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British director Mike Hodges, known for films like “Flash Gordon” and “Croupier”, has died. He was 90. His death was confirmed to NBC News by producer and “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead” collaborator Mike Kaplan, reports ‘People’ magazine.

According to Kaplan, Hodges died at his home in Dorset, England, due to heart failure. Hodges’ long standing career dates back to the 1950s. Before getting a start in films, he spent two years in mandatory national service on a royal navy minesweeper, which he credits as the inspiration for his first film, “Get Carter”.

In a letter published by The Guardian in May, quoted by ‘People’, he said: “For two years, my middle-class eyes were forced to witness horrendous poverty and deprivation that I was previously unaware of. I went into the navy as a newly qualified chartered accountant and complacent young Tory, and came out an angry, radical young man.

Mike Hodges, director of Flash Gordon, has passed. Finally saw this movie during the pandemic and it brought me such joy. Have watched it a bunch of times since. Nothing else like it. Rest in Peace, sir. pic.twitter.com/v0YQDBmaFs

— Brian Lynch (@BrianLynch) December 20, 2022

Tributes have been paid to Get Carter director Mike Hodges who has died at the age of 90.

His long-time friend Mike Kaplan confirmed the director's death in Dorset on Saturday, although no further details have been released.

After his gangster classic starring Michael Caine as a man out for justice, which Hodges adapted himself for the screen from the book by Ted Lewis, he reteamed with the star on Pulp the following year.

Among his other credits were Flash Gordon and, with Clive Owen, Croupier and I'll Sleep When I'm Dead. Owen told us in an interview he believed...

Mike Hodges, British director known for “Croupier,” “Flash Gordon,” and “Get Carter,” has died. He was 90.

Hodges’ good friend Mike Kaplan and producer of “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead” confirmed the director’s death to multiple media outlets.

At the beginning of his career, Hodges carved out a space for himself in crime dramas with “Get Carter” (1971) and “Pulp” (1972), concluding with “Croupier” (1999) and “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead” (2003). Outside of this bookend category of his catalog, he was also known for his rendition of “Flash Gordon.”

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Hodges adapted “Get Carter” from a novel by Ted Lewis. The story follows Caine, a London gangster who seeks vengeance fr his brother’s murder. The British gangster movie experienced a resurgence after its 2000 remake starring Sylvester Stallone in the role of Caine.

Hodges’ second film “Pulp” consisted of another crime drama,...

British director Mike Hodges, known for directing “Get Carter,” “Croupier” and “Flash Gordon,” died in Dorset, England on Dec. 17. He was 90.

His death was announced by Mike Kaplan, longtime friend and producer of “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead.”

Hodges’ crime dramas came at the beginning of his career — “Get Carter” (1971) and “Pulp” (1972) — and the end — “Croupier” (1999) and “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead” (2003). In addition to his crime dramas he was known for his campy, stylized take on “Flash Gordon.”

Andrew Sarris wrote in the Observer in 2000, “Director Mike Hodges has become one of the most under-appreciated and virtually unknown masters of the medium over the last 30 years” and “Mr. Hodges has been hailed by everyone from Martin Scorsese to Pauline Kael as a stylist of the first order.”

Hodges adapted “Get Carter” — one of the greatest British gangster movies of all time — himself from a novel by Ted Lewis.

Mike Hodges’ Brit-crime magnum opus from 1971, which gave Caine the role of a lifetime as gangland enforcer Jack Carter, can be savoured again on re-release

Even after 50 years, do we properly get Carter? And understand that his awful destiny is bound up with British shame, envy and the class system? Mike Hodges created a Brit-crime magnum opus with this unforgettably sleazy, slimy, nasty film from 1971 – now on re-release, linked to the director’s retrospective at London’s BFI Southbank. It is a violent kitchen-sink pulp with the observational brilliance and dour working-class realism of something by Ken Loach, adapted by Hodges from the novel Jack’s Return Home by the neglected British writer Ted Lewis.

