With six Oscar bids to her name, Scottish-born thespian Deborah Kerr is one of the most celebrated performers of all time. However, she never actually won one of those little gold statuettes, giving her the dubious distinction of tying Thelma Ritter and Glenn Close as the most nominated actress without a victory. Still, she must’ve done something right to rack up all that Academy recognition. Let’s take a look back at 15 of her greatest films, ranked worst to best.
Born in 1921, Kerr got her start on the London stage before appearing in her first film when she was just 20-years-old: “Major Barbara” (1941). She had her big break two years later in Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger‘s epic “The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp” (1943). Kerr reunited with the filmmaking duo for “Black Narcissus” (1946), which brought her the first of three Best Actress victories at the New York Film Critics Circle.
Born in 1921, Kerr got her start on the London stage before appearing in her first film when she was just 20-years-old: “Major Barbara” (1941). She had her big break two years later in Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger‘s epic “The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp” (1943). Kerr reunited with the filmmaking duo for “Black Narcissus” (1946), which brought her the first of three Best Actress victories at the New York Film Critics Circle.
- 9/28/2024
- by Zach Laws and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
The devilishly charming, rugged Robert Mitchum made a name for himself with a number of classics spanning many genres, most notably noirs, westerns, war dramas and crime thrillers. But how many of his titles stand the test of time? In honor of his birthday, let’s take a look back at 20 of his greatest films, ranked worst to best.
Born in 1917 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Mitchum cut his teeth in a number of bit parts before landing his star-making turn in “The Story of G.I. Joe” (1945), playing an army captain in WWII. The film brought him his sole Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor and solidified his screen persona as a world-weary, hardbitten antihero.
Mitchum found his greatest success in film noirs, where his cynical, playfully ironic demeanor proved a perfect match for the ultra-dark genre. Whether playing the hero in “Out of the Past” (1947) or the villain in “The Night of the Hunter...
Born in 1917 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Mitchum cut his teeth in a number of bit parts before landing his star-making turn in “The Story of G.I. Joe” (1945), playing an army captain in WWII. The film brought him his sole Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor and solidified his screen persona as a world-weary, hardbitten antihero.
Mitchum found his greatest success in film noirs, where his cynical, playfully ironic demeanor proved a perfect match for the ultra-dark genre. Whether playing the hero in “Out of the Past” (1947) or the villain in “The Night of the Hunter...
- 8/3/2024
- by Zach Laws and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
Many movie stars of the Hollywood Golden Age were "the strong, silent type" — Robert Mitchum was definitely one of them. That silence and piercing gaze meant Mitchum could play villains more convincingly than many of his contemporaries. He played not one but two serial killers — Harry Powell in "The Night of The Hunter" and Max Cady in "Cape Fear" — before the phrase even entered the popular lexicon. Even his heroic roles, such as Jeff Markham in the noir "Out of the Past," had as much edge as the Hays Code would permit.
Mitchum's stardom even survived brushes with the law. In 1949, he served two months in prison for marijuana possession. So, why was Mitchum in such demand? It wasn't just because audiences loved him.
Where The Demand Came From
A 1982 Village Voice profile explores why Mitchum was popular with both Hollywood money-men and movie-goers. For the former, it's because he...
Mitchum's stardom even survived brushes with the law. In 1949, he served two months in prison for marijuana possession. So, why was Mitchum in such demand? It wasn't just because audiences loved him.
Where The Demand Came From
A 1982 Village Voice profile explores why Mitchum was popular with both Hollywood money-men and movie-goers. For the former, it's because he...
- 8/13/2022
- by Devin Meenan
- Slash Film
Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.
The Hottest August (Brett Story)
Where better than New York City to make a structuralist film? Cities are iterative, their street grids diagrams of theme and variation, and New York most of all—with its streets and avenues named for numbers and letters and states and cities and presidents and Revolutionary War generals spanning an archipelago, intersecting at a million little data points at which to measure class, race, culture, history, architecture and infrastructure. And time, too—from this human density emerge daily and seasonal rituals, a set of biorhythms, reliable as the earth’s, against which to mark gradual shifts and momentary fashions. Summer is for lounging on fire escapes, always, and, today, for Mister Softee. Yesterday it was shaved ice.
The Hottest August (Brett Story)
Where better than New York City to make a structuralist film? Cities are iterative, their street grids diagrams of theme and variation, and New York most of all—with its streets and avenues named for numbers and letters and states and cities and presidents and Revolutionary War generals spanning an archipelago, intersecting at a million little data points at which to measure class, race, culture, history, architecture and infrastructure. And time, too—from this human density emerge daily and seasonal rituals, a set of biorhythms, reliable as the earth’s, against which to mark gradual shifts and momentary fashions. Summer is for lounging on fire escapes, always, and, today, for Mister Softee. Yesterday it was shaved ice.
