age of 103
Kirk Douglas.
Kirk Douglas's profile says he is an actor, producer, director, and entrepreneur. These different identities also highlight different aspects of Douglas's life.
Because of his family's poverty, Douglas was very self-reliant from an early age, working as a waiter and wrestler. After graduating from the University of St. Lawrence, he entered Broadway and became an actor. Douglas's image in front of the screen is the standard "tough guy", and so is his own experience. After the outbreak of World War II, Douglas enlisted in the army and served in the U.S. Navy, only to return to show business after the war.
In 1949, at the age of 33, Douglas played a boxer lost in desire in the movie "Winning the Championship", and was nominated for the Oscar for Best Actor for the first time, achieving career success. Since then, he has become Hollywood's iconic tough guy superstar. Not only that, Douglas worked hard to break through his own drama path and play different roles, and was twice nominated for the Academy Award for "The Jade Girl" in 1953 and "Van Gogh Biography" in 1956. Unfortunately, Douglas never won the Oscar for Best Actor. To make up for this regret, in 1996 the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awarded him the Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement in recognition of his contributions to the film industry. In 1999, he was named 17th by the American Film Institute as "The Greatest Actor of a Hundred Years."
Douglas in van Gogh's biography.
As an outstanding actor, Douglas has worked with many famous directors in his lifetime, starring in Vincent Minnelly's "The Jade Girl" and "Van Gogh", Billy Wilder's "Upside Down Ace", Richard Fletcher's "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea", Kubrick's "The Glorious Road", David Miller's "How Lonely Heroes From Ancient Times" and other classic masterpieces.
Not content to be manipulated, Douglas, as merely an actor, recognized early on the rules of the Game in Hollywood: power is the only way to have capital. In the late 1950s, Douglas set up his own production company, pioneering the trend. Under his decision, he began to shoot works such as "The Road to Glory" and "Invincible", and thus excavated Kubrick, a talented director. Because of the obsession with heroic narrative in his bones, Douglas shot "Spartacus", which best represented his own image, and although the director was still Kubrick, Douglas showed extraordinary control and made the film a masterpiece of his life. However, because the control is too strong and Kubrick is out of harmony, the latter embarked on the road of independent directorship, and today it seems to have created a film anecdote.
Not only that, Douglas is a good director, who first became a director in 1973 to shoot the film "Scalawag". Posse, a 1975 Western, was also nominated for the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival.
It is worth mentioning that kirk Douglas's four sons have also followed his steps into the film industry. In particular, the eldest son, Michael Douglas, is even more accomplished, becoming a new generation of superstars who are not inferior to his father, and won the Oscar for best actor with "Wall Street", not to mention, but also fulfilled his father's wish to produce the movie "Flying Over the Madhouse" and create history.
In his later years, Kirk Douglas also did not stop developing his career, and his production company was active until the 1990s. After 2000, he also appeared frequently in movies or TV series. The 2003 film "Three Generations Together" brings together the performances of three generations of Douglas family filmmakers (Kirk's ex-wife plays his wife in the movie), expressing the contradictions and love of three generations of a family to the fullest, because it is rich in some self-conditioning, this film was very concerned at that time.
Poster of "Three Generations Together".
Someone once said of Kirk Douglas, saying that his iconic role made him a world-class star because his performances were unique, and in the world beyond the film, he continued to inspire audiences and fans through writing and philanthropy.
In addition to acting, Douglas is also passionate about humanitarian causes and has been awarded a special honorable mention for his work on children's charity. He has been a Goodwill Ambassador to the U.S. Department of State since 1963, receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1981 and the Jefferson Award in 1983.
The passing of Kirk Douglas seems to remind us once again of the passing of the golden age of Hollywood, but we need not be sad about it. The centenarian has left us nearly 80 films, two best-selling books and two autobiographies, and his life and his work itself are the best footnotes of the times, preserving for us the uncorruptible flesh of the historical spirit.
□ Yu (Film Critic)
Beijing News Editor Wu Longzhen Proofreader He Yan