1959 Films
The year 1959 in film involved some significant events, with '' Ben-Hur'' winning a record 11 Academy Awards. Top-grossing films (U.S.) The top ten 1959 released films by box office gross in North America are as follows: Events * January 23 – Republic Pictures releases its last production, '' Plunderers of Painted Flats''. * January 29 – Walt Disney releases his 16th animated film, ''Sleeping Beauty'' in Beverly Hills. It is Disney's first animated film to be shown in 70mm and modern 6-track stereophonic sound, but its last fairytale adaptation until 1989. Also on the program is Disney's new "pictorial interpretation" ''Grand Canyon'', which uses the music of Ferde Grofé's '' Grand Canyon Suite''. ''Grand Canyon'' wins an Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Subject). *April 30 – François Truffaut's '' The 400 Blows'' opens the 1959 Cannes Film Festival bringing international attention to the French New Wave. * June 4 – The Three Stooges release t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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North By Northwest
''North by Northwest'' is a 1959 American spy thriller film produced and directed by Alfred Hitchcock, starring Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, and James Mason. The original screenplay written by Ernest Lehman was intended to be the basis for "the Hitchcock picture to end all Hitchcock pictures". ''North by Northwest'' is a tale of mistaken identity: an innocent man (Grant) is pursued across the United States by agents of a mysterious organization that aims to prevent him from blocking their plan to smuggle microfilm containing government secrets out of the country. It is one of several Hitchcock films featuring a musical score by Bernard Herrmann and an opening title sequence by graphic designer Saul Bass. The film was the first to feature extended use of kinetic typography in its opening credits. ''North by Northwest'' was released on July 1, 1959, to critical and commerical success. It topped the box office in the United States for seven consecutive weeks and, after its ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Grand Canyon Suite
The ''Grand Canyon Suite'' is a suite for orchestra by Ferde Grofé, composed between 1929 and 1931. It was initially titled ''Five Pictures of the Grand Canyon''. It consists of five movements, each an evocation in tone of a particular scene typical of the Grand Canyon. Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra gave the first public performance of the work, in concert at the Studebaker Theatre in Chicago on November 22, 1931. Grofe, in 1937, described the genesis of his piece: Although I was born in New York City, I lost all consciousness of being a New Yorker at the age of five. From that age till a few years ago, I lived in California.... In writing "Grand Canyon Suite" I drew from notes I had made during my constant visits to the rim of the mighty work of nature. I had watched the Canyon in all seasons, in all its moods. And my findings were on paper, notes in hieroglyphics that were later transcribed into musical notes." Structure The movements of the suite are: Influenc ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ferde Grofé
Ferdinand Rudolph von Grofé (March 27, 1892 April 3, 1972), known as Ferde Grofé () was an American composer, arranger, pianist, and instrumentalist. He is best known for his 1931 five-movement symphonic poem, ''Grand Canyon Suite'', and for orchestrating George Gershwin's '' Rhapsody in Blue'' for its 1924 premiere. During the 1920s and 1930s, he went by the name Ferdie Grofé. Early life Grofé was born on 127 East Third Street, New York City, in 1892 to German immigrants. He came by his extensive musical interests naturally. His family included several musicians. His father, Emil von Grofé, was a baritone who mainly performed in light opera. His mother, Elsa Johanna Bierlich von Grofé, was a professional cellist and a versatile music teacher who taught Ferde to play both the violin and the piano. Elsa's father, Bernard Bierlich, was a cellist in the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in New York, and her brother, Julius Bierlich, was the first violinist and concertmaster of t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Grand Canyon (1958 Film)
''Grand Canyon'' is a 1958 American short documentary film directed by James Algar and produced by Walt Disney Productions. The film producer was Ernst Heiniger, assisted by his wife Jeanne. It was shown as a supplement during '' Sleeping Beauty's'' initial run. The short won an Oscar at the 31st Academy Awards in 1959 for Best Short Subject (Live Action). It is also included as a bonus feature on the 1997 laserdisc, 2003 DVD, and 2008 DVD & Blu-ray releases of ''Sleeping Beauty''. According to the opening credits, ''Grand Canyon'' is "a pictorial interpretation of Ferde Grofé's ''Grand Canyon Suite The ''Grand Canyon Suite'' is a suite for orchestra by Ferde Grofé, composed between 1929 and 1931. It was initially titled ''Five Pictures of the Grand Canyon''. It consists of five movements, each an evocation in tone of a particular scen ...''", much as the animated segments in '' Fantasia'' are pictorial representations of music, and the film is strongly related to ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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1989
1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin Wall in November, the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia and the overthrow of the communist dictatorship in Romania in December; the movement ended in December 1991 with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Revolutions against communist governments in Eastern Europe mainly succeeded, but the year also saw the suppression by the Chinese government of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, 1989 Tiananmen Square protests in Beijing. It was the year of the first 1989 Brazilian presidential election, Brazilian direct presidential election in 29 years, since the end of the Military dictatorship in Brazil, military government in 1985 that ruled the country for more than twenty years, and marked the redemocratization process's final poin ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Fantasia (1940 Film)
