It’s time for a new episode of the Real Slashers video series, and with this one we’re heading back into the glorious ’80s to look at a film that was released during the slasher boom of 1981: Happy Birthday to Me (watch it Here)! This movie was directed by J. Lee Thompson, whose previous credits included the classics The Guns of Navarone and Cape Fear (not to mention Conquest of the Planet of the Apes and Battle for the Planet of the Apes). To hear all about his contribution to the ’80s slasher era, check out the video embedded above.
From here, Thompson would go on to make several films with Charles Bronson, including 10 to Midnight and Death Wish 4: The Crackdown, as well as King Solomon’s Mines and the Chuck Norris adventure Firewalker.
Scripted by Timothy Bond, Peter Jobin, and John Saxton, Happy Birthday to Me...
From here, Thompson would go on to make several films with Charles Bronson, including 10 to Midnight and Death Wish 4: The Crackdown, as well as King Solomon’s Mines and the Chuck Norris adventure Firewalker.
Scripted by Timothy Bond, Peter Jobin, and John Saxton, Happy Birthday to Me...
- 3/18/2024
- by Cody Hamman
- JoBlo.com
Norman Reynolds, known for his production design work for films in the “Star Wars” franchise and the first Indiana Jones film, “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” has died. He was 89.
Production designer Dave Blass confirmed the designer’s death on Twitter along with the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.
“Norman was a cherished husband, father, father-in-law, granddad and great grandad,” read a statement obtained by BBC. “He died peacefully with his wife Ann and three daughters by his side.”
Also Read:
Judy Farrell, Actress Who Played Nurse Able on ‘M*A*S*H,’ Dies at 84
Reynolds worked as art director on “Star Wars: A New Hope” in 1977, winning an Oscar for it in 1978. He then took the production design reins from Josh Barry for the sequel films. He was behind the carbon freezing chamber that encased Han Solo in carbonite, The Emperor’s throne room, Yoda’s planet of Dagobah,...
Production designer Dave Blass confirmed the designer’s death on Twitter along with the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.
“Norman was a cherished husband, father, father-in-law, granddad and great grandad,” read a statement obtained by BBC. “He died peacefully with his wife Ann and three daughters by his side.”
Also Read:
Judy Farrell, Actress Who Played Nurse Able on ‘M*A*S*H,’ Dies at 84
Reynolds worked as art director on “Star Wars: A New Hope” in 1977, winning an Oscar for it in 1978. He then took the production design reins from Josh Barry for the sequel films. He was behind the carbon freezing chamber that encased Han Solo in carbonite, The Emperor’s throne room, Yoda’s planet of Dagobah,...
- 4/6/2023
- by Dessi Gomez
- The Wrap
Seymour Stein, the founder of Sire Records who launched the recording careers of Madonna, the Ramones, Talking Heads and the Pretenders, died Sunday of cancer in Los Angeles. He was 80.
His death was announced by his daughter Mandy Stein.
In a tribute posted today on Instagram, Madonna called Stein “one of the most influential men in my life,” adding, “Anyone who knew Seymour knew about his passion for music and his impeccable taste. He had an ear like no other! He was Intense – wickedly funny – a little bit crazy And deeply intuitive.”
Read her entire post below.
Related Story Hollywood & Media Deaths In 2023: Photo Gallery & Obituaries Related Story Sharon Acker Dies: Veteran Film ('Point Blank') And TV ('Perry Mason') Actress Was 87 Related Story Mark Russell Dies: PBS Piano-Playing Political Satirist Was 90
A hugely influential force on the American pop and rock music scene since the 1970s,...
His death was announced by his daughter Mandy Stein.
In a tribute posted today on Instagram, Madonna called Stein “one of the most influential men in my life,” adding, “Anyone who knew Seymour knew about his passion for music and his impeccable taste. He had an ear like no other! He was Intense – wickedly funny – a little bit crazy And deeply intuitive.”
Read her entire post below.
