20 Unheralded Geniuses Who Basically Invented Modern Movies

For many people, filmmaking begins and ends with the director. We call it a director's medium. It's their vision that guides the entire production and it's their name that gets the praise when a movie is good, and gets dragged through the mud when a movie stinks. While that's somewhat accurate, it's completely forgetting about the hundreds of artists, technicians, producers and craftsmen who bring equal skill to the table and without whom our favorite movies would be totally different.

Take Tim Burton, for example. His films have a "look," right? Edward Scissorhands, Pee-Wee's Great Adventure and Beetlejuice sort of exemplify Burton taking atomic age nostalgia and running it through the prism of Dr. Seuss on acid. Burton gets the credit for it, but all of those films (and a huge swath more) were art designed by the same guy, Rick Heinrichs. Without Heinrich's input, who knows what those movies would look like or if any of them would be as instantly memorable as they are now.

Alex Schimdt welcomes Michael Swaim and Matt Gourley (Superego, I Was There Too, James Bonding) to talk about people like Heinrichs. Unknown artists who have had as much of a guiding hand in modern cinema as your Spielbergs, Lucases and Scorseses, but who you've never heard of.

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Footnotes:

Article: Fast Company: How Ben Burtt Designed The Sounds of Star Wars

Article: io9: The Most Unforgettable Creations of HR Giger

Article: Telegraph: Ken Adam: The Man Who Drew the Cold War

Video: Alex McDowell Lecture on Design and Storytelling

Article: Wired: After Pee Wee and 'Tonight, Tonight,' Artist Wayne White is Reborn

Video: Roger Deakins Featurette

Article/Podcast: NPR: The Story Behind the Stunts: Remembering Hal Needham

Article: Vanity Fair: Meet the Most Powerful Woman in Hollywood

Article: Playbill: The Other Chenoweth: Casting Director Gives Stage Actors Their Film Careers

Video: Trailer for 'Casting By'

Article: Wired: Love Classic Star Trek? You Owe A Huge Debt To Gene L. Coon