Calendar: October 7

A Year: Day to Day Men: 7th of October

Light Green Shirt

October 7, 1971 was the date of the New York City and Los Angeles premieres of “The French Connection”.

“The French Connection” is a 1971 American crime thriller film directed by William Friedkin, who began his career in documentaries and is closely identified with the New Hollywood movement of the 1970s. The screenplay by Ernest Tidyman is based on Robin Moore’s non-fiction book of the same name. It tells the story of New York Police Department detectives in pursuit of a wealthy French heroin smuggler.

William Friedkin noted that the film’s documentary style realism was the result of his having seen the French film “Z’, a political thriller film. He credits his decision to direct “The French Connection” to director Howard Hawks who thought Friedkin’s previous films were bad and recommended that Friedkin make a movie with a better chase scene than any previous films.

The casting of “The French Connection” ultimately was one of the film’s greatest strengths; however Friedkin had problems with casting choices from the start. He was strongly opposed to the choice of Gene Hackman for the lead; he was considering Paul Newman, Jimmy Breslin, and Charles Bronson, among others. For different reasons these choices were not available, so Friedkin chose Hackman for the role of Detective Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle..

The choice of the French heroin smuggler was the result of a mistaken identity. Friedkin was impressed with the performance of Francisco Rabal in the film “Belle de Jour”; but he could not remember the actor’s name, only thatt the actor was Spanish. The casting director contacted another Spanish actor named Fernando Rey for the role. After Francisco Rabal was finally contacted, Friedkin discovered that the actor spoke neither French nor English; so Fernando Rey was given the role of Alain Charnier.

“The French Connection” contains one of the greatest car chase sequences in film history. The detective Popeye played by Hackman commandeers a civilian’s car and frantically chases an elevated train, on which a hitman is attempting to escape. Some of the chase scenes were filmed from a bumper mount camera on the car, resulting in a low-angle view of the streets racing by. The speed of the camera was set a 18 frames per second to enhance the sense of the car’s speed. Stunt drivers were supposed to barely miss the speeding chase car, but accidental collisions occurred and were left in the final film.

“The French Connection” was the first R-rated movie to win an Academy Award for Best Picture since the rating system started. It also won Best Actor for Gene Hackman, Best Diredtor for William Friedkin, Best Film Editing, and Best Adapted Screenplay. Ernest Tidyman won for his screenplay a Writers Guild of America Award, a Golden Globe nomination, and won an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for his screenplay.

Calendar: September 7

A Year: Day to Day Men: 7th of September

Refrigerator Door Open

September 7, 1937 was the birthdate of American actor John Phillip Law.

John Phillip Law moved to New York after graduating from the University of Hawaii and studied with Elia Kazan’s Lincoln Center Repertory Theater. While there he had a small role in the 1962 comedy “Come on Strong”. Looking for another way to enter the movie business, Law moved to Italy, where he acted in several films. Director Norman Jewison, seeing one of these films, cast Law in the role of a young Soviet sailor in the 1966 comedy film “The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming”.

Law next costarred with Michael Caine and Jane Fonda in the 1967 American drama “Hurry Sundown” produced and directed by Otto Preminger. Law then returned to Europe playing the lead in two films: “Spaghetti Western, Death Rides a Horse” and “Danger: Diebolik”, a crime action film based on the Italian comic book series “Diabolik”. Law’s best known role was his 1968 appearance in Roger Vadim’s comic book-based science fiction movie “Barbarella” , cast in the now famous role of Pygar, the blind angel who had lost the will to fly.

John Phillip Law costarred with Rod Steiger in the 1968 drama film “The Sergeant” directed by John Flynn. Law played Private First Class Swanson, the object of Steiger’s character’s, Sergeant Callan, secret sexual attraction. This film differs from the original book, becoming the Sargeant’s self-discovery instead of Private Swanson as was written. “The Sergeant” ends in defeat and suicide that once were so obligatory in popular, homosexual literature and films like “The Children’s Hour” and “The City and the Pillar”.

In 1971, Law co-starred in Roger Corman’s film “Richthofen and Brown, playing Manfred von Richthofen opposite actor Don Stoud’s Roy Brown. He was trained by Canadian pilot Lynn Garrison in the basics of flying to land and take off, making some of the movie footage more realistic. From the 1970s until the fall of 2003, the mult-lingual Law traveled and worked abroad appearing in films and television series.

John Phillip Law was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in December of 2007. He died five months later at his home in Los Angeles. Law’s body was cremated and his ashes were scattered at sea.

Some of John Phillip Law’s movies have become cult classics, including “The Love Machine”, “The Golden Voyage of Sinbad” and the World War ii drama “Attack Force Z”. Mystery Science Theater included in its series two of Law’s films: “Space Mutiny” and “Danger” Diabolik”.

Calendar: July 7

A Year: Day to Day Men: 7th of July

Casual Attitude

July 7, 1880 was the birthdate of the American inventor Otto Frederick Rohwedder.

Otto Rohwedder was born in Davenport, Iowa, the son of Claus and Elizabeth Rohwedder, of ethnic German descent. He attended the public schools in Davenport, eventually becoming an apprentice fo a jeweler to learn a trade. He continued his studies, graduating with a degree in optics from the Northern Illinois College of Ophthalmology and Otology in Chicago.

Otto Rohwedder became successful in his career as a jeweler, expanding his business to three locations in Saint Joseph, Missouri, where he had settled with his wife and two children. He used his experience with watches to invent new machines in his spare time. Convinced that he could develop a machine that would slice bread, Rohwedder sold his jewelry stores to fund his efforts. In 1917 a fire broke out in his factory, destroying his prototype and his blueprints. Forced to find new funding for his project, it took several more years before he could bring his machine to market.

In 1927 Otto Rohwedder successfully designed a machine that not only sliced the bread but wrapped it afterwards. He applied for patents and sold the first machine to Frank Bench of the Chillicothe Baking Company in Chillicothe, Missouri, in 1928. The first loaf of automatically sliced bread sold commercially on July 7, 1928, on Rhowedder’s forty-eighth birthday. Sales of the machine to other bakeries increased and sliced bread became available across the country.

In 1930 the Continental Baking Company of New York City introduced their “Wonder Bread” as a sliced bread. Other major companies saw the success of the marketing and followed with their own sliced products. The availability of standardized slices boosted the sales of the 1926 invention, the automatic pop-up toaster. For the first time, American bakeries in the year 1933 sold more sliced than unsliced bread loaves.

Otto Rohwedder was granted seven patents for his bread slicing and handling machines between the years 1927 to 1936. In 1933, he sold his patent rights to the Micro-Westco Company of Bettendorf, Iowa, and joined the company. He became vice-president and sales manager of the Rohwedder Bakery Machine division. His original bread-slicing machine is in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC.