Offscreen Notes
Robert Altman [1925-2006]
Iconoclast maverick American filmmaker Robert Altman passed away on November 20, 2006 at the age of 81. I guess it was in the cards, when the Academy honored Altman with their honorary award this past March (it seems like the touch of death). Altman’s heyday was no doubt the 1970’s, when he directed a string of remarkably innovative and entertaining revisionist genre films: War satire, M*A*S*H*, 1970, Western, McCabe & Mrs. Miller, 1971, psychological horror, Images, film noir, The Long Goodbye, 1973 (the latter two also wonderful for their expressive use of the telephoto lens), crime film, Thieves Like Us, 1974, and epic drama, Nashville 1975. Altman had a late career comeback (not that he was ever inactive) in 1992 with the clever, reflexive The Player (with its playful opening rendition of A Touch of Evil) and once again in 2001 with his loosely veiled remake of Renoir’s Rules of the Game, Gosford Park, where he reminded everyone of how instrumental he was in refining the use of overlapping dialogue. One of the genuine foot soldiers of cinema is gone.
