Anniversary of Robert Zemeckis
On May 14, 1952 in Chicago, in the family of Alphonse Zemeckis and his wife Rosa (nee - Nespeca) son Robert Lee was born. The father of Robert Zemeckis, a construction welder by profession, had Polish-Lithuanian roots, and his mother had Italian origin. From childhood, Robert developed an addiction to watching movies and TV shows. That's why, the parents presented their son a movie camera for his 13th birthday, with which Robert began to film all family events. At the age of 15, Robert watched the film by Arthur Penn "Bonnie and Clyde", after which he firmly decided to link his fate with the cinema.
After graduating high school, Robert Zemeckis entered the University of Northern Illinois, where he combined his studies with work as an editor at the NBC News television company, as well as an editor of commercials. The skills of working as an editor subsequently allowed Robert Zemeckis to create and develop his "corporate style", which consists in combining real actors and cartoon characters in one shot, as, for example, in the movie "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" (1988), or live actors and real historical characters, captured by documentary filming, as, for example, in the movie "Forrest Gump".
Zemeckis was a student at Northern Illinois University not a long time, choosing to transfer to the USC Film School from which he graduated in 1973. His thesis, a short film about a Vietnam veteran, "A Field of Honor", caught the attention of Steven Spielberg, and it helped him later when he began work on his first feature film. Universal Pictures refused to finance the project of the 26-year-old debutant director. Only Spielberg's guarantee helped Zemeckis secure a modest $2.8 million budget for the project. But at the box office, Beatlemania-themed "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" (1978) flopped, grossing only $1.9 million. Zemeckis' next film, "Used Cars", was a little more successful.
However, both films received good reviews from film critics. And, most importantly, they did not disappoint the mentor and patron of the young director - Steven Spielberg. For several years, Zemeckis worked in the Spielberg team and, finally, in 1984, he shot on his own a real "box office bomb" - the film "Romancing the Stone", whose box office almost 8 times exceeded the budget of the picture. By his 70th birthday, Robert Zemeckis made 20 full-length feature films, 4 of which were included in the Golden Thousand. Based on this indicator, Robert Zemeckis is included in the list of the 100 greatest directors of world cinema, compiled by FilmGourmand.
To date, Robert Zemeckis is the owner of 36 film awards, the most prestigious of which are the Oscar Award, the Golden Globe Award, the Italian David di Donatello Award. In honor of the anniversary of the famous director, I would like to remind the fans of his work the frames from his best films included in the Golden Thousand.
