Editing Robert Siodmak

{{Short description|German film director (1900–1973)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=November 2021}}
{{Infobox person
| name               = Robert Siodmak
| image              = RobertSiodmak.jpg
| caption            = 
| birth_date         = {{Birth date|1900|8|8|df=y}}
| birth_place        = [[Dresden]], [[Saxony]], [[German Empire]]
| death_date         = {{Death date and age|1973|3|10|1900|8|8|df=y}}
| death_place        = [[Ascona]], [[Ticino]], Switzerland
| occupation         = Film director
| years_active       = 1927–1969
| birth_name         = 
| spouse             = Bertha Odenheimer (1933–1973; her death)
| family             = [[Curt Siodmak]], Roland, Werner (brothers)
}}
'''Robert Siodmak''' ({{IPAc-en|s|i|ˈ|ɒ|d|.|m|æ|k}}; 8 August 1900 – 10 March 1973) was a German Jewish film director. His career spanned some 40 years, working extensively in the United States and France, as well as in his native country.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |date=2015-03-27 |title=How to get into... film noir master Robert Siodmak |url=https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/how-get-into-film-noir-master-robert-siodmak |access-date=2024-10-16 |website=BFI |language=en}}</ref> Though he worked in many genres, he was best known as a skilled craftsman of [[Thriller film|thrillers]] and [[film noir]],<ref name=":0" /><ref name="mov">{{cite magazine |date=11–22 February 1998 |title=Wettbewerb/In Competition |magazine=[[Moving Pictures (magazine)|Moving Pictures]], Berlinale Extra |location=Berlin |pages=84–85}}</ref> and was nominated for an [[Academy Award for Best Director]] for ''[[The Killers (1946 film)|The Killers]]'' (1946).

==Early life==
Siodmak was born in [[Dresden]], Germany, the son of Rosa Philippine (née Blum) and Ignatz Siodmak and the brother of [[Curt Siodmak|Curt]], Werner and Roland.<ref name="google">{{cite book|title=Siodmak Brothers |author1=Jacobsen, W.|author2=Prinzler, H.H.|date=1998|publisher=Argon|isbn=9783870244699|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=20YcAQAAIAAJ|access-date=1 August 2015}}</ref> His parents were both from Jewish families in [[Leipzig]] (the myth of his American birth in [[Memphis, Tennessee]] was necessary for him to obtain a visa in Paris during World War II). He worked as a stage director and a banker before becoming editor and scenarist for [[Curtis Bernhardt]] in 1925 (Bernhardt directed a film of Siodmak's story ''[[Conflict (1945 film)|Conflict]]'' in 1945). At twenty-six he was hired by his cousin, producer [[Seymour Nebenzal]], to assemble original silent movies from stock footage of old films. Siodmak worked at this for two years before he persuaded Nebenzal to finance his first feature, the silent masterpiece, ''[[Menschen am Sonntag]]'' (''[[People on Sunday]]'') in 1929. The script was co-written by [[Billy Wilder]] and Siodmak's brother [[Curt Siodmak]], later the screenwriter of ''[[The Wolf Man (1941 film)|The Wolf Man]]'' (1941). It was the last German silent and also included such future Hollywood artists as [[Fred Zinnemann]], [[Edgar G. Ulmer]], and [[Eugen Schufftan]]. His next film—the first at UFA to use sound—was the 1930 comedy ''[[Farewell (1930 film)|Abschied]]'' for writers [[Emeric Pressburger]] and [[Irma von Cube]], followed by ''[[Der Mann, der seinen Mörder sucht]]'', another comedy, yet quite different and unusual, a likely product of Billy Wilder's imagination. But in his next film, the crime thriller ''[[Stürme der Leidenschaft]]'', with [[Emil Jannings]] and [[Anna Sten]], Siodmak found a style that would become his own.

