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Rafer Johnson in Westside Special Olympics (WSO) Games (1976)

News

Rafer Johnson

10 Best Elvis Presley Movies, Ranked
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Netflix's documentary Return of the King: The Fall and Rise of Elvis Presley has allowed audiences a glimpse into the life of one of pop culture's most famous figures, and the iconic singer has numerous films to check out next. Aside from being one of the defining musical artists of the 20th century, Elvis Presley's acting career saw him star in 31 films, primarily including musicals that showcased his singing talent and charisma.

Throughout the 1950s, Elvis was a fairly consistent box-office success, with his controversial manager, Colonel Tom Parker, dictating many of his acting choices. Presley wanted to partake in more serious roles, but those films, like Flaming Star, earned less at the box office. Movies like Jailhouse Rock and Viva Las Vegas were some of the highest-grossing films of their respective years, proving a desire for his musical movies with accompanied soundtrack albums.

Wild in the Country...
See full article at ScreenRant
  • 11/17/2024
  • by Charles Papadopoulos
  • ScreenRant
Hollywood & Entertainment Industry Deaths In 2020 – Photo Gallery
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As we finally turn the calendar on the Cruelest Year, let’s take a moment to reflect on some of the memorable people we lost from the world of entertainment. Click through the photo gallery above.

Among those who passed during 2020 were big-screen Hollywood legends from Kirk Douglas and Olivia de Havilland to Sean Connery and Chadwick Boseman, sitcom favorites Jerry Stiller and Dawn Wells and two of the all-time showbiz multihyphenates in Carl Reiner and Buck Henry. Other actors who left us include Diana Rigg, Max Von Sydow, Brian Dennehy, Kelly Preston, Fred Willard, Naya Rivera, Nick Cordero, Monty Python’s Terry Jones and Indian stars Irrfan Khan and Soumitra Chatterjee.

The movie world also mourns filmmakers Alan Parker, Joel Schumacher and Kim Ki-duk, along with a man who would be on a Mount Rushmore for film composers: Ennio Morrocone.

Also gone this past year were such admired TV personalities as Regis Philbin,...
See full article at Deadline Film + TV
  • 12/31/2020
  • by Erik Pedersen
  • Deadline Film + TV
Rafer Johnson Dies: Olympic Champion Who Lit Torch For 1984 L.A. Games & Helped Subdue Rfk Assassin Was 86
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Rafer Johnson, a Los Angeles legend who won the 1960 Olympic decathlon gold medal, helped organize the 1984 Games in L.A. and wrestled the gun from Sen. Robert F. Kennedy’s assassin at the Ambassador Hotel in 1968, died today at his home in Sherman Oaks. He was 86. His family confirmed the news but did not provide a cause of death.

Born on August 18, 1934, in Hillsboro, Texas, Johnson moved with his family to the San Joaquin Valley town of Kingsburg when he was 9 and became a four-sport high school star while working as a cotton picker with his father and siblings. The town’s middle school now is named in his honor.

Johnson already was a local hero at UCLA, where he would become student body president but faced racial discrimination, when he began to draw national attention as a decathlete. He broke the world record in 1955 and was the favorite at...
See full article at Deadline Film + TV
  • 12/2/2020
  • by Erik Pedersen
  • Deadline Film + TV
Wild in the Country
Elvis fans laud this high-end drama, an attempt by the superstar to lock into a mainstream acting career. Presley has fine dramatic support, especially from his three leading ladies, but the requirement that an Elvis movie be all things to all people — especially marketers — really takes its toll. It’s a soap where almost nothing is believable, except to true believers for whom Presley can do no wrong.

Wild in the Country

Blu-ray

Twilight Time

1961 / Color / 2:35 widescreen 1:37 academy / 114 min. / Street Date August 20, 2019 / Available from Twilight Time Movies / 29.95

Starring: Elvis Presley, Hope Lange, Tuesday Weld, Millie Perkins, Rafer Johnson, John Ireland, Gary Lockwood, William Mims, Raymond Greenleaf, Christina Crawford, Pat Buttram, Doreen Lang, Alan Napier, Jason Robards Sr..