- 8/6/2021
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
by Camila Henriques
The mid 50s were huge for Deborah Kerr. She followed up the huge hit The King and I (1956) with two leading roles the following year in Heaven Knows Mr Allison and An Affair to Remember.
1957 brought Oscar nomination number four to Deborah Kerr. It happened for her turn as a nun in Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison. She lost to Joanne Woodward’s intricate work in The Three Faces of Eve. She would applaud, sitting in the Academy audience as a gracious nominees, twice more until the Academy gave her an honorary award in 1994. But, for me, it was another movie she did in '57 that truly cemented her as a Hollywood icon.
Leo McCarey’s An Affair to Remember put Kerr in the same frame as Cary Grant. It wasn’t a first time partnership for them, as they had worked together in 1953’s Dream Wife...
The mid 50s were huge for Deborah Kerr. She followed up the huge hit The King and I (1956) with two leading roles the following year in Heaven Knows Mr Allison and An Affair to Remember.
1957 brought Oscar nomination number four to Deborah Kerr. It happened for her turn as a nun in Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison. She lost to Joanne Woodward’s intricate work in The Three Faces of Eve. She would applaud, sitting in the Academy audience as a gracious nominees, twice more until the Academy gave her an honorary award in 1994. But, for me, it was another movie she did in '57 that truly cemented her as a Hollywood icon.
Leo McCarey’s An Affair to Remember put Kerr in the same frame as Cary Grant. It wasn’t a first time partnership for them, as they had worked together in 1953’s Dream Wife...
- 6/26/2020
- by Camila Henriques
- FilmExperience
It’s the Oscar record no one wants on their resume. With Amy Adams‘ loss at the 91st Academy Awards for “Vice,” she now ties Deborah Kerr and Thelma Ritter as the three actresses with six Oscar nominations and no wins. Unfortunately, Glenn Close tops them all with seven Oscar misfires; she lost on Sunday to Olivia Colman (“The Favourite”). Among male actors, Richard Burton (seven noms) and Peter O’Toole (eight bids) are the record-holders. Click through our photo gallery above for a closer look at Adams’ six Oscar nominations.
See 2019 Oscars: Full list of winners (and losers) at the 91st Academy Awards [Updating Live]
For her role as Lynne Cheney, devoted wife of Vice President Dick Cheney, Adams earned her latest bid for Best Supporting Actress. Her co-nominees this time around were Marina de Tavira (“Roma”), Regina King (“If Beale Street Could Talk”), Emma Stone (“The Favourite”) and Rachel Weisz...
See 2019 Oscars: Full list of winners (and losers) at the 91st Academy Awards [Updating Live]
For her role as Lynne Cheney, devoted wife of Vice President Dick Cheney, Adams earned her latest bid for Best Supporting Actress. Her co-nominees this time around were Marina de Tavira (“Roma”), Regina King (“If Beale Street Could Talk”), Emma Stone (“The Favourite”) and Rachel Weisz...
- 2/25/2019
- by Marcus James Dixon
- Gold Derby
Deborah Kerr would’ve celebrated her 97th birthday on September 30, 2018. With six Oscar bids to her name, the Scottish-born thespian is one of the most celebrated performers of all time. However, she never actually won one of those little gold statuettes, giving her the dubious distinction of tying Thelma Ritter and Glenn Close as the most nominated actress without a victory. Still, she must’ve done something right to rack up all that Academy recognition. In honor of her birthday, let’s take a look back at 15 of her greatest films, ranked worst to best.
Born in 1921, Kerr got her start on the London stage before appearing in her first film when she was just 20-years-old: “Major Barbara” (1941). She had her big break two years later in Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger‘s epic “The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp” (1943). Kerr reunited with the filmmaking duo for “Black Narcissus...
Born in 1921, Kerr got her start on the London stage before appearing in her first film when she was just 20-years-old: “Major Barbara” (1941). She had her big break two years later in Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger‘s epic “The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp” (1943). Kerr reunited with the filmmaking duo for “Black Narcissus...
- 9/30/2018
- by Zach Laws and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
'King and I' star Deborah Kerr dies
Deborah Kerr, whose remarkable body of work brought her six Academy Award nominations for best actress but no Oscar wins, has died. She was 86.
Kerr, who suffered from Parkinson's disease, died Tuesday in Suffolk in eastern England, her agent, Anne Hutton, said Thursday.
Kerr, whose embrace with Burt Lancaster on the beach in From Here to Eternity is one of the most indelible romantic movie scenes in history, holds the record for most Academy Award nominations without winning. However, in 1994, she was presented with an honorary Oscar for being "an artist of impeccable grace and beauty, a dedicated actress whose motion picture career has always stood for perfection, discipline and elegance."
She received her Oscar nominations for Edward, My Son (1949), From Here to Eternity (1953), The King and I (1956), Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957), Separate Tables (1958) and The Sundowners (1960).