With the rise of [[Nazism]] and following an attack in the press by Hitler's minister of propaganda [[Joseph Goebbels]] in 1933 after viewing  ''[[Brennendes Geheimnis]]'' (''The Burning Secret''), Siodmak left Germany for Paris. His creativity flourished, as he worked for the next six years in a variety of film genres, from comedy (''[[The Weaker Sex (1933 film)|Le sexe faible]]'' and ''[[Parisian Life (1936 film)|La Vie Parisienne]]'' ) to musical (''[[The Crisis is Over|La crise est finie]]'', with [[Danielle Darrieux]]) to drama (''[[Compliments of Mister Flow|Mister Flow]]'', ''[[White Cargo (1937 film)|Cargaison blanche]]'', ''[[Mollenard]]''—compare Gabrielle Dorziat's shrewish wife with that of Rosalind Ivan in ''[[The Suspect (1944 film)|The Suspect]]''—and ''[[Personal Column (film)|Pièges]]'', with [[Maurice Chevalier]] and [[Erich von Stroheim]]). While in France, he was well on his way to becoming successor to [[Rene Clair]], until Hitler again forced him out. Siodmak arrived in [[California]] in 1939, where he made 23 movies, many of them widely popular thrillers and crime melodramas, which critics today regard as classics of film noir.

==Hollywood career==
Beginning in 1941, he first turned out several B-films and programmers for various studios before he gained a seven-year contract with [[Universal Pictures|Universal Studios]] in 1943. The best of those early films are the thriller ''[[Fly-by-Night (film)|Fly by Night]]'' in 1942, with [[Richard Carlson (actor)|Richard Carlson]] and [[Nancy Kelly]], and in 1943 ''[[Someone to Remember]]'', with Mable Paige in a signature role. As house director, his services were often used to salvage troublesome productions at the studio. On Mark Hellinger's production ''[[Swell Guy]]'' (1946), for instance, Siodmak was brought in to replace [[Frank Tuttle]] only six days after completing work on ''[[The Killers (1946 film)|The Killers]]''. Siodmak worked steadily while under contract, overshadowed by high-profile directors, like [[Alfred Hitchcock]], with whom he had been often compared by the press.

At Universal, Siodmak made yet another B-film, ''[[Son of Dracula (1943 film)|Son of Dracula]]'' (1943), the third in the studio's series of Dracula movies (based on his brother [[Curt Siodmak|Curt]]'s original story). His second feature was the [[Maria Montez]]/[[Jon Hall (actor)|Jon Hall]] vehicle, ''[[Cobra Woman]]'' (1944), made in [[Technicolor]].

His first all-out noir was ''[[Phantom Lady (film)|Phantom Lady]]'' (1944), for staff producer [[Joan Harrison (screenwriter)|Joan Harrison]], Universal's first female executive and [[Alfred Hitchcock]]'s former secretary and script assistant. It showcased Siodmak's skill with camera and editing to dazzling effect, but no more so than in the iconic jam-session sequence with [[Elisha Cook Jr.]] in throes on the drums. Following the critical success of ''Phantom Lady'', Siodmak directed ''[[Christmas Holiday]]'' (1944) with [[Deanna Durbin]] and [[Gene Kelly]] ([[Hans J. Salter]] received an Oscar nomination for best music). Beginning with this film, his work in Hollywood attained the stylistic and thematic characteristics that are evident in his later noirs. ''Christmas Holiday'', adapted from a [[W. Somerset Maugham]] [[Christmas Holiday (novel)|novel of the same title]] by [[Herman J. Mankiewicz]], was Durbin's most successful feature. Siodmak's use of black-and-white cinematography and urban landscapes, together with his light-and-shadow designs, followed the basic structure of classic noir films. In fact, he had a number of collaborations with cinematographers, such as [[Nicholas Musuraca]], [[Elwood Bredell]], and [[Franz Planer]], in which he achieved the Expressionist look he had cultivated in his early years at UFA.  During Siodmak's tenure, Universal made the most of the noir style in ''[[The Suspect (1944 film)|The Suspect]]'', ''[[The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry]]'' and ''[[The Dark Mirror (1946 film)|The Dark Mirror]]'', but the capstone was ''[[The Killers (1946 film)|The Killers]]''. Released in 1946, it was [[Burt Lancaster]]'s film debut and [[Ava Gardner]]'s first dramatic, featured role. A critical and financial success, it earned Siodmak his only Oscar nomination for direction in Hollywood. His German production ''[[Nachts, wenn der Teufel kam]]'', based on the false story of [[Bruno Lüdke]], who was falsely accused of being a serial killer by the Nazis,<ref name="The invented serial killer">{{cite news|url=https://taz.de/Stolperstein-fuer-Bruno-Luedke/!5793059/ |title=The invented serial killer |access-date=6 September 2021|work=Die Tageszeitung|date=3 September 2021 |last1=Glaser |first1=Emeli }}</ref> was nominated for [[Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film|Best Foreign Language Film]] in 1957.<ref name="Oscars1958">{{cite web|url=http://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1958 |title=The 30th Academy Awards (1958) Nominees and Winners |access-date=25 October 2011|work=oscars.org}}</ref>