Cinematography: William C. Mellor

Editor : Dorothy Spencer

Original Music: Kenyon Hopkins

Written by Clifford Odets from a novel by J. R. Salamanca

Produced by Jerry Wald

Directed by Philip Dunne...
See full article at Trailers from Hell
  • 8/20/2019
  • by Glenn Erickson
  • Trailers from Hell
Frank Sinatra in None But The Brave Available on Blu-ray From Warner Archives
Great new for Frank Sinatra fans. None But The Brave is currently available on Blu-ray From Warner Archives. Ordering information can be found Here

A crippled C-47 transport crash-lands on a remote Pacific island. For the Marines aboard, World War II becomes smaller, but no less deadly. The atoll is held by a Japanese platoon, also cut off from its command.

Debuting director Frank Sinatra stars in this suspenseful war saga, joined by Clint Walker, Tony Bill and Olympic champion Rafer Johnson. After initial bullet-laced confrontations, the Japanese leader (Tatsuya Mihashi) offers to swap water for the aid of Pharmacist Mate Maloney (Sinatra), whom he has mistaken for a doctor. When Maloney amputates the leg of a Japanese soldier and saves his life, peace results. But can it last? There are two sides to every war. None but the Brave skillfully shows the heroism of both.

Frank Sinatra added “director...
See full article at WeAreMovieGeeks.com
  • 6/25/2019
  • by Tom Stockman
  • WeAreMovieGeeks.com
The Night Bobby Kennedy Was Shot – An Eyewitness Account 50 Years Later (Guest Blog)
Exactly half a century ago this week, Sen. Robert Kennedy, the man who would be president, roared frantically across California from Chinatown in San Francisco down to San Diego, delivering fiery speeches until his voice ran out, and hugging supporters and shaking hands until his fingers were bruised and bleeding.

In June 1968, I witnessed all of this firsthand as a foreign correspondent for the London Daily Express when I traveled with Bobby throughout California. He had become the Democratic presidential front runner and hot favorite to win the presidency. President Lyndon Baines Johnson had become something of a pariah as a result of his gross mishandling of the escalating Vietnam War.

For America, 1968 was to be a memorable year — but for all the horribly wrong reasons: An unwinnable war, that had divided the nation and gun violence that destroyed the lives of two of the country’s most famous men,...
See full article at The Wrap
  • 6/5/2018
  • by Ivor Davis
  • The Wrap
8 Coolest Ways the Olympic Torch Has Been Lit (Video)
Ahead of the 2018 Winter Olympic Games in PyeongChang, South Korea, TheWrap looks back at some of the best torch lighting ceremonies, including to Rafer Johnson’s big climb in Los Angeles and gymnast Ning Li’s gravity-defying run around the stadium in Beijing. At the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, boxer Muhammad Ali was called on to finish the torch relay and ignite the flame. In London 2012, seven young athletes aged 16 to 19 were brought out to light the cauldron, to “symbolize the passing of the Olympic flame to the young generation.”...
See full article at The Wrap
  • 2/9/2018
  • by Reid Nakamura
  • The Wrap
Rafer Johnson in Westside Special Olympics (WSO) Games (1976)
8 Coolest Ways the Olympic Torch Has Been Lit (Photos)
Rafer Johnson in Westside Special Olympics (WSO) Games (1976)
Los Angeles, 1984: Decathlete Rafer Johnson climbed a staircase to light a tube which carried the flame through the Olympic rings up to the cauldron. https://www.olympic.org/los-angeles-1984-torch-relay Barcelona, 1992: Paralympic archer Antonio Rebollo shot an arrow lit by the flame into the cauldron. https://www.olympic.org/barcelona-1992-torch-relay Atlanta, 1992: Boxer Muhammad Ali was called on to finish the torch relay and ignite the flame. https://www.olympic.org/atlanta-1996-torch-relay Nagano, 1998: The flame was split into three and carried around the country before arriving in Nagano, Japan where they were reunited in Central Square. https://www.olympic.org/nagano-1998-torch-relay Salt Lake City, 2002: The winning Us men’s ice hockey team from the 1980 Winter Games in Lake Placid lit...
See full article at The Wrap
  • 2/8/2018
  • by Reid Nakamura
  • The Wrap
Rafer Johnson in Westside Special Olympics (WSO) Games (1976)
Olympics 2012: Team USA's Decathletes Eaton and Hardee Are 'World's Greatest Athletes'
Rafer Johnson in Westside Special Olympics (WSO) Games (1976)
Ashton Eaton and Trey Hardee became the first American men to take home gold and silver in the decathlon since Milt Campbell and Rafer Johnson in 1956. Their combined point total is also the highest ever of any other country that had a duo win the top two spots in the Olympics. Eaton and Hardee were leading from the start of their 100m race all the way through the long jump, shot put, high jump, 400m, 110m hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin and finishing with a grueling 1500m run.
See full article at buddytv.com
  • 8/10/2012
  • by editor@buddytv.com
  • buddytv.com
Can London 2012's opening ceremony beat its predecessors?
Danny Boyle is up against faked footprint-shaped fireworks, aliens in flying saucers and spectacles with artillery fire and pigeons