Kerr received another burst of fame when 1957's An Affair to Remember was celebrated as the ultimate "chick flick" in 1993 film Sleepless in Seattle. Affair was remade as Love Affair in 1994 with Annette Bening and Warren Beatty reprising the parts played by Kerr and Cary Grant.
The epitome of the cultured and proper lady, Kerr blossomed best when the fires of passions erupted from her restrained character's surfaces. Her most memorable roles were in steamy romances. Her best-remembered movie line was also in a romance: In 1956's Tea and Sympathy, she played an older woman who had a disastrous affair with a younger man: "Years from now when you talk about this, and you will, be kind."
Deborah Jane Kerr-Trimmer was born on Sept. 30, 1921, in Helensburgh, Scotland. As a child, she expressed interest in drama and played in many local productions.
Kerr, who suffered from Parkinson's disease, died Tuesday in Suffolk in eastern England, her agent, Anne Hutton, said Thursday.
Kerr, whose embrace with Burt Lancaster on the beach in From Here to Eternity is one of the most indelible romantic movie scenes in history, holds the record for most Academy Award nominations without winning. However, in 1994, she was presented with an honorary Oscar for being "an artist of impeccable grace and beauty, a dedicated actress whose motion picture career has always stood for perfection, discipline and elegance."
She received her Oscar nominations for Edward, My Son (1949), From Here to Eternity (1953), The King and I (1956), Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957), Separate Tables (1958) and The Sundowners (1960).
Kerr received another burst of fame when 1957's An Affair to Remember was celebrated as the ultimate "chick flick" in 1993 film Sleepless in Seattle. Affair was remade as Love Affair in 1994 with Annette Bening and Warren Beatty reprising the parts played by Kerr and Cary Grant.
The epitome of the cultured and proper lady, Kerr blossomed best when the fires of passions erupted from her restrained character's surfaces. Her most memorable roles were in steamy romances. Her best-remembered movie line was also in a romance: In 1956's Tea and Sympathy, she played an older woman who had a disastrous affair with a younger man: "Years from now when you talk about this, and you will, be kind."
Deborah Jane Kerr-Trimmer was born on Sept. 30, 1921, in Helensburgh, Scotland. As a child, she expressed interest in drama and played in many local productions.
- 10/19/2007
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Deborah Kerr, the elegant, red-headed actress best known for her roles in The King and I and From Here to Eternity, died Tuesday (10/16) of Parkinson's disease in Suffolk, England. She was 86. Kerr was born in Scotland in 1921. A former ballet dancer, she acted on the stage as well but was quickly put before the cameras. She was 20 when she was cast in a supporting part in Major Barbara, opposite Rex Harrison and multiple roles in Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp as Blimp's (and the directors') ideal woman. Her next role for Powell, a lead part as a Catholic nun in Black Narcissus five years later, made her a star and got the attention of Hollywood. On contract with MGM, she was often cast as a refined paragon of womanly virtue, appearing as the virtuous Lygia in Quo Vadis?, the headstrong Beth in King Solomon's Mines, and Portia, the noble wife of the equally noble Brutus (James Mason) in Julius Caesar. Kerr went decidedly against that typecasting when she landed the part of the adulterous Karen Holmes, who has an affair with one of her husband's subordinates, played by Burt Lancaster, in 1953's From Here to Eternity. Kerr and Lancaster's lusty beachside romp, one so intense that they seem oblivious to the pounding waves about them, became one of the most notorious and famous kisses in movie history, perhaps all the more so due to Kerr's established image of reserve and civility. She went on to return to that image in Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein's musical The King and I. Marni Nixon was dubbed in for Ms. Kerr's singing voice, but it was all Deborah filling the screen as the prim but level-headed Anna Leonowens. The film was a smashing success and earned nine Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture. Though her co-star, Yul Brynner won for Best Actor, Kerr was not to win for Best Actress (that went to Ingrid Bergman for Anastasia). Indeed Kerr was never to win an acting Oscar though she was nominated six times in twelve years. Kerr followed King with more memorable roles, including Terry McKay, the vibrant, witty woman with whom Cary Grant has An Affair to Remember, the matriarch of an Australian family of sheep-drovers in The Sundowners, a nun again, shipwrecked with a hard-living Marine (Robert Mitchum) in Heaven Knows, Mr. Alison, and a governess utterly unable to comprehend her charges in The Innocents. Kerr acted sporadically thereafter and moved to Switzerland for many years before returning to the UK in the face of her illness. Married twice, she is survived by her second husband, screenwriter Peter Viertel, two children from her first marriage, and three grandchildren. In 1994 she received an honorary Oscar for being "An artist of impeccable grace and beauty, a dedicated actress whose motion picture career has always stood for perfection, discipline and elegance." -Keith Simanton, IMDb...
- 10/18/2007
- IMDb News
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