While still under contract at Universal, Siodmak worked on loan out to [[RKO]] for producer [[Dore Schary]] in the thriller ''[[The Spiral Staircase (1946 film)|The Spiral Staircase]]'', a masterly blending of suspense and horror, which Siodmak said he edited as he pleased, due to a strike in Hollywood in 1945. The film earned [[Ethel Barrymore]] an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress. For [[20th Century Fox]] and producer [[Darryl F. Zanuck]], he directed, partly on location in New York City, the crime noir ''Cry of the City'' in 1948, and in 1949 for [[MGM]] he tackled its lux production ''[[The Great Sinner]]'', but the prolix script proved unmanageable for Siodmak who relinquished direction to the dependable [[Mervyn LeRoy]]. On loan out to [[Paramount Pictures|Paramount]] in 1949, he made for producer [[Hal B. Wallis]] his penultimate American noir ''[[The File on Thelma Jordon]]'', with [[Barbara Stanwyck]] at her most fatal—and sympathetic. Siodmak saw in this film a thematic link with ''The Suspect'' and ''The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry'', with the failed lovers of these films and significantly their tragic conclusions (ten years later he addressed the same theme in ''The Rough and the Smooth''). Perhaps his finest American noir—although not his last—is ''[[Criss Cross (film)|Criss Cross]]'' that was to reunite him not only with Lancaster, but also ''[[The Killers (1946 film)|The Killers]]''  producer [[Mark Hellinger]], who died suddenly before production began in 1949. Working without the hands-on control of Hellinger again, Siodmak was able to make this film his own as he could not the earlier film. Yvonne De Carlo's working-class femme fatal (a high mark in her career) completes the deadly triangle, along with Lancaster and [[Dan Duryea]]: the archetype of doomed attraction central to all Siodmak's noirs, but the one he could fully express to its nihilistic conclusion.

Siodmak immersed himself in the creative process and genuinely loved working with actors, acquiring a reputation as an actor's director for his work with many future stars, including Burt Lancaster, [[Ernest Borgnine]], [[Tony Curtis]], [[Debra Paget]], [[Maria Schell]], [[Mario Adorf]], Ava Gardner, [[Olivia de Havilland]], [[Dorothy McGuire]], [[Yvonne de Carlo]], [[Barbara Stanwyck]], [[Geraldine Fitzgerald]], and [[Ella Raines]].<ref name=mov/>

He directed [[Charles Laughton]] (a close friend) and [[George Sanders]], and got from both perhaps the unlikeliest, most natural and under-acted performances of their careers. From [[Lon Chaney Jr.]] he drew an uncharacteristically controlled and coldly menacing performance for ''[[Son of Dracula (1943 film)|Son of Dracula]]''. He managed with Lancaster to capture a youthful vulnerability in ''The Killers'', despite the actor's age (he was 33). He was able to get a believable, dramatic performance from Gene Kelly. He also helped raise Ava Gardner's public profile.

==Return to Europe==
Before leaving for Europe in 1952, following the problematic production ''The Crimson Pirate'' for [[Norma Productions]] (distributed through [[Warner Bros.]]) and producer [[Harold Hecht]], his third and last film with Burt Lancaster (Siodmak dubbed the chaotic experience "The Hecht Follies"), Siodmak had directed some of the era's best films noirs (twelve in all), more than any other director who worked in that style. However, his identification with film noir, generally unpopular with American audiences, may have been more of a curse than a blessing.

