Ferris Webster
Birth : 1912-04-29, Walla Walla, Washington, USA
Death : 1989-02-04
History
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ferris Webster (April 29, 1912 – February 4, 1989) was an American film editor with approximately seventy-two film credits. He was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Film Editing for his work on Blackboard Jungle (1955), The Manchurian Candidate (1962), and The Great Escape (1963).
Webster was raised in the state of Washington, and was a student at the University of Southern California, where he was an outstanding track and field athlete. He was trained as an editor at the MGM Studios, and received his first feature-film credit in 1943 for Harrigan's Kid. At MGM, Webster edited six films with director Vincente Minnelli: Undercurrent (1946), Madame Bovary (1949), Father of the Bride (1950), Father's Little Dividend (1951), The Long, Long Trailer (1954), and Tea and Sympathy (1956). Film critic Bruce Eder has written of Madame Bovay that, "the cutting of the film in the gala ball sequence, in particular, was a marvel of the editor's art in the service of old Hollywood's restrained, elegant storytelling." In the mid-1950s, he edited three films with director Richard Brooks: Blackboard Jungle (1955), Something of Value (1957), and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958); Webster received his first nomination for the Academy Award for Blackboard Jungle. His last film at MGM was Key Witness (1960).
Bruce Eder has written, "If ever a film editor deserved public recognition in the 1960s, it was Ferris Webster." Webster edited the three films of director John Frankenheimer's "paranoia trilogy": The Manchurian Candidate (1962), Seven Days in May (1964), and Seconds (1966). Eder writes that The Manchurian Candidate was "the editor's magnum opus. The shooting, cutting, and intercutting of one extended brainwashing sequence, seen from multiple points-of-view, is still striking decades later, and the movie earned Webster his second Academy Award nomination." Frankenheimer cast Webster in his only appearance as a film actor, as Air Force Gen. Bernard "Barney" Rutkowski in Seven Days in May.
Webster was nominated for an Academy Award for the editing of The Great Escape (1963), which was directed by John Sturges. Webster and Sturges' notable collaboration included fifteen films between 1950 and 1972, which is about half of Sturges' films in that period. It started with The Magnificent Yankee and Mystery Street (1950), and included The Law and Jake Wade (1958), The Magnificent Seven (1960), and Ice Station Zebra (1968). The final film of their collaboration was Joe Kidd (1972), which was near the end of Sturges' career.
Joe Kidd starred Clint Eastwood. In the last phase of his career, Webster edited and co-edited eight films that were directed by Eastwood, starting with High Plains Drifter (1973), which was Eastwood's second film as a director. Webster edited Breezy (1973), The Eiger Sanction (1975), The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976), The Gauntlet (1977), Bronco Billy (1980), Firefox (1982) and Honkytonk Man (both 1982). These latter two films with Eastwood concluded Webster's career as an editor, apparently after a falling-out between the two men.
Additional credits include The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), Lili (1953), Forbidden Planet (1956), Les Girls (1957), Divorce American Style (1967).
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During the Great Depression, a young boy leaves his family's Oklahoma farm to travel with his country musician uncle who is trying out for the Grand Ole Opry.
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The Soviets have developed a revolutionary new jet fighter, called 'Firefox'. Worried that the jet will be used as a first-strike weapon—as there are rumours that it is undetectable by radar—the British send ex-Vietnam War pilot, Mitchell Gant on a covert mission into the Soviet Union to steal the Firefox.
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An idealistic, modern-day cowboy struggles to keep his Wild West show afloat in the face of hard luck and waning interest.
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San Francisco Bay, January 18, 1960. Frank Lee Morris is transferred to Alcatraz, a maximum security prison located on a rocky island. Although no one has ever managed to escape from there, Frank and other inmates begin to carefully prepare an escape plan.
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Philo Beddoe is your regular, easygoing, truck-driving guy. He's also the best bar-room brawler west of the Rockies. And he lives with a 165-pound orangutan named Clyde. Like other guys, Philo finally falls in love - with a flighty singer who leads him on a screwball chase across the American Southwest. Nothing's in the way except a motorcycle gang, and legendary brawler Tank Murdock.
