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Top Ten CountdownJonathan Demme (director, writer) A director comfortable making documentaries as well as feature films, Jonathan Demme has proven himself as one of the most durable of filmmakers—whether it be indie or Hollywood—over his 64 years. The son of an actress mother and public relations man father, Demme moved from Long Island to Miami when he was a teenager. While working as a film critic at a Florida newspaper, Demme’s father introduced him to mega-producer Joseph E. Levine, who gave him a job in his PR department. Eventually, Demme met Roger Corman, who enlisted him to work on exploitation films, with Demme getting to helm his own in 1974 with Caged Heat. In addition to the requisite nudity, violence, and nasty prison matrons, Demme added some feminist and social themes that made it a genre classic. After working on Crazy Mama and Fighting Mad for Corman, Demme helmed Citizen’s Band (a/k/a Handle With Care), a funny satire of the country’s then-current interest in CB radios. Good reviews in spite of lousy box-office led to the Roy Scheider thriller Last Embrace, which also saw a light turnout in theaters. But Demme’s next effort, Melvin And Howard, about the meeting of billionaire Howard Hughes (Jason Robards) and Melvin Dummar (Paul Le Mat), the working stiff who claimed to be his legatee, garnered great reviews and Academy Awards for Mary Steenburgen’s supporting performance and Bo Goldman’s screenplay, although, once again, little in box-office response. Demme’s involvement in the Goldie Hawn-Kurt Russell starrer Swing Shift ended acrimoniously, with the director delivering a different cut of the film than was released. As a means of relief, Demme shifted his attentions to documentaries, and won great praise for capturing the band Talking Heads performing live in Stop Making Sense. Demme’s feel for pop culture, kitsch and unpredictability was evident in Something Wild and Married To The Mob, two off-the-wall comedies. However, it was his 1991 translation of Thomas Harris’ best-seller The Silence Of The Lambs that finally brought him clout, a financial windfall, and Academy Awards for Best Actor (Anthony Hopkins), Best Actress (Jodie Foster), Best Picture and Best Director to boot. An outspoken advocate for liberal causes, Demme took some heat for his depiction of “Buffalo Bill” in Silence Of The Lambs, and decided to deliver a corrective with Philadelphia, the first mainstream Hollywood film to deal with the AIDS crisis. Good reviews and box-office along with an Oscar for Tom Hanks added to Demme’s clout, but he followed up with such subsequent disappointments as Beloved, The Trouble With Charlie (a remake of Charade), and The Manchurian Candidate with Denzel Washington. Through the years, Demme has delved into the documentary pool several times with such films as Storefront Hitchcock, about singer-songwriter Robyn Hitchcock; Neil Young: Heart Of Gold; and Jimmy Carter Man From Plains. Demme’s latest feature, Rachel Getting Married, returns the filmmaker to his low-budget roots with a story of a drug addict (Anne Hathaway) returning home for her sister’s wedding. Early bets are that Hathaway’s efforts will give Demme at least one more Oscar-contending performance delivered under his watch.
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