He often expressed his desire to make pictures "of a different type and background" than the ones he had been making for ten years. Nevertheless, he ended his Universal contract with one last noir, the disappointing ''Deported'' (1951) which he filmed partly abroad (Siodmak was among the first refugee directors to return to Europe after making American films). The story is loosely based on the deportation of gangster [[Charles "Lucky" Luciano]]. Siodmak had hoped [[Loretta Young]] would star, but settled for the Swedish actress [[Märta Torén]].

Those "different type" of films he had made—''The Great Sinner'' (1949) for [[MGM]], ''[[Time Out of Mind (1947 film)|Time Out of Mind]]'' (1947) for Universal (which Siodmak also produced), ''The Whistle at Eaton Falls'' (1951) for [[Columbia Pictures]] (Ernest Borgnine's debut and [[Dorothy Gish]]'s return to the screen)—all proved ill-suited to his noir sensibilities (although in 1952 ''The Crimson Pirate'', despite the difficult production, was a surprising and pleasing departure—in fact, Lancaster believed it was inspiration for the tongue-in-cheek style of the [[James Bond]] films).

The five months he collaborated with [[Budd Schulberg]] on a screenplay tentatively titled ''A Stone in the River Hudson'', an early version of ''[[On the Waterfront]]'', was also a major disappointment for Siodmak. In 1954 he sued producer [[Sam Spiegel]] for copyright infringement. Siodmak was awarded $100,000, but no screen credit. His contribution to the original screenplay has never been acknowledged.

Siodmak's return to Europe in 1954 with a Grand Prize nomination at the [[Cannes Film Festival]] for his remake of [[Jacques Feyder]]'s ''[[Le Grand Jeu (1954 film)|Le grand jeu]]'' was a misstep, despite its stars, [[Gina Lollobrigida]] and [[Arletty]] in the role originated by [[Françoise Rosay]], Feyder's wife. In 1955, Siodmak returned to the [[West Germany|Federal Republic of Germany]] to make ''[[Die Ratten]]'', with [[Maria Schell]] and [[Curd Jurgens]], winning the [[Golden Bear|Golden Berlin Bear]] at the [[5th Berlin International Film Festival|1955 Berlin Film Festival]].<ref name="Berlinale 1955">{{cite web |url=http://www.berlinale.de/en/archiv/jahresarchive/1955/03_preistr_ger_1955/03_Preistraeger_1955.html |title=5th Berlin International Film Festival: Prize Winners |access-date=24 December 2009 |work=berlinale.de}}</ref> It was the first in a series of films critical of his homeland, during and after Hitler, which included ''[[Nachts, wenn der Teufel kam]]'', both thriller and social artifact of Germany under Nazi rule, shot in documentary style reminiscent of ''Menschen am Sonntag'' and ''Whistle at Eaton Falls'', and in 1960, ''[[Mein Schulfreund]]'', an absurdist comedy, dark and strange, with [[Heinz Rühmann]] as a postal worker attempting to reunite with childhood friend [[Hermann Göring]]. In April 1958, Siodmak was made an executive in [[Kirk Douglas]]' film production company [[Bryna Productions]], as European Representative.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Variety|url=http://archive.org/details/variety210-1958-04|title=Variety (April 1958)|date=1958|publisher=New York, NY: Variety Publishing Company|others=Media History Digital Library}}</ref>