''Fantasia'' is a 1940 American Animated film, animated Musical film, musical anthology film produced by Walt Disney Productions, with story direction by Joe Grant and Dick Huemer and production supervision by Walt Disney and Ben Sharpsteen. It consists of eight animated segments set to pieces of classical music conducted by Leopold Stokowski, seven of which are performed by the Philadelphia Orchestra. Music critic and composer Deems Taylor acts as the film's Master of Ceremonies who introduces each segment in live action. Disney settled on the film's concept in 1938 as work neared completion on ''The Sorcerer's Apprentice'', originally an elaborate ''Silly Symphony'' cartoon designed as a comeback role for Mickey Mouse, who had declined in popularity. As production costs surpassed what the short could earn, Disney decided to include it in a feature-length film of multiple segments set to classical pieces with Stokowski and Taylor as collaborators. The soundtrack was recorded u ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Stereophonic Sound
Stereophonic sound, commonly shortened to stereo, is a method of sound reproduction that recreates a multi-directional, 3-dimensional audible perspective. This is usually achieved by using two independent audio channels through a configuration of two loudspeakers (or stereo headphones) in such a way as to create the impression of sound heard from various directions, as in natural hearing. Because the multi-dimensional perspective is the crucial aspect, the term ''stereophonic'' also applies to systems with more than two channels or speakers such as quadraphonic and surround sound. Binaural recording, Binaural sound systems are also ''stereophonic''. Stereo sound has been in common use since the 1970s in entertainment media such as broadcast radio, recorded music, television, video cameras, cinema, computer audio, and the Internet. Etymology The word ''stereophonic'' derives from the Greek language, Greek (''stereós'', "firm, solid") + (''phōnḗ'', "sound, tone, voice" ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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70 Mm Film
70 mm film (or 65 mm film) is a wide high-resolution film gauge for motion picture photography, with a negative area nearly 3.5 times as large as the standard 35 mm motion picture film format. As used in cameras, the film is wide. For projection, the original 65 mm film is printed on film. The additional 5 mm contains the four magnetic stripes, holding six tracks of stereophonic sound. Although later 70 mm prints use digital sound encoding (specifically the DTS format), the vast majority of existing and surviving 70 mm prints pre-date this technology. Each frame is five perforations tall (i.e., 23.8125 mm or 15/16 inches tall), with an image aspect ratio of 2.2:1. The use of anamorphic Ultra Panavision 70 lenses squeezes an ultra-wide 2.76:1 aspect ratio horizontally into that 2.2:1 imaging area. To this day, Ultra Panavision 70 produces the widest picture size in the history of filmmaking; surpassed only by Polyvision, which was on ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Beverly Hills, California
Beverly Hills is a city located in Los Angeles County, California, United States. A notable and historic suburb of Los Angeles, it is located just southwest of the Hollywood Hills, approximately northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Beverly Hills' land area totals and (together with the neighboring smaller city of West Hollywood, California, West Hollywood to the east) is entirely surrounded by the Los Angeles, city of Los Angeles. According to the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the city has a population of 32,701, marking a decrease of 1,408 from the 2010 United States census, 2010 census count of 34,109. In Culture of the United States, American popular culture, Beverly Hills has been known as an affluent location within Greater Los Angeles, which corresponds to higher Real estate appraisal, property values and Property tax in the United States, taxes in the area. The city is well known for its Rodeo Drive shopping district that includes many Designer label, designer b ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sleeping Beauty (1959 Film)
''Sleeping Beauty'' is a 1959 American animated musical fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by Buena Vista Film Distribution. Based on Charles Perrault's 1697 fairy tale, the film follows Princess Aurora, who was cursed by the evil fairy Maleficent to die from pricking her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel on her 16th birthday. She is saved by three good fairies, who alter Aurora's curse so that she falls into a deep sleep and will be awakened by true love's kiss. The production was supervised by Clyde Geronimi, and was directed by Wolfgang Reitherman, Eric Larson, and Les Clark. It features the voices of Mary Costa, Bill Shirley, Eleanor Audley, Verna Felton, Barbara Luddy, Barbara Jo Allen, Taylor Holmes, and Bill Thompson. ''Sleeping Beauty'' began development in 1950. The film took nearly a decade and $6 million () to produce, and was Disney's most expensive animated feature at the time. Its tapestry-like art style w ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Walt Disney
Walter Elias Disney ( ; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer, voice actor, and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the Golden age of American animation, American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film producer, he holds the record for most Academy Awards earned (22) and nominations (59) by an individual. He was presented with two Golden Globe Special Achievement Awards and an Emmy Award, among other honors. Several of his films are included in the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress and have also been named as some of the greatest films ever by the American Film Institute. Born in Chicago in 1901, Disney developed an early interest in drawing. He took art classes as a boy and took a job as a commercial illustrator at the age of 18. He moved to California in the early 1920s and set up the Disney Brothers Studio (now the Walt Disney Company) with his brother Roy O. Disney, Roy. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |