Dean Riesner

Birth : 1918-11-03, New Rochelle, New York, USA

Death : 2002-08-18

History

Dean Riesner (November 3, 1918, New Rochelle, New York – August 18, 2002, Encino, California) was an American film and television writer. Riesner's father, Charles Reisner, was a German American silent film director, and Dean began acting in films at the age of five as "Dinky Dean". His most notable role was in Charlie Chaplin's 1923 film The Pilgrim. His career at this young age ended because his mother wanted her son to have a real childhood. As an adult, his first job in films was as a co-writer of the 1939 Ronald Reagan movie Code of the Secret Service. Riesner won an Oscar for directing Bill and Coo (1948), a feature film with a cast of real birds, costumed as humans, acting on the world's smallest film set. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Riesner worked primarily in television, including writing for Rawhide and the "Tourist Attraction" episode of The Outer Limits, although he occasionally contributed to feature films like The Helen Morgan Story. In 1968 he landed a job working on the Clint Eastwood action film Coogan's Bluff, and this in turn would lead to him writing several other Eastwood features throughout the 1970s. Riesner helped pen the screenplays for two Eastwood films in 1971, Play Misty for Me and the original Dirty Harry. In 1973 he provided an uncredited rewrite for High Plains Drifter, and in 1976 he was one of the writers to draft The Enforcer, the third Dirty Harry thriller. That same year he provided the teleplay for NBC's highly rated miniseries Rich Man, Poor Man, starring Nick Nolte. In 1979 he wrote an early draft screenplay for The Godfather Part III, but his script was discarded when Francis Ford Coppola and Mario Puzo finally agreed to collaborate on a third entry in the series. Riesner continued to write into the 1980s, though most of his work from that period went uncredited. Those films include Das Boot, The Sting II, and Starman. Riesner died in 2002 of natural causes. He had been married to actress Maila Nurmi, better known as the horror hostess Vampira.