Between these films, and ''[[My Father, the Actor|Mein Vater, der Schauspieler]]'' in 1956, with [[O. W. Fischer]] (the West German [[Rock Hudson]]), he took a detour into [[Douglas Sirk]] territory with the sordid melodrama, ''[[Dorothea Angermann]]'' in 1959, featuring Germany's star [[Ruth Leuwerik]]. Later the same year he left Germany for Great Britain to film ''[[The Rough and the Smooth]]'', with [[Nadja Tiller]] and [[Tony Britton]], yet another noir, but much meaner and gloomier than anything he had made in America (compare its downbeat ending with that of ''The File on Thelma Jordan''). He followed with ''[[Magnificent Sinner|Katia]]'' also in 1959, a tale of Czarist Russia, with twenty-one-year-old [[Romy Schneider]], mistakenly titled in America ''Magnificent Sinner'', recalling—unfavorably—Siodmak's other costume melodrama. In 1961, ''[[The Nina B. Affair|L'affaire Nina B]]'', with [[Pierre Brasseur]] and Nadja Tiller (again), returned Siodmak to familiar ground in a slick, black-and-white thriller about a pay-for-hire Nazi hunter, which could be argued was the start of the many spy themed films so popular in the 1960s. In 1962, the entertaining ''[[Escape from East Berlin]]'', with [[Don Murray (actor)|Don Murray]] and Christine Kaufman, had all the characteristic style of a Siodmak thriller, but was one that he later dismissed as something he had made for "little kids in America." His work in Germany returned to programmers like those that had begun his career in [[Cinema in the United States|Hollywood]] 23 years earlier. From 1964 to 1965, he made a series of films with former Tarzan [[Lex Barker]]: ''[[The Shoot (1964 film)|The Shoot]]'', ''[[The Treasure of the Aztecs]]'', and ''[[The Pyramid of the Sun God]]'', all taken from the western, adventure novels of [[Karl May]].

==Later career==
Siodmak's return to Hollywood filmmaking in 1967 with the wide-screen western ''[[Custer of the West]]'' was another disappointment, receiving mostly negative reviews from critics and failing to generate box-office appeal. Siodmak ended his career with a six-hour, two-part toga and chariot epic, ''[[Kampf um Rom]]'' (1968), a more campy work (perhaps intentionally) than ''Cobra Woman'' had been. There was a brief and profitable foray into television in Great Britain with the series ''[[O.S.S. (TV series)|O.S.S.]]'' (1957–58). Siodmak was last seen publicly in an interview for Swiss television at his home in [[Ascona]] in 1971. He died alone in 1973 in [[Locarno]] of a [[heart attack]],<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1973/03/12/archives/robert-siodmak-film-director-72-master-of-lowkeysuspense-in-the.html|title = Robert Siodmak, Film Director, 72|newspaper = The New York Times|date = 12 March 1973}}</ref> seven weeks after his wife's death.

The [[British Film Institute]] held a retrospective of his career in April and May 2015.<ref name="bfi">{{cite web|url=https://whatson.bfi.org.uk/Online/default.asp?BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::permalink=robertsiodmak|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150316000735/https://whatson.bfi.org.uk/Online/default.asp?BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::permalink=robertsiodmak|url-status=dead|archive-date=16 March 2015|title=Welcome to the BFI Southbank online|publisher=whatson.bfi.org.uk|access-date=1 August 2015}}</ref>