Related Story Hollywood & Media Deaths In 2023: Photo Gallery & Obituaries Related Story Sharon Acker Dies: Veteran Film ('Point Blank') And TV ('Perry Mason') Actress Was 87 Related Story Mark Russell Dies: PBS Piano-Playing Political Satirist Was 90
A hugely influential force on the American pop and rock music scene since the 1970s,...
- 4/3/2023
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
Lauded Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto died on March 28 at the age of 71, recording company Avex announced on Sunday. “While undergoing treatment for cancer discovered in June 2020, Sakamoto continued to create works in his home studio whenever his heath would allow,” the statement read. “He lived with music until the very end.”
In the 1970s, Sakamoto was a member of the influential electronic music group Yellow Magic Orchestra, which released hit songs including “Yellow Magic (Tong Poo)” and “Technopolis.”
He made his film composing debut with 1983’s “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” and later composed the score for Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1987 film “The Last Emperor,” for which he earned the Best Original Score Oscar. His other film scores included Pedro Almodóvar’s “Tacones Iejanos,” Brian De Palma’s “Snake Eyes” and “Femme Fatale,” Oliver Stone’s “Wild Palms,” Oshima’s “Gohatto” and Alejandro G. Iñàrritu’s “The Revenant.”
A documentary about Sakamoto’s life and work,...
In the 1970s, Sakamoto was a member of the influential electronic music group Yellow Magic Orchestra, which released hit songs including “Yellow Magic (Tong Poo)” and “Technopolis.”
He made his film composing debut with 1983’s “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” and later composed the score for Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1987 film “The Last Emperor,” for which he earned the Best Original Score Oscar. His other film scores included Pedro Almodóvar’s “Tacones Iejanos,” Brian De Palma’s “Snake Eyes” and “Femme Fatale,” Oliver Stone’s “Wild Palms,” Oshima’s “Gohatto” and Alejandro G. Iñàrritu’s “The Revenant.”
A documentary about Sakamoto’s life and work,...
- 4/2/2023
- by Adam Chitwood
- The Wrap
Sharon Acker, who racked up dozens of TV appearances in the 1970s and 1980s, has died at 87 years old. The actor died in her hometown of Toronto on March 16, nearly three decades after retiring from her acting career, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Acker got her start in the mid-1950s, appearing, for example, in a 1956 CBC production of Anne of Green Gables. That same year, she joined the Stratford Shakespeare Festival company and teamed up with future Star Trek star William Shatner for a production of The Merry Wives of Windsor. In another Shakespeare adaptation, she costarred with Sean Connery in a 1961 CBC production of Macbeth. She made her mark in American cinema in 1967 with a role as Lee Marvin’s onscreen wife in the cult crime flick Point Blank. In 1970, she and Hal Holbrook graced the cover of TV Guide Magazine in promotion of their NBCpolitical drama The Bold Ones: The Senator.
- 4/2/2023
- TV Insider
Sharon Acker, a Canadian film, television and theater actor best known for her roles in “Point Blank,” “The New Perry Mason” and “Happy Birthday to Me,” has died. She was 87.
Acker’s death was confirmed by her cousin, David Glover, in a tribute to his family member on Facebook: “My wife Judy and I were very close with Sharon and we spoke regularly even after she moved back to Toronto to be close to with daughters and family. I can never forget Sharon’s million dollar smile. She made everyone she came in contact with feel so much better.”
According to reports, Acker died March 16 at her retirement home in Toronto.
Across an acting career spanning four decades, Acker found one of her most enduring roles in the 1967 neo-noir “Point Blank,” helmed by John Boorman. Acker played the wife to Lee Marvin’s lead, who betrays her conman husband after a robbery on Alcatraz.
Acker’s death was confirmed by her cousin, David Glover, in a tribute to his family member on Facebook: “My wife Judy and I were very close with Sharon and we spoke regularly even after she moved back to Toronto to be close to with daughters and family. I can never forget Sharon’s million dollar smile. She made everyone she came in contact with feel so much better.”
According to reports, Acker died March 16 at her retirement home in Toronto.
Across an acting career spanning four decades, Acker found one of her most enduring roles in the 1967 neo-noir “Point Blank,” helmed by John Boorman. Acker played the wife to Lee Marvin’s lead, who betrays her conman husband after a robbery on Alcatraz.