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Phoenix cop Ben Shockley is well on his way to becoming a derelict when he is assigned to transport a witness from Las Vegas. The witness turns out to be a belligerent prostitute with mob ties—and incriminating information regarding a high-ranking figure.
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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.
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After avenging his family's brutal murder, Wales is pursued by a pack of soldiers. He prefers to travel alone, but ragtag outcasts are drawn to him - and Wales can't bring himself to leave them unprotected.
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A classical art professor and collector, who doubles as a professional assassin, is coerced out of retirement to avenge the murder of an old friend.
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With the help of an irreverent young sidekick, a bank robber gets his old gang back together to organise a daring new heist.
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"Dirty" Harry Callahan is a San Francisco Police Inspector on the trail of a group of rogue cops who have taken justice into their own hands. When shady characters are murdered one after another in grisly fashion, only Dirty Harry can stop them.
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A free-spirited young woman, Breezy, hitches a ride with an aging real estate salesman, Frank. Sensing that she just wants to use him he tries to have nothing to do with her. She's not that easy to shake, however, and over time a bond forms between them.
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A gunfighting stranger comes to the small settlement of Lago. After gunning down three gunmen who tried to kill him, the townsfolk decide to hire the Stranger to hold off three outlaws who are on their way.
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A band of Mexicans find their U. S. land claims denied and all the records destroyed in a courthouse fire. Their leader, Louis Chama, encourages them to use force to regain their land. A wealthy landowner wanting the same decides to hire a gang of killers with Joe Kidd to track Chama.
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After a group of young revolutionaries break into a company's corporate headquarters and steal $5,000,000 worth of heroin to keep it off the street, they call on San Francisco Police Lieutenant Virgil Tibbs for assistance.
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Two soldiers return from Vietnam with serious PTSD. They decide to go for a couple of days to a peaceful farm owned by the father of one of the men. A psychotic sergeant who also did tours in Nam, joins them. Personalities clash hard.
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An account of the adventures of two sets of identical twins, badly scrambled at birth, on the eve of the French Revolution. One set is haughty and aristocratic, the other poor and somewhat dim. They find themselves involved in palace intrigues as history happens around them. Based, very loosely, on Dickens's "A Tale of Two Cities," Dumas's "The Corsican Brothers," etc.
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A sophisticated, middle-aged grandmother, wed to a New York law professor, falls in love with a down-to-earth Tennessee farmer.
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A dying man frames himself for murder so his widow can collect the reward.
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A top-secret Soviet spy satellite -- using stolen Western technology -- malfunctions and then goes into a descent that lands it near an isolated Arctic research encampment called Ice Station Zebra, belonging to the British, which starts sending out distress signals before falling silent. The atomic submarine Tigerfish, commanded by Cmdr. James Ferraday (Rock Hudson), is dispatched to save them.
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Marshal Wyatt Earp kills a couple of men of the Clanton-gang in a fight. In revenge Clanton's thugs kill the marshal's brother. Thus, Wyatt Earp starts to chase the killers together with his friend Doc Holliday.
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After 17 years of marriage in American suburbia, Richard and Barbara Harmon step into the new world of divorce.
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An unhappy middle-aged banker agrees to a procedure that will fake his death and give him a completely new look and identity – one that comes with its own price.
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A wagon train heads for Denver with a cargo of whisky for the miners. Chaos ensues as the Temperance League, the US cavalry, the miners and the local Indians all try to take control of the valuable cargo.
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A US government germ warfare lab has had an accident. The first theory is that one of the germs has been released and killed several scientists. The big fear is that a more virulent strain, named The Satan Bug because all life can be killed off by it should it escape, may have been stolen.
Gen. Bernard "Barney" Rutkowski (uncredited)
A U.S. Army colonel alerts the president of a planned military coup against him.
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A U.S. Army colonel alerts the president of a planned military coup against him.
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The Nazis, exasperated at the number of escapes from their prison camps by a relatively small number of Allied prisoners, relocate them to a high-security 'escape-proof' camp to sit out the remainder of the war. Undaunted, the prisoners plan one of the most ambitious escape attempts of World War II. Based on a true story.
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Near the end of the Korean War, a platoon of U.S. soldiers is captured by communists and brainwashed. Following the war, the platoon is returned home, and Sergeant Raymond Shaw is lauded as a hero by the rest of his platoon. However, the platoon commander, Captain Bennett Marco, finds himself plagued by strange nightmares and soon races to uncover a terrible plot.
