Morris Engel
| Morris Engel | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Morris Engel April 8, 1918 Brooklyn, New York |
| Died | March 5, 2005 (aged 86) New York City |
| Nationality | American |
| Known for | Filmmaking, Cinematography, Photography |
| Notable work | Little Fugitive (1952), Lovers and Lollipops (1955) Weddings and Babies (1960) |
| Movement | French New Wave |
| Spouse(s) | Ruth Orkin |
Morris Engel (April 8, 1918 – 5 March 2005) was an American photographer, cinematographer and filmmaker best known for directing the 1953 film Little Fugitive in collaboration with his wife, photographer Ruth Orkin, and their friend, writer Raymond Abrashkin.
Engel completed two more features during the 1950s, Lovers and Lollipops (1956) and Weddings and Babies (1960).
Engel was a pioneer in the use of hand-held cameras and nonprofessional actors in his films, using cameras that he helped design, and his naturalistic films influenced future prominent independent and French New Wave filmmakers.
A lifelong New Yorker, Morris Engel was born in Brooklyn in 1918. After joining the Photo League in 1936, Engel had his first exhibition in 1939, at the New School for Social Research. He worked briefly as a photographer for the Leftist newspaper PM before joining the United States Navy as a combat photographer from 1941 to 1946 in World War II. After the war, he returned to New York where he again was an active Photo League member, teaching workshop classes and serving as co-chair of a project group focusing on postwar labor issues.
In 1953, Engel, along with his girlfriend, fellow photographer Ruth Orkin, and his former colleague at PM, Raymond Abrashkin, made Little Fugitive for $30,000, shooting the film on location with hand-held 35mm camera. The film, one of the first successful American "independent films" earned them an Academy Award nomination for Best Writing, Motion Picture Story and a Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival. The film told the story of a seven-year-old boy, played by Richie Andrusco, who runs away from home and spends the day at Coney Island. Andrusco never appeared in another film, and the other performers were mainly nonprofessionals. Though the film was a critical success, Engel and Orkin, who had since married, had a hard time finding funding for their next film, Lovers and Lollipops, which was completed in 1955. The film was about a widowed mother dating an old friend, and how her young daughter complicates their budding relationship.
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