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United States Pictures

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United States Pictures (also known as United States Productions) was the name of the motion picture production company belonging to Milton Sperling who was Harry Warner's (of the Warner Bros. studio) son-in-law.

Sperling was a highly experienced screenwriter and producer with 20th Century Fox and other studios who had just returned from his World War II service in the U.S. Marine Corps Photographic Unit. Warner Bros. offered Sperling an independent production company that would use Warner Bros. studio resources and financing to make motion pictures that would be released by the studio. In the post World War II era, the Hollywood major studios were beginning to find the idea of purchasing completed motion pictures from independent film production companies more economical than producing the films themselves (although United Artists had done this decades earlier, acting as a distributor for independent films since its establishment in 1919).[1]

Beginning with Fritz Lang's Cloak and Dagger (1946), followed by Raoul Walsh's Pursued (1947), Sperling's United States Pictures made a total of 14 films. The last two, Samuel Fuller's Merrill's Marauders (1962) and Ken Annakin's Battle of the Bulge (1965) were filmed in the Philippines and Spain respectively. Sperling found that the Filipino and Spanish governments and film companies thought they were dealing with a branch of the United States Government due to the name of the company and provided superb cooperation.

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Milton Sperling

Milton Sperling

Milton Sperling was an American film producer and screenwriter for 20th Century Fox and Warner Bros., where he had his own independent production unit, United States Pictures.

Harry Warner

Harry Warner

Harry Morris Warner was an American studio executive, one of the founders of Warner Bros., and a major contributor to the development of the film industry. Along with his three younger brothers Warner played a crucial role in the film business and played a key role in establishing Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc, serving as the company president until 1956.

Film producer

Film producer

A film producer is a person who oversees film production. Either employed by a production company or working independently, producers plan and coordinate various aspects of film production, such as selecting the script, coordinating writing, directing, editing, and arranging financing.

Cinema of the United States

Cinema of the United States

The cinema of the United States, consisting mainly of major film studios along with some independent films, has had a large effect on the global film industry since the early 20th century. The dominant style of American cinema is classical Hollywood cinema, which developed from 1910 to 1969 and is still typical of most films made there to this day. While Frenchmen Auguste and Louis Lumière are generally credited with the birth of modern cinema, American cinema soon came to be a dominant force in the emerging industry. As of 2017, it produced the third-largest number of films of any national cinema, after India and China, with more than 600 English-language films released on average every year. While the national cinemas of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand also produce films in the same language, they are not part of the Hollywood system. Because of this, Hollywood has also been considered a transnational cinema, and has produced multiple language versions of some titles, often in Spanish or French. Contemporary Hollywood often outsources production to Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.

Fritz Lang

Fritz Lang

Friedrich Christian Anton Lang, known as Fritz Lang, was an Austrian film director, screenwriter, and producer who worked in Germany and later the United States. One of the best-known émigrés from Germany's school of Expressionism, he was dubbed the "Master of Darkness" by the British Film Institute. He has been cited as one of the most influential filmmakers of all time.

Cloak and Dagger (1946 film)

Cloak and Dagger (1946 film)

Cloak and Dagger is a 1946 spy film directed by Fritz Lang which stars Gary Cooper as an American scientist sent by the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) to contact European scientists working on the German nuclear weapons program and Lilli Palmer as a member of the Italian resistance movement who shelters and guides him. The story was drawn from the 1946 non-fiction book Cloak and Dagger: The Secret Story of O.S.S. by Corey Ford and Alastair MacBain, while a former OSS agent E. Michael Burke acted as technical advisor. Like 13 Rue Madeleine (1947), the film was intended as a tribute to Office of Strategic Services (OSS) operations in German-occupied Europe during World War II.

Raoul Walsh

Raoul Walsh

Raoul Walsh was an American film director, actor, founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), and the brother of silent screen actor George Walsh. He was known for portraying John Wilkes Booth in the silent film The Birth of a Nation (1915) and for directing such films as the widescreen epic The Big Trail (1930) starring John Wayne in his first leading role, The Roaring Twenties starring James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart, High Sierra (1941) starring Ida Lupino and Humphrey Bogart, and White Heat (1949) starring James Cagney and Edmond O'Brien. He directed his last film in 1964. His work has been noted as influences on directors such as Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Jack Hill, and Martin Scorsese.

Pursued

Pursued

Pursued is a 1947 American Western film directed by Raoul Walsh with cinematography by James Wong Howe, written by Niven Busch, and starring Theresa Wright and Robert Mitchum. The supporting cast features Judith Anderson, Dean Jagger, Alan Hale Sr., and Harry Carey Jr. The music is by Max Steiner and the picture was shot on location in Gallup, New Mexico.

Merrill's Marauders (film)

Merrill's Marauders (film)

Merrill's Marauders is a 1962 Technicolor war film, photographed in CinemaScope, and directed and co-written by Samuel Fuller. It is based on the exploits of the long-range penetration jungle warfare unit of the same name in the Burma campaign, culminating in the Siege of Myitkyina.

Ken Annakin

Ken Annakin

Kenneth Cooper Annakin, OBE was an English film director.

Battle of the Bulge (1965 film)

Battle of the Bulge (1965 film)

Battle of the Bulge is a 1965 American widescreen epic war film produced in Spain, directed by Ken Annakin, and starring Henry Fonda, Robert Shaw, Telly Savalas, Robert Ryan, Dana Andrews, and Charles Bronson. The feature was filmed in Ultra Panavision 70 and exhibited in 70 mm Cinerama. Battle of the Bulge had its world premiere on December 16, 1965, the 21st anniversary of the titular battle, at the Pacific Cinerama Dome Theatre in Hollywood, California.