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Mike, Chip, and Larry are three lusty, brawling U. S. Cavalry sergeants stationed in Indian Territory in 1870.
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Captain Maddocks will never be promoted beyond Captain because of a mistake that he made in the past. Lt. McQuade is a green rookie who is now under the command of the tough Captain and he does not seem to be able to do anything right. Lt. McQuade also has trouble with Tracey, but it will be the renegade Indians that will test him and teach him the importance of following orders.
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An unhappily married woman engages in an affair with her husband's law partner.
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An oppressed Mexican peasant village hires seven gunfighters to help defend their homes.
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A U.S. military troop takes command of a band of Burmese guerillas during World War II.
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A young Venezuelan idealist flees his native land to escape a revolution. Hoping to find peace, he goes to the mountains and the forests of the Amazon. There he encounters Rima, the Bird Girl, an orphan living a life of nature, who is feared by a local jungle tribe.
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An alcoholic ex-football player drinks his days away, having failed to come to terms with his sexuality and his real feelings for his football buddy who died after an ambiguous accident. His wife is crucified by her desperation to make him desire her: but he resists the affections of his wife. His reunion with his father—who is dying of cancer—jogs a host of memories and revelations for both father and son.
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Middle-aged middle-manager Jim Fry, with the same company for fifteen years, is in a comfortable rut. But life becomes less predictable when he doesn't receive an invitation to an important luncheon being held by the new company president. Convinced that he's about to lose his job, Jim begins to mull over his limited prospects when his wife confirms that she's pregnant.
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After writing a tell-all book about her days in the dance troupe "Barry Nichols and Les Girls", Sybil Wren is sued for libeling her fellow dancer Angele. A Rashômon style narrative presents the story from three points of view where Sybil accuses Angele of having an affair with Barry, while Angele insists that it was actually Sybil who was having the affair. Finally, Barry gives his side of the story.
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As Kenya's Mau Mau uprising tears the country apart, former childhood friends Kimani (Sidney Poitier), a native, and Peter (Rock Hudson), a British colonist, find themselves on opposite sides of the struggle in this provocative drama. Though each is devoted to his cause, both wish for a more moderate path -- but their hopes for a peaceful resolution are thwarted by rage, colonial arrogance and escalating violence on both sides.
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Tom Lee is more interested in the arts than in sports, something that sits uneasily with both his father and his classmates. Tom's school housemaster Bill Reynolds even gives him a hard time for his "effeminate" interests. However, Bill's wife Laura sympathizes with Tom and tries to help him with her own overtures.
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Whenever it becomes known how good he is with guns, ex-gunman George and his wife Dora have to flee the town, in fear of all the gunmen who might want to challenge him. Unfortunately he again spills his secret when he's drunk. All citizens swear to keep his secret and support him to give up his guns forever -- but a boy tells the story to a gang of wanted criminals. Their leader threatens to burn down the whole town, if he doesn't duel him.
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Starship C57D travels to planet Altair 4 in search of the crew of spaceship "Bellerophon," a scientific expedition that has been missing for 20 years, only to find themselves unwelcome by the expedition's lone survivor and warned of destruction by an invisible force if they don't turn back immediately.
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A rich man (Glenn Ford) stuns his wife (Donna Reed) and town with a televised threat to his son's kidnapper.
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Richard Dadier is a teacher at North Manual High School, an inner-city school where many of the pupils frequently engage in anti-social behavior. Dadier makes various attempts to engage the students' interest in education, challenging both the school staff and the pupils. He is subjected to violence as well as duplicitous schemes.
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A newly wed couple, Tacy and Nicky, travel in a trailer for their honeymoon. The journey is a humorous one that could end up destroying their marriage.
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In the South Pacific islands, two brothers, one good and one bad, fight over the same girl and over a bag of pearls.
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After their orphanage burns down, a group of children are being transported west by train to Manitoba. All of them are available for adoption and at a stop at Scourie, Ontario little Patsy meets Victoria McChesney. Victoria and her husband Patrick have no children and she immediately decides to adopt the girl. The only condition imposed on them is that as Patsy has been baptized a Roman Catholic the Protestant McChesneys agree to raise her as a Catholic. Patsy is a well-behaved little girl whose only real problem is a school bully, also one of the orphans, who spreads stories that she set their orphanage on fire.
