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Alan J. Pakula: President's Men
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Renowned for guiding actors to the Oscars and, as Robert Redford put it, bringing "sensitivity and intellect to seemingly intractable subjects," Alan J. Pakula built a successful career that was cut short by his death in a car accident in 1998. With his restrained, thoughtful filmmaking style, Pakula weathered industry upheavals and audience tastes that often preferred anything but intelligent subtlety, leaving a legacy that includes All the President's Men (1976).
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Alan Jay Pakula (April 7, 1928 - November 19, 1998) was an American film producer, writer, and director noted for his contributions to the conspiracy thriller genre. In 1962, he produced "To Kill a Mockingbird", for which he received a Best Picture nomination in the 1963 Academy Awards. In 1969, he directed his first feature, "The Sterile Cuckoo", starring Liza Minnelli. Pakula gained recognition for his "paranoia trilogy", which included 1971's "Klute", 1974's "The Parallax View", and 1976's "All the President's Men".
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Movie director and producer Alan Pakula, who made such hits as "To Kill a Mockingbird," "Klute," "All the President's Men" and "Sophie's Choice," was killed in a freak accident Thursday. Pakula, 70, was driving on the Long Island Expressway when a seven-foot-long metal bar on the roadway flew up and crashed through the windshield of his car, striking him on the head and causing the vehicle to swerve across a service road and hit a fence, said Suffolk County (NY) police. He was pronounced dead at 12:22 p.m. at the North Shore University Hospital. Pakula's family said he had been on his way to his home in East Hampton to work on "No Ordinary Time," a screenplay about the White House during the era of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. Pakula was nominated for an Academy award as best director for "All the President's Men" and nominated for best screenplay for "Sophie's Choice," which he ... directed. His most recent film was "The Devil's Own," with Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt.
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Pakula launched his own directorial career with the sensitive, if somewhat static melodrama, "The Sterile Cuckoo" (1969) that yielded a strong Oscar-nominated performance from Liza Minnelli. Two years, later, he hit his stride with "Klute" (1971), a moody psychological thriller with Donald Sutherland as a private detective protecting Oscar-winner Jane Fonda as a Manhattan call girl. The underrated, gorgeously shot "Love and Pain and the Whole Damn Thing" (1973) focused on the unlikely relationship between a dying woman (Maggie Smith) and a much younger man (Timothy Bottoms). Along with photographer Gordon Willis and production designer George Jenkins, he provided a brilliant "look" for the gripping political thriller "The Parallax View" (1974). This Warren Beatty vehicle about a reporter who accidentally uncovers an assassination plot was something of a warm-up for 1976's factual "All the President's Men". Assembling the same production team, he created a Washington that was authentic yet frightening and by concentrating on the dynamics between reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein (played by Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman) sustained the suspense of a story of which the audience already knew the ending.
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PRESUMED INNOCENT is a disturbing murder mystery told in the style director Alan J. Pakula (ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN) enjoys best. Harrison Ford (RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER) plays prosecuting attorney Rusty Sabich, who is deeply shaken by the sudden rape and murder of a colleague and former love interest. Sabich is assigned to the case, which becomes clouded by both personal and political interests that are in conflict. An adaptation of Scott Turow's best-selling novel, the film presents an intense look at the human flaws of ambition, greed and lust.
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[I]n 1976, Pakula rounded out the "trilogy" with All the President's Men, another commercial hit considered by many critics and fans to be one of the best thrillers of the 1970s. [1] The film was based on the bestselling account of the Watergate scandal written by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.
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