- 4/1/2023
- by J. Kim Murphy
- Variety Film + TV
Sharon Acker, best known as Lee Marvin’s unfaithful wife in the 1967 film Point Blank, died March 16 in a Toronto residential home. She was 87 and her death was confirmed by daughter Kim Everest, a casting director.
Acker had a long and varied resume in film, television, and the stage. In 1956, she played the teacher Mrs. Stacey on a CBC adaptation of Anne of Green Gables. She then joined the Stratford Shakespeare Festival company, starring as Anne Page opposite future Star Trek costar William Shatner in a production of The Merry Wives of Windsor.
In addition to Point Blank, her film credits include Lucky Jim (1957). Acker also was in Don’t Let the Angels Fall (1969), which played in competition at Cannes. She was selected by the Motion Picture Exhibitors of Canada as their Film Star of Tomorrow that year,
Her memorable TV roles included a 1976-77 CBS adaptation of Executive Suite, playing...
Acker had a long and varied resume in film, television, and the stage. In 1956, she played the teacher Mrs. Stacey on a CBC adaptation of Anne of Green Gables. She then joined the Stratford Shakespeare Festival company, starring as Anne Page opposite future Star Trek costar William Shatner in a production of The Merry Wives of Windsor.
In addition to Point Blank, her film credits include Lucky Jim (1957). Acker also was in Don’t Let the Angels Fall (1969), which played in competition at Cannes. She was selected by the Motion Picture Exhibitors of Canada as their Film Star of Tomorrow that year,
Her memorable TV roles included a 1976-77 CBS adaptation of Executive Suite, playing...
- 4/1/2023
- by Bruce Haring
- Deadline Film + TV
Sharon Acker, the Canadian actress who portrayed Lee Marvin’s unfaithful wife in the 1967 neo-noir classic Point Blank and the right-hand woman Della Street opposite Monte Markham on a rebooted Perry Mason in the 1970s, has died. She was 87.
Acker died March 16 in a retirement home in her native Toronto, her daughter Kim Everest, a casting director, told The Hollywood Reporter.
Star Trek fans know Acker for her January 1969 turn as Odona, a desperate woman from an overpopulated planet, on the third-season episode “The Mark of Gideon.”
She also starred on a 1976-77 CBS adaptation of Executive Suite, playing the wife of Mitchell Ryan‘s Dan Walling. (Acker and Ryan assumed the parts performed by William Holden and June Allyson in the 1954 MGM film directed by Robert Wise.)
In John Boorman’s Point Blank, Acker’s character takes up with John Vernon’s Mal Reese after he shoots Walker (Marvin...
Acker died March 16 in a retirement home in her native Toronto, her daughter Kim Everest, a casting director, told The Hollywood Reporter.
Star Trek fans know Acker for her January 1969 turn as Odona, a desperate woman from an overpopulated planet, on the third-season episode “The Mark of Gideon.”
She also starred on a 1976-77 CBS adaptation of Executive Suite, playing the wife of Mitchell Ryan‘s Dan Walling. (Acker and Ryan assumed the parts performed by William Holden and June Allyson in the 1954 MGM film directed by Robert Wise.)
In John Boorman’s Point Blank, Acker’s character takes up with John Vernon’s Mal Reese after he shoots Walker (Marvin...
- 4/1/2023
- by Mike Barnes
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Erle Stanley Gardner’s brilliant and savvy criminal defense attorney Perry Mason has been on the case since 1933’s “The Case of the Velvet Claws.” The attorney describes himself in that first novel as a “lawyer who has specialized in trial work, and in a lot of criminal work…I’m a specialist on getting people out of trouble.”
Inspired by the famed Los Angeles criminal defense attorney Earl Rogers who only lost three of his 77 murder trials, Mason was featured in 82 novels and four short stories, six Warner Bros. murder mystery movies, a long-running radio series, the beloved 1957-66 CBS series starring Raymond Burr and Barbara Hale as his true-blue assistant Della Street, movies and a 1973-74 series with Monte Markham. Matthew Rhys (“The Americans” ) plays the latest incarnation in HBO’s stylish “Perry Mason” series, currently in its second season.