==Filmography==
{{div col|colwidth=32em}}
* ''[[People on Sunday]]'' (German silent film, 1930)
* ''{{Ill|Der Kampf mit dem Drachen oder: Die Tragödie des Untermieters|fr|Der Kampf mit dem Drachen oder : Die Tragödie des Untermieters}}'' (1930, short)
* ''[[Farewell (1930 film)|Farewell]]'' (German-language, 1930)
* ''[[The Man in Search of His Murderer]]'' (German-language, 1931)
* ''[[Inquest (1931 German film)|Inquest]]'' (German-language, 1931)
** ''[[About an Inquest]]'' (French-language, 1931)
* ''[[Storms of Passion]]'' (German-language, 1932)
** ''Tumultes'' (French-language, 1932)
* ''[[Quick (1932 film)|Quick]]'' (German-language, 1932)
** ''Quick'' (French-language, 1932)
* ''[[The Burning Secret]]'' (German-language, 1933)
* ''[[The Weaker Sex (1933 film)|The Weaker Sex]]'' (French-language, 1933)
* ''[[The Crisis is Over]]'' (French-language, 1934)
* ''[[La Vie parisienne (1936 film)|La Vie parisienne]]'' (French-language, 1936)
** ''[[Parisian Life (1936 film)|Parisian Life]]'' (English-language, 1936)
* ''[[The Great Refrain]]'' (co-director: [[Yves Mirande]], 1936)
* ''[[Compliments of Mister Flow]]'' (1936)
* ''[[White Cargo (1937 film)|White Cargo]]'' (1937)
* ''[[Mollenard]]'' (1938)
* ''[[Ultimatum (1938 film)|Ultimatum]]'' (1938, co-directed with [[Robert Wiene]], uncredited)
* ''[[The Corsican Brothers (1939 film)|The Corsican Brothers]]'' (1939, supervising director)
* ''[[Personal Column (film)|Personal Column]]'' (1939)
* ''[[West Point Widow]]'' (1941)
* ''[[Fly-by-Night (film)|Fly-by-Night]]'' (1942)
* ''[[My Heart Belongs to Daddy (film)|My Heart Belongs to Daddy]]'' (1942)
* ''[[The Night Before the Divorce]]'' (1942)
* ''[[Someone to Remember]]'' (1943)
* ''[[Son of Dracula (1943 film)|Son of Dracula]]'' (1943)
* ''[[Phantom Lady (film)|Phantom Lady]]'' (1944)
* ''[[Cobra Woman]]'' (1944)
* ''[[Christmas Holiday]]'' (1944)
* ''[[The Suspect (1944 film)|The Suspect]]'' (1944)
* ''[[The Strange Affair of Uncle Harry]]'' (1945)
* ''[[The Spiral Staircase (1946 film)|The Spiral Staircase]]'' (1945)
* ''[[The Killers (1946 film)|The Killers]]'' (1946)
* ''[[The Dark Mirror (1946 film)|The Dark Mirror]]'' (1946)
* ''[[Time Out of Mind (1947 film)|Time Out of Mind]]'' (1947)
* ''[[Cry of the City]]'' (1948)
* ''[[Criss Cross (1949 film)|Criss Cross]]'' (1949)
* ''[[The Great Sinner]]'' (1949)
* ''[[The File on Thelma Jordon]]'' (1949)
* ''[[Deported (film)|Deported]]'' (1950)
* ''[[The Whistle at Eaton Falls]]'' (1951)
* ''[[The Crimson Pirate]]'' (1952)
* ''[[Flesh and the Woman]]'' (1954)
* ''[[Die Ratten]]'' (1955)
* ''[[My Father, the Actor]]'' (1956)
* ''[[The Devil Strikes at Night]]'' (1957)
* ''[[O.S.S. (TV series)|O.S.S.]]'' (1957–1958, TV series, 4 episodes)
* ''[[Dorothea Angermann]]'' (1959)
* ''[[The Rough and the Smooth]]'' (1959)
* ''[[Magnificent Sinner]]'' (1959)
* ''[[My Schoolfriend]]'' (1960)
* ''[[The Nina B. Affair]]'' (1961)
* ''[[Escape from East Berlin]]'' (1962)
* ''[[The Shoot (1964 film)|The Shoot]]'' (1964)
* ''[[The Treasure of the Aztecs]]'' (1965)
* ''[[The Pyramid of the Sun God]]'' (1965) 
* ''[[Custer of the West]]'' (1967)
* ''[[Kampf um Rom|Kampf um Rom I]]'' (1968)
* ''[[Kampf um Rom|Kampf um Rom II]]'' (1969)
{{div col end}}

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
{{Commons category|Robert Siodmak}}
*{{IMDb name|802563|Robert Siodmak}}
*[http://www.sensesofcinema.com/2003/great-directors/siodmak/ Senses of Cinema: Great Directors Critical Database]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20110715171049/http://www.regilexikon.com/ Regilexikon]
*[http://www.virtual-history.com/movie/person/2242/robert-siodmak Literature on Robert Siodmak]

{{Robert Siodmak}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Siodmak, Robert}}
[[Category:1900 births]]
[[Category:1973 deaths]]
[[Category:Bryna Productions people]]
[[Category:Film people from Dresden]]
[[Category:People from the Kingdom of Saxony]]
[[Category:Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United States]]
[[Category:Film directors from Los Angeles]]
[[Category:German film directors]]
[[Category:Best Director German Film Award winners]]
[[Category:Directors of Golden Bear winners]]
[[Category:Jewish film people]]