Movies

Play It Again: A Look Back at 'Play Misty for Me'
Clint Eastwood tells us how he yearned to be a director from the time he was on 'Rawhide' to finally obtaining the approval of his mentor, Don Siegel. He then asked Lew R. Wasserman, a Universal executive, if he could direct a story called 'Play Misty For Me.' Lew said yes but that he wouldn't be paid as the director. Clint agreed and began to locate the cast and crew he desired.
Fatal Beauty
Screenplay
Detective Rita Rizzoli is accustomed to donning costumes and going undercover to nail crooks. But she'll be required to use all of her get-ups and more when a major cocaine ring is suspected of turning out a potent new strain of the drug, called "Fatal Beauty." With the help of her partner and a former bodyguard for a local cartel, Rita will do whatever it takes to find out who's dealing Fatal Beauty and stop them.
Sudden Impact
Writer
When a young rape victim takes justice into her own hands and becomes a serial killer, it's up to Dirty Harry Callahan, on suspension from the SFPD, to bring her to justice.
The Sting II
Writer
Hooker and Gondorf pull a con on Macalinski, an especially nasty mob boss with the help of Veronica, a new grifter. They convince this new victim that Hooker is a somewhat dull boxer who is tired of taking dives for Gondorf. There is a ringer. Lonigan, their victim from the first movie, is setting them up to take the fall.
Das Boot
Screenplay
A German submarine hunts allied ships during the Second World War, but it soon becomes the hunted. The crew tries to survive below the surface, while stretching both the boat and themselves to their limits.
The Enforcer
Screenplay
Dirty Harry Callahan returns again, this time saddled with a rookie female partner. Together, they must stop a terrorist group consisting of angry Vietnam veterans.
The Keegans
Writer
A professional football player is accused of murdering the man who attacked his sister. His brother, an investigate reporter, sets out to prove his brother's innocence.
Charley Varrick
Screenplay
Charley Varrick robs a bank in a small town with his friends, but instead of obtaining a small amount of money, they discover they stole a very large amount of money belonging to the mob. Charley must now come up with a plan to not only evade the police but the mob as well.
Dirty Harry
Screenplay
When a madman dubbed 'Scorpio' terrorizes San Francisco, hard-nosed cop, Harry Callahan – famous for his take-no-prisoners approach to law enforcement – is tasked with hunting down the psychopath. Harry eventually collars Scorpio in the process of rescuing a kidnap victim, only to see him walk on technicalities. Now, the maverick detective is determined to nail the maniac himself.
Play Misty for Me
Screenplay
A brief fling between a male disc jockey and an obsessed female fan takes a frightening, and perhaps even deadly turn when another woman enters the picture.
The Intruders
Teleplay
The James and Younger outlaw gangs ride into town, and it is up to the local marshal, who has lost both his nerve and his gun skills, to stop them.
Lost Flight
Writer
The captain of a downed airliner must help his crew and passengers survive on a deserted jungle island in the midst of a power struggle - an adult version of "Lord of the Flies."
Coogan's Bluff
Screenplay
Coogan, an Arizona deputy sheriff goes to New York to pick up a prisoner. While escorting the prisoner to the airport, he escapes and Coogan heads into the city to recapture him.
Stranger on the Run
Teleplay
A drifter finds himself wrongly accused of murder by a power-crazed sheriff. The sheriff gives him a horse, some supplies, and a one-hour head start into the desert before sending his murderous posse after him.
The Man from Galveston
Writer
Circuit-riding Texas lawyer Timothy Higgins defends a former girlfriend against a murder charge stemming from an extortionist's threat to reveal her shady past. Through adroit courtroom work, Higgins is able to acquit her and reveal who actually shot the fatal bullet.
Paris Holiday
Writer
Comedian Bob Hunter is aided by his French counterpart Fernydel and two beautiful blondes when he is targeted for death by a powerful European counterfeiting ring.
The Helen Morgan Story
Writer
Torch singer Helen Morgan rises from sordid beginnings to fame and fortune only to lose it all to alcohol and poor personal choices.
So You Want to Know Your Relatives
Story
Do-gooder Joe McDoakes is the guest on the "Know Your Relatives" TV show where, to his chagrin, many of his black sheep relations reveal the skeletons in the family closet.
Skipalong Rosenbloom
Screenplay
Skipalong Rosenbloom is the star of a heavily commercialized TV kiddie show, presided over by a smarmy announcer. He is at odds with western bad guy Butcher Baer.
Gunfire
Outlaw Mack (as Dean Reisner)
Tubercular Frank James has become a born again and retired from his career as an outlaw with his family but a look-a-like outlaw causes suspicion to fall back on him.
Operation Haylift
Writer
A pilot devises a plan to airlift hay to thousands of ranch cattle stranded and dying due to severe winter weather.
The Traveling Saleswoman
Tom
The daughter of a soap manufacturer heads to the wild and woolly west to sell her daddy's product.
Assigned to Danger
Dr. Michael Kelly (uncredited)
A gang of bank robbers is pursued by an insurance investigator.
The Cobra Strikes
Detective Brody
A newspaper reporter investigates the near-fatal shooting of a medical scientist.
Bill and Coo
Screenplay
The feathered residents of Chirpendale are terrorized by an evil black crow by the name of "The Black Menace". But to the citizen's rescue comes a brave young taxi puller named Bill! In other words, every single role in this film is played by birds. Actual birds.
Bill and Coo
Director
The feathered residents of Chirpendale are terrorized by an evil black crow by the name of "The Black Menace". But to the citizen's rescue comes a brave young taxi puller named Bill! In other words, every single role in this film is played by birds. Actual birds.
Tombstone: The Town Too Tough to Die
Story
Uneven version of Wyatt Earp vs. the Clanton Gang with a little romance thrown in haphazardly.
A Fugitive from Justice
Additional Writing
Leslie is being chased by the gangsters, the police and the insurance investigators. He is on the run. Falsely accused of a murder, he embarks upon a life-and-death journey to save his family.
The Fighting 69th
Screenplay
Although loudmouthed braggart Jerry Plunkett alienates his comrades and officers, Father Duffy, the regimental chaplain, has faith that he'll prove himself in the end.
Everybody Dance
Tommy Spurgeon
When her sister dies, a nightclub singer is left with her children. In order to raise the children properly, she leaves her singing career and takes her new family to a farm. However, her greedy manager--seeing his "cash cow" slipping away--goes to court to have her declared legally incompetent.
It's in the Air
Brave (uncredited)
Con men Calvin Churchill and Clip McGurk know how to fix a horse-race or boxing match. Calvin wants to go straight and win back his estranged wife, but first the men must dodge a dogged IRS agent and bilk a bunch of aviation investors out of the backing boodle for a balloon excursion into the stratosphere.
The Pilgrim
Little Boy
The Tramp is an escaped convict who is mistaken as a pastor in a small town church.
Grief
Begins with a child-cast parody of "The Kid." The Adams portion finds the guy chased about town because they are looking for some crook in a gray derby...and Jimmie happens to have one.
Peck's Bad Boy
This portrayal of small town life before the War is based on a small boys determination to get to see the circus, over all obstacles. Escaped lions, lightheaded blackmail of his father, and playfully planting stolen papers on his sisters boyfriend are all in a days work for little Henry Peck.