Philippines

Philippines

The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. It is situated in the western Pacific Ocean and consists of around 7,641 islands that are broadly categorized under three main geographical divisions from north to south: Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. The Philippines is bounded by the South China Sea to the west, the Philippine Sea to the east, and the Celebes Sea to the southwest. It shares maritime borders with Taiwan to the north, Japan to the northeast, Palau to the east and southeast, Indonesia to the south, Malaysia to the southwest, Vietnam to the west, and China to the northwest. The Philippines is the world's thirteenth-most-populous country and has diverse ethnicities and cultures throughout its islands. Manila is the country's capital, while the largest city is Quezon City; both lie within the urban area of Metro Manila.

Filmography

The United States Pictures marked with an (*) signifies Milton Sperling contributed to the screenplay.

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Cloak and Dagger (1946 film)

Cloak and Dagger (1946 film)

Cloak and Dagger is a 1946 spy film directed by Fritz Lang which stars Gary Cooper as an American scientist sent by the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) to contact European scientists working on the German nuclear weapons program and Lilli Palmer as a member of the Italian resistance movement who shelters and guides him. The story was drawn from the 1946 non-fiction book Cloak and Dagger: The Secret Story of O.S.S. by Corey Ford and Alastair MacBain, while a former OSS agent E. Michael Burke acted as technical advisor. Like 13 Rue Madeleine (1947), the film was intended as a tribute to Office of Strategic Services (OSS) operations in German-occupied Europe during World War II.

Fritz Lang

Fritz Lang

Friedrich Christian Anton Lang, known as Fritz Lang, was an Austrian film director, screenwriter, and producer who worked in Germany and later the United States. One of the best-known émigrés from Germany's school of Expressionism, he was dubbed the "Master of Darkness" by the British Film Institute. He has been cited as one of the most influential filmmakers of all time.

Pursued

Pursued

Pursued is a 1947 American Western film directed by Raoul Walsh with cinematography by James Wong Howe, written by Niven Busch, and starring Theresa Wright and Robert Mitchum. The supporting cast features Judith Anderson, Dean Jagger, Alan Hale Sr., and Harry Carey Jr. The music is by Max Steiner and the picture was shot on location in Gallup, New Mexico.

Raoul Walsh

Raoul Walsh

Raoul Walsh was an American film director, actor, founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), and the brother of silent screen actor George Walsh. He was known for portraying John Wilkes Booth in the silent film The Birth of a Nation (1915) and for directing such films as the widescreen epic The Big Trail (1930) starring John Wayne in his first leading role, The Roaring Twenties starring James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart, High Sierra (1941) starring Ida Lupino and Humphrey Bogart, and White Heat (1949) starring James Cagney and Edmond O'Brien. He directed his last film in 1964. His work has been noted as influences on directors such as Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Jack Hill, and Martin Scorsese.

My Girl Tisa

My Girl Tisa

My Girl Tisa is a 1948 film directed by Elliott Nugent and starring Lilli Palmer and Sam Wanamaker. It is based on the play Ever the Beginning by Lucille S. Prumbs and Sara B. Smith.

Elliott Nugent

Elliott Nugent

Elliott Nugent was an American actor, playwright, writer, and film director.

Ray Enright

Ray Enright

Ray Enright was an American film director. He directed 73 films between 1927–53, many of them for Warner Bros. He oversaw comedy films like Joe E. Brown vehicles, five of the six informal pairings of Joan Blondell and Glenda Farrell, and later directed a number of Westerns, many featuring Randolph Scott. Enright was born in Anderson, Indiana, and died in Hollywood, California, from a heart attack.

Bretaigne Windust

Bretaigne Windust

Ernest Bretaigne Windust was a United States-based French-born theater, film, and television director.

Distant Drums

Distant Drums

Distant Drums is a 1951 American Florida Western film directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Gary Cooper. It is set during the Second Seminole War in the 1840s, with Cooper playing an Army captain who successfully destroys a fort held by Spanish gunrunners and is pursued into the Everglades by a large group of Seminoles. The fort used in the film was the historic Castillo de San Marcos in St. Augustine, Florida, and most of the principal photography was shot on location in Florida.

Joseph H. Lewis

Joseph H. Lewis

Joseph H. Lewis was an American B-movie film director whose stylish flourishes came to be appreciated by auteur theory-espousing film critics in the years following his retirement in 1966. In a 30-year directorial career, he helmed numerous low-budget westerns, action pictures, musicals, adventures, and thrillers. Today he is remembered for mysteries and film noir stories: My Name Is Julia Ross (1945) and So Dark the Night (1946) as well as his most highly regarded features, 1950's Gun Crazy, which spotlighted a desperate young couple who embark on a deadly crime spree, and the 1955 film noir The Big Combo, with its stunning cinematography by John Alton.

Blowing Wild

Blowing Wild

Blowing Wild is a 1953 American Western film directed by Hugo Fregonese starring Gary Cooper, Barbara Stanwyck, and Anthony Quinn. It was written by Philip Yordan. The story revolves around a love triangle set in the oilfields of an unnamed South American country plagued with bandits. Ruth Roman also stars and adds to the romantic entanglements.

Hugo Fregonese

Hugo Fregonese

Hugo Geronimo Fregonese was an Argentine film director and screenwriter who worked both in Hollywood and his home country.

Source: "United States Pictures", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2022, March 24th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Pictures.

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References
  1. ^ Sperling, Cass Warner, Millner, Cork, and Warner Jr, Jack Hollywood Be Thy Name Prima Publishing (1994)

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