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The History of American Cinema: 1962

September - December

18/9 -

The Music Corporation of America (MCA) acquires the Decca record company, the major shareholder in Universal. [ADD]

4/10 -

20^th Century-Fox’s recreation of the events of D-day, The Longest Day, is released.   The film required three directors – Ken Annakin, Andrew Marton and Bernhard Wicki – used 10,000 extra and 48 technical advisors, and cost $10 million to make.   A total of nearly 50 stars include John Wayne, Rod Steiger, Robert Ryan, Henry Fonda, Richard Burton, Eddie Albert, Curd Jürgens, Red Buttons, Sean Connery, Peter Lawford, Gert Frobe, Robert Wagner, Sal Mineo, Alexander Knox, Richard Beymer, and Richard Todd who took part in the real Operation Overlord. [ADD]

24/10 -

John Frankenheimer’s brainwashing Cold War thriller, The Manchurian Candidate, is released.   Based on the best-selling novel by Richard Condon, the film stars Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey and Angela Lansbury. [ADD]

31/10 -

Bette Davis and Joan Crawford’s careers are given a boost in Robert Aldrich’s Grand Guignol horror What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?   Davis is the former child star who psychologically tortures her crippled sister. [ADD]

1/11 -

The film version of the Broadway musical Gypsy, starring Natalie Wood as stripper Gypsy Rose Lee and Rosalind Russell as her domineering mother. [ADD]

8/11 -

Lewis Milestone’s $19.5 million remake of The Mutiny on the Bounty is finally released after a troubled shoot.   Marlon Brando plays Fletcher Christian and Trevor Howard is Captain Bligh.   Brando is paid $1.25m including a percentage cut. [ADD]

12/12 -

John Huston’s Freud adaptation (with Charles Kaufman and producer Wolfgang Reinhardt) of Jean-Paul Sartre’s gargantuan script for the biopic Freud is released.   Montgomery Clift stars as the father of psychoanalysis. [ADD]

20/12 -

The Hal Roach studios in Culver City in which Laurel & Hardy shot many of their early films is purchased by a real estate firm. [ADD]

25/12 -

Robert Mulligan’s adaptation of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird is released.   Gregory Peck stars as small-town Southern lawyer Atticus Finch, defender of a black man accused of rape.   Robert Duvall makes his film debut as Boo Radley. [ADD]

26/12 -

Blake Edwards’ Days of Wine and Roses, a drama about the self-destructive dependency of a PR man and his wife on alcohol, is released.   Jack Lemmon and Lee Remick star as the afflicted couple. [ADD]

26/12 -

Frank Perry's psychological drama David and Lisa is released.   Keir Dullea and Janet Margolin co-star in the title roles as a mentally-ill couple who fall in love.   Howard Da Silva supports. [ADD]

– 20^th Century-Fox receive an Academy Award for developing a technique of panning and scanning widescreen films for broadcast on television. [ADD]

Other Key American Films of 1962

Birdman of Alcatraz (John Frankenheimer) [ADD]

The Connection (Shirley Clarke) [ADD]

Dog Star Man (Stan Brakhage) [ADD]

Hatari! (Howard Hawks) [ADD]

The Miracle Worker (Arthur Penn) [ADD]

Ride the High Country (Sam Peckinpah) [ADD]

The History of Cinema: 1962