Don Siegel Overview:

Director, Don Siegel, was born Donald Siegel on Oct 26, 1912 in Chicago, IL. Siegel died at the age of 78 on Apr 20, 1991 in Nipomo, CA .

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Terror in the Garden – ‘Invasion of the Body Snatchers’ (, 1956)

By Virginie Pronovost on Nov 8, 2025 From The Wonderful World of Cinema

When one thinks of 50s American cinema, a plethora of genres surface in our minds, but one took a particularly significant place during that decade and touched, directly and metaphorically, the socio-political context. I’m thinking of science fiction. If the genre evolved through the years pri... Read full article


reblog: ’s The Killers

By John Grant on Sep 10, 2019 From Noirish

***A tremendous account by J.D. Lafrance of ?s classic hardboiled movie. Wonders in the Dark By J.D. Lafrance The first feature-length adaptation of Ernest Hemingway?s short story, ?The Killers? was directed by Robert Siodmak in 1946 and featured a young Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner... Read full article


Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956, )

By Andrew Wickliffe on May 6, 2019 From The Stop Button

The longest continuous stretch of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is about fifteen minutes (the film runs eighty). Small California city doctor Kevin McCarthy and his long-lost lady friend Dana Wynter have just spent the night holed up in his office, hiding from their neighbors, who have all been rep... Read full article


Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956, )

By Andrew Wickliffe on May 6, 2019 From The Stop Button

The longest continuous stretch of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is about fifteen minutes (the film runs eighty). Small California city doctor Kevin McCarthy and his long-lost lady friend Dana Wynter have just spent the night holed up in his office, hiding from their neighbors, who have all been rep... Read full article


Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956, )

on May 6, 2019 From The Stop Button

The longest continuous stretch of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is about fifteen minutes (the film runs eighty). Small California city doctor Kevin McCarthy and his long-lost lady friend Dana Wynter have just spent the night holed up in his office, hiding from their neighbors, who have all been rep... Read full article


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Don Siegel Facts
He originally intended for Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) to end with the hero, Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) on the highway shouting to the motorists, "You're next! You're next!" but Allied Artists wanted a happier ending that assured the audience the hero's efforts had not been in vain. Siegel subsequently added the opening with Miles in the hospital recounting his story to the other two doctors, who find out at the end of the film that the pod people are real and contact the FBI.

He was asked by Richard Widmark to take over the direction of Death of a Gunfighter (1969) from original director Robert Totten. Widmark had Totten fired a week before filming was completed. Siegel finished the film, but refused credit because he felt the film was Totten's, and that he himself had contributed little. Totten refused to take credit because he had been fired. The Directors Guild allowed the two to use the pseudonym "Alan Smithee" for the first time in film history. Siegel writes about the incident in his autobiography, "A Siegel Film."

Siegel was the first director to be credited by the Director's Guild of America's universal pseudonym Alan Smithee, for Death of a Gunfighter (1969). Siegel wished to remain uncredited because he felt the film's star, Richard Widmark, ruined the picture by insisting on creative control that usurped Siegel's authority as director, and also because Widmark had fired original director Robert Totten, who completed most of the picture, and Siegel felt that if anyone should be credited for the film it should have been Totten and not him.

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