Robert Altman's “Final Cut” (Kemper Alumni ?)

Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2007 9:29 pm

Robert Altman, who died in Los Angeles aged 81, spent much of his life on the outer with Hollywood establishment. Altman was stated "They make gloves, and I sell shoes," went from low-budget productions and industrial films to TV series, and finally on to feature films such as M*A*S*H, Nashville, McCabe & Mrs Miller, The Player, Short Cuts and this year's A Prairie Home Companion.

Through flush and lean times he stubbornly steered his own path. Altman worked only on the projects that interested him, and often battled a studio culture that found his work too unpredictable, too individualistic and too sardonic for mainstream tastes. Altman was often described as an iconoclast and a maverick, but still received five Oscar nominations for his direction, and earlier this year received an honorary Academy Award for his work. His was a career of highs and lows. "I don't know how to account for the fact that when he's good, he's superb, and when he isn't good, he's nothing," wrote New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael.

Altman's flops far outnumbered his hits (in fact he had only one real hit, 1970's M*A*S*H), but he always bounced back. When the big studios wouldn't have anything to do with him, he launched low-budget films like Fool for Love, Secret Honor and Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean. Altman also did daring work for TV, directing short plays by Harold Pinter, a version of Herman Wouk's The Caine Mutiny Court Martial and the HBO series Tanner '88. He also directed for the theatre and opera house.

Altman married three times. He and his third wife, Kathryn, had two sons, and he had a daughter and two other sons from previous marriages. He was born in 1925, and his father was a prosperous Kansas City insurance broker. Altman went to Rockhurst High School, but his contempt for authority landed him at Kemper Military School, in Boonville, MO. He later served as a crewman on a bomber in the Pacific in the waning days of World War II. Returning home, Altman took a job with Calvin Communications in Kansas City, writing and directing training and industrial films such as How to Run a Filling Station and Better Football. It wasn't glamorous work, but it was a great way to learn everything about cinema. By the time he relocated to Los Angeles in the mid-1950s, Altman had already directed two features in Kansas City. He worked quickly and cheaply on TV series as varied as Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Peter Gunn, Whirlybirds, The Millionaire, Maverick, Bonanza and Combat.

Finally, at age 45, Altman landed a feature film assignment. His first two made little impact but his third, M*A*S*H, was huge. It earned an Oscar nomination for best picture, but more important, it captured the funny, loose, pleasantly jaded feel that became the hallmark of Robert Altman pictures. For young people who grew up with sex, drugs and Vietnam protests, the appearance in the '70s of a new Altman film was cause for celebration. Whatever he did, Altman's films could be counted on to offer a gentle appreciation of life's losers, a gleeful dismantling of authority figures and a distinctive visual and aural style that opened new cinematic possibilities.

He rarely told conventional stories and many had the unrehearsed feel of life caught on the fly. Along the way, Altman built a repertory company of actors, designers and writers who fell in love with his method. His sets gained notoriety for party atmosphere. Typically, everyone involved was invited to watch the "dailies", the developed footage from the previous day's shooting, and offer comments. For years alcohol and marijuana were part of the ritual. In 1995 Altman returned to his hometown to shoot Kansas City. On a visit to a doctor there, he was told his heart was deteriorating and he was urged to sign up for a heart donor list. Altman spent lots of time in his trailer between shots on Kansas City. Later that year Altman received the heart of a young woman. In recent years Altman's career resurged. His British drawing-room mystery Gosford Park was an international success and picked up seven Oscar nominations.