Set during the Great Depression, the HBO drama has a real “Chinatown” feel,...
Inspired by the famed Los Angeles criminal defense attorney Earl Rogers who only lost three of his 77 murder trials, Mason was featured in 82 novels and four short stories, six Warner Bros. murder mystery movies, a long-running radio series, the beloved 1957-66 CBS series starring Raymond Burr and Barbara Hale as his true-blue assistant Della Street, movies and a 1973-74 series with Monte Markham. Matthew Rhys (“The Americans” ) plays the latest incarnation in HBO’s stylish “Perry Mason” series, currently in its second season.
Set during the Great Depression, the HBO drama has a real “Chinatown” feel,...
- 3/20/2023
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
Killer Collectibles highlights five of the most exciting new horror products released each and every week, from toys and apparel to artwork, records, and much more.
Here are the coolest horror collectibles unveiled this week!
Stranger Things: The Ultimate Pop-Up Book from Insight Editions
Insight Editions has released Stranger Things: The Ultimate Pop-Up Book, which will cost you 67.50. It’s illustrated by Stranger Things artist Kyle Lambert, while The Babadook book designer Simon Arizpe handled the paper engineering and Matthew Reinhart (Star Wars: A Pop-Up Guide to the Galaxy) served as creative director.
Happy Birthday to Me Blu-ray from Kino Lorber
Happy Birthday to Me will slash onto Blu-ray on October 18 via Kino Lorber. The 1981 film is presented in high definition with 5.1 Surround & 2.0 Lossless audio.
J. Lee Thompson (Cape Fear) directs from as script by John C.W. Saxton (Class of 1984), Peter Jobin, and Timothy Bond (Friday the 13th: The Series). Melissa Sue Anderson,...
Here are the coolest horror collectibles unveiled this week!
Stranger Things: The Ultimate Pop-Up Book from Insight Editions
Insight Editions has released Stranger Things: The Ultimate Pop-Up Book, which will cost you 67.50. It’s illustrated by Stranger Things artist Kyle Lambert, while The Babadook book designer Simon Arizpe handled the paper engineering and Matthew Reinhart (Star Wars: A Pop-Up Guide to the Galaxy) served as creative director.
Happy Birthday to Me Blu-ray from Kino Lorber
Happy Birthday to Me will slash onto Blu-ray on October 18 via Kino Lorber. The 1981 film is presented in high definition with 5.1 Surround & 2.0 Lossless audio.
J. Lee Thompson (Cape Fear) directs from as script by John C.W. Saxton (Class of 1984), Peter Jobin, and Timothy Bond (Friday the 13th: The Series). Melissa Sue Anderson,...
- 9/2/2022
- by Alex DiVincenzo
- bloody-disgusting.com
Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, and Tom Stockman
Lee Marvin rose through the ranks of movie stardom as a character actor, delivering mostly villainous supporting turns in many films before finally graduating to leading roles. Regardless of which side of the law he was on however, he projected a tough-as-nails intensity and a two-fisted integrity which elevated even the slightest material. Born February 19, 1924, in New York City, Marvin quit high school to enter the Marine Corps and while serving in the South Pacific was badly wounded in battle when a machine gun nest shot off part of his buttocks and severed his sciatic nerve. He spent a year in recovery before returning to the U.S. where he began working as a plumber. The acting bug bit after filling in for an ailing summer-stock actor and he studied the art at the New York-based American Theater Wing. Upon making his debut in summer stock,...
Lee Marvin rose through the ranks of movie stardom as a character actor, delivering mostly villainous supporting turns in many films before finally graduating to leading roles. Regardless of which side of the law he was on however, he projected a tough-as-nails intensity and a two-fisted integrity which elevated even the slightest material. Born February 19, 1924, in New York City, Marvin quit high school to enter the Marine Corps and while serving in the South Pacific was badly wounded in battle when a machine gun nest shot off part of his buttocks and severed his sciatic nerve. He spent a year in recovery before returning to the U.S. where he began working as a plumber. The acting bug bit after filling in for an ailing summer-stock actor and he studied the art at the New York-based American Theater Wing. Upon making his debut in summer stock,...