Hodges gave the role of a lifetime to Michael Caine as the dead-eyed, pill-popping gangland enforcer Jack Carter, who is working for London’s mobster porn supremos with their interest in trafficking and exploitation. Carter...

Get Carter (1971). Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures.A fascinating figure in British cinema, Mike Hodges made his astonishing debut with Get Carter in 1971, a vicious tale of gangland revenge featuring an immortal lead performance from Michael Caine. A seminal British gangster movie, Get Carter immediately announced the arrival of a filmmaker with a keen eye for genre deconstruction, the film’s pithy nihilism and modernist sensibilities strikingly attuned to its vision of wanton amorality and national dilapidation. Other studio gigs followed, but film after film, it quickly became apparent that executives and marketing departments had no idea what to do with the work of this perennial outsider. The Terminal Man (1974) never saw a UK release, and A Prayer for the Dying (1987) was re-cut behind his back. Horror sequel Omen II: Damien (1978) was a disaster from the off, with Hodges unceremoniously replaced as director, and Black Rainbow (1989) effectively vanished for some 30 years.

In his latest podcast/interview, host and screenwriter Stuart Wright talks to writer Nick Triplow about his new book Getting Carter: Ted Lewis and the Birth of Brit Noir, which is out now from No Exit Press: https://www.noexit.co.uk/index1.php?imprint=1&isbn=&ebookid=1689

The story of Ted Lewis carries historical and cultural resonances for our own troubled times. Get Carter are two words to bring a smile of fond recollection to all British film lovers of a certain age. The cinema classic was based on a book called Jack’s Return Home, and many commentators agree contemporary British crime writing began with that novel. The influence of both book and film is strong to this day, reflected in the work of David Peace, Jake Arnott and a host of contemporary crime & noir authors. But what of the man who wrote this seminal work? Ted Lewis is...

Exclusive: Bedlam, the small, critically acclaimed Off Broadway theater company known for its clever, spare and unconventional stagings of classics like The Crucible and Saint Joan, is developing Bedlam: The Series, an eight-episode New Media mash-up of Shakespeare plays using the Bard’s own language.

The series, to be released on an as-yet-unannounced platform, begins filming this month in New York City and New York’s Hudson Valley.

Written by Bedlam artistic director Eric Tucker and Musa Gurnis and directed by Tucker, the series will combine characters and plots from King Lear, The Merry Wives of Windsor, The Merchant of Venice and other plays in an all-new story.

“As a theatre company, most immediately, we need to adapt to our current situation and find ways of staying alive,” Tucker said, “creating content that serves our mission and vision, while assuring the well-being and livelihood of our regular artists and staff.

“Manchester by the Sea” is a top Oscar contender, becoming one of the most universally adored films by critics since its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival. The drama stars Casey Affleck as a man who moves back to his New England home in order to take care of his deceased brother’s 16-year-old son.

The score is composed by Lesley Barber and perfectly accompanies the somber film with its string and piano arrangements. The album features 16 song composed by Barber, as well as by various artists including Gerhard Kanzian and Ed Lewis, Musica Sacra Chorus and Orchestra and more.

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The LP also features the haunting main theme, “Manchester by the Sea Chorale.”

“With that piece, I was really looking at the opening landscape and where we’re at with Lee when...

Luchaworld.com

Professional wrestling has been around for well over a century now, and has evolved through a variety of different forms as society and popular culture has changed around it.

In fact, back in the 1920s there wasn’t really any such thing as pop culture. America had the Depression and Prohibition instead, the two suckiest horsemen of the apocalypse, and after wrestling’s first superstar Frank Gotch retired, Ed Lewis, Billy Sandow and Toots Mondt – the Gold Dust Trio – responded to the crash in wrestling’s fortunes by changing a fair few things: adding more panache and pizazz to the product, introducing gimmicked holds and the concept of the roster.

Television came along, completely redefining the business. Bruno Sammartino ruled the northeast in the 1960s, but Verne Gagne’s Awa ran the rest of America. With the advent of cable over regional television, the business suffered another seismic change,...