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Members of a circus troupe "adopt" Lili Daurier when she finds herself stranded in a strange town. The magician who first comes to her rescue already has romantic entanglements and thinks of her as a little girl. Who can she turn to but the puppets, singing to them her troubles, forgetting that there are puppeteers? A crowd gathers around Lili as she sings. The circus has a new act. She now has a job. Will she get her heart's desire?
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Rip-roaring big star, big budget semi-historical story about cattle baron Devereaux Burke, who is enlisted by an aging Andrew Jackson to dissuade Sam Houston from establishing Texas as a republic. Burke must fight state senator Thomas Craden, in the process winning the heart of Craden's newspaper-editor girlfriend Martha Ronda.
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The first female doctor in New York City comes up against prejudice from male counterparts who feel threatened by her skills. Eventually, though, they come to respect her and romance blossoms between her and the head doctor.
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Mary Herries has a passion for art and fine furniture. Even though she is getting on in years, she enjoys being around these priceless articles. One day she meets a strange young painter named Elcott, who uses his painting skill to enter into her life. Little does she expect that his only interest in Mary is to covet everything she has.
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In this sequel to Father of the Bride, newly married Kay Dunstan announces that she and her husband are going to have a baby, leaving her father having to come to grips with the fact that he will soon be a granddad.
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Biography of celebrated American jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes.
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When a young woman's skeletal remains turn up on a Massachusetts beach, Barnstable cop Peter Moralas teams with Boston police and uses forensics, with the help of a Harvard professor, to determine the woman's identity, how she died, and who killed her.
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Proud father Stanley Banks remembers the day his daughter, Kay, got married. Starting when she announces her engagement through to the wedding itself, we learn of all the surprises and disasters along the way.
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Dr. Michael Corday, a recent graduate of the Harvard Medical School, is the son of Dr. John Corday, an eminent New York City surgeon who has a tendency to continue to direct the lives of his grown children. The daughter, Fabienne, runs away from home, and Michael, after first following his father's advice of being callous to the point of cruelty toward patients, changes when he falls in love with a patient, marries her and sets up his practice on the lower East Side in New York.
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Based on the French literary classic, this drama presents author Gustave Flaubert narrating his tale of infidelity and narcissism. After marrying small-town doctor Charles Bovary, Emma becomes tired of her limited social status and begins to have affairs, first with the young Leon Dupuis and later with the wealthy Rodolphe Boulanger. Eventually, however, her self-involved behavior catches up with her.
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A young navy lieutenant is brought in as technical adviser on a song-dance-and-swim film being made by screen star Rosalind Reynolds. Having once done a number with her at a Forces show, the young lad somehow believes she should be his girl. Her boyfriend is just one of those disagreeing.
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A World War II pilot (Gene Kelly) comes home to a bride (Marie McDonald) who, spoiled by her father (Charles Winninger), now wants a divorce.
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After a rapid engagement, a dowdy daughter of a chemist weds an industrialist, knowing little of his family or past. He transforms her into an elegant society wife, but becomes enraged whenever she asks about Michael, his mysterious long-lost brother.
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A former reporter comes back home after serving in the army during World War I and finds that it's much more difficult to find work than he expected. Desperate, one day he crashes a wedding attended by many of the city's rich and powerful, meets a beautiful girl named Kay who turns out to be his ticket to meeting those rich and powerful people, and he soon manages to land a job on a newspaper. He gets caught up in the "make money at all costs" game but receives a rude awakening when the stock market crashes in 1929.
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A young couple's accident could make them rich, if they can evade a Nazi spy ring.
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Posing for a portrait, Dorian Gray talks with Lord Henry Wotton, who says that men should pursue their sensual longings, but laments that only the young get to do so. Taken with the idea, Dorian imagines a scenario in which the painting will age as he stays youthful. His wish comes true, and his boyish looks aid him as he indulges his every whim. But when a stunning revelation forces him to see what he's become, Dorian faces some very dangerous questions.
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A small-town butcher has problems coping with meat rationing.
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Comedy about a bandleader with hypnotic powers.