Anyone concerned that Danny Boyle faces a daunting, Newton-like climb on to the shoulders of choreographic giants in his role as the Olympic opening ceremony organiser needs only to glance at some of his predecessors' efforts for reassurance.

Beijing 2008 saw computer faked footprint-shaped fireworks trek across the sky from Tiananmen Square to the Bird's Nest stadium, and a seven-year-old singer's vocals mimed by a more aesthetically-pleasing girl.

In 1984, not content with sending torch-bearer Rafer Johnson up the longest, steepest staircase imaginable and having an Evel Knievel lookalike in a jetpack buzz the crowd, the La games organisers decided for the closing ceremony that nothing embodied the Olympic spirit quite as potently as a big alien in a flying saucer.

Hitler's ambitious plans for the 1936 Berlin Olympics – complete with Leni Riefenstahl's...
See full article at The Guardian - Film News
  • 1/28/2012
  • by Sam Jones, Edward Gibbes
  • The Guardian - Film News
Stars Line Up For Kennedy Family Celebrity Charity Golf
Mrs. Robert F. Kennedy and the Kennedy family will host the 22nd annual Rfk Center for Justice and Human Rights Golf Tournament in Hyannis Port, Cape Cod, on Friday, Oct. 14, to benefit the non-profit Rfk Center.

Mrs. Robert Kennedy will be joined by 144 golfers from around the world, including celebrities Alec Baldwin, George Lopez, Matt McCoy and Bill Murray, and sports legends Darrell Green, Rafer Johnson, Jim Lonborg, Bobby Orr and Bill Russell.

Read more...
See full article at Look to the Stars
  • 10/7/2011
  • Look to the Stars
Anthony Daniels, Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill, James Earl Jones, David Prowse, and Kenny Baker in Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977)
California Hall of Fame names inductees
Anthony Daniels, Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill, James Earl Jones, David Prowse, and Kenny Baker in Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977)
"Star Wars" creator George Lucas, TV icon Carol Burnett and NFL broadcasting legend John Madden will be among this year's inductees to the California Hall of Fame.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and first lady Maria Shriver unveiled the class of 2009 inductees Tuesday, saying they "embody California's innovative spirit and have made their mark on history."

Other inductees include Harvey Milk, the slain San Francisco politician and gay rights activist whose story was told in the Oscar-nominated biopic "Milk," and test pilot Chuck Yeager, who was portrayed in the 1983 film "The Right Stuff."

Also named to the California Hall on Tuesday were author Danielle Steel, Olympic decathlon champion and philanthropist Rafer Johnson, former Intel chief executive Andrew Grove, former Gov. Hiram Johnson, industrialist Henry Kaiser, philanthropist and peace activist Joan Kroc, bodybuilder and Schwarzenegger mentor Joe Weider and artist Fritz Scholder.

The nominees will be inducted in a Dec. 1 ceremony at the California Museum in Sacramento.
See full article at The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
  • 8/25/2009
  • The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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