- 8/30/2016
- by Movie Geeks
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, and Tom Stockman
We’re celebrating one of Hollywood’s great tough guys and one of our favorite actors September 6th at The Way Out Club in St. Louis with Super-8 Lee Marvin Movie Madness.
Lee Marvin rose through the ranks of movie stardom as a character actor, delivering mostly villainous supporting turns in many films before finally graduating to leading roles. Regardless of which side of the law he was on however, he projected a tough-as-nails intensity and a two-fisted integrity which elevated even the slightest material. Born February 19, 1924, in New York City, Marvin quit high school to enter the Marine Corps and while serving in the South Pacific was badly wounded in battle when a machine gun nest shot off part of his buttocks and severed his sciatic nerve. He spent a year in recovery before returning to the U.S. where...
We’re celebrating one of Hollywood’s great tough guys and one of our favorite actors September 6th at The Way Out Club in St. Louis with Super-8 Lee Marvin Movie Madness.
Lee Marvin rose through the ranks of movie stardom as a character actor, delivering mostly villainous supporting turns in many films before finally graduating to leading roles. Regardless of which side of the law he was on however, he projected a tough-as-nails intensity and a two-fisted integrity which elevated even the slightest material. Born February 19, 1924, in New York City, Marvin quit high school to enter the Marine Corps and while serving in the South Pacific was badly wounded in battle when a machine gun nest shot off part of his buttocks and severed his sciatic nerve. He spent a year in recovery before returning to the U.S. where...
- 8/30/2011
- by Movie Geeks
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Date: 1981Director: J. Lee ThompsonCast: Melissa Sue Anderson, Glenn Ford, Sharon Acker, Lenore Zann, Matt Craven, Lesleh DonaldsonFright Meter Award Winner: Best Actress
Months before the film actually begins, Virginia Wainwright suffers a traumatic car accident that still causes her to have physical and mental issues. However, her life seems to be back to normal and she is blessed to be part of the elite "Crawford 10" at her high school; these are the students who are most popular and involved on this prestigious campus. Her eighteenth birthday is approaching, but rather than be joyous celebration, it becomes a nightmare as a mysterious killer begins gruesomely murdering her friends.
Happy Birthday to Me is one of the most ambitious and well acted slasher films of the 1980's. One of the main reasons that it never enjoyed the impact or success films such as Prom Night or Friday the 13th, which were released around the same time,...
Months before the film actually begins, Virginia Wainwright suffers a traumatic car accident that still causes her to have physical and mental issues. However, her life seems to be back to normal and she is blessed to be part of the elite "Crawford 10" at her high school; these are the students who are most popular and involved on this prestigious campus. Her eighteenth birthday is approaching, but rather than be joyous celebration, it becomes a nightmare as a mysterious killer begins gruesomely murdering her friends.
Happy Birthday to Me is one of the most ambitious and well acted slasher films of the 1980's. One of the main reasons that it never enjoyed the impact or success films such as Prom Night or Friday the 13th, which were released around the same time,...
- 3/4/2011
- by noreply@blogger.com (Troy)
- Fright Meter
If Resnais made crime thrillers…The grimy smudge in the Alcatraz cell at the onset might be Proust’s “little patch of yellow wall” (The Captive), the dying Bergotte here becomes Lee Marvin’s double-crossed thug Walker, sprawled on the floor. “Did it happen? A dream?” In John Boorman’s hands, Donald E. Westlake’s pulp novel becomes a boundlessly inventive modernist welter of alienation, identity, and memory. Walker’s meeting with his duplicitous wife (Sharon Acker) is wondrously strange: He unloads his pistol on the empty bedroom, then sits on the sofa silently as she dazedly goes into her incantatory speech (“Gone. Cold … Can’t sleep. Haven’t slept … Dream about you … How good it must be, being dead”), neither looking at the other. The next morning she vanishes into a rainbow of vanity liquids splattered on the bathroom floor. (The bullet-riddled mattress is just the first of the...
- 2/27/2010
- MUBI
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