Léonide Moguy

Léonide Moguy 14 July 1899 21 April 1976 was a Ukrainian French and Italian film director screenwriter and film editor Moguy was born Leonid Mohylevskyi Леонід Могилевський in Odesa Russian Empire in 1899 in a Jewish family He lived in Soviet Ukraine until 1929 in the United States in the 1940s and in Italy from 1949 until his death He was active in film between 1927 and 1961 His work has influenced American director Quentin Tarantino who discovered him while writing the script for Inglourious Basterds and named a character after him in Django Unchained Mohylevskyi was born in Odesa in a family of a merchandise worker During World War I he was a soldier of the 51st Lithuanian infantry regiment of the Imperial Russian Army in Simferopol After the war he was a medical student and worked parttime at the film studio of Dmytro Kharytonov who came from Moscow to Odesa Mohylevskyi did not become a doctor however graduating from Odesa Institute of National Economy in 1924 he became a lawyer Soon he was invited to work as a VUFKU legal advisor at Odesa Film Studio Mohylevskyi showed interest not only in the letter of the law but also in laws and principles of film editing as he assisted the director Mykola Saltykov In 1927 Mohylevskyi was the head of the Newsreel Department VUFKU was a colleague of Dziga Vertov and Mikhail Kaufman Together with Oleksandr Dovzhenko he initiated the creation of the first library of Ukrainian films The department headed by Mohylevskyi began to issue Kinotyzhden and later Kinozhurnal VUFKU a collection of fresh newsreels timely and urgent that became nearly the only source of news at that time Then Mohylevskyi made two mashup films How It Was 1927 and Documents of the Era 1928 in collaboration with the director Ya Habovych The latter was the most popular VUFKU mashup film based on 150000 meters of newsreels dating back to 19171922 Leonid Mohylevskyi used archive materials some positive fragments and prerevolutionary rubbish stored in VUFKU archives or bought from other film studios or private persons as the basis for his film An active member of the society Friends of Soviet Cinema Mohylevskyi edited 16 short films for them such as Now and Peak ticket Піковий квиток filmed by amateur Experimental Film Studio headed by Hlib Zatvornytskyi He moved to France and developed a reputation as a play doctor of films He started directing and had a hit with 40 Little Mothers Moguy moved to Hollywood in 1940 He made the film The Night is Ending 1943 at 20th Century Fox He stayed at Fox to make Paris After Dark then went to RKO to make Action in Arabia He was meant to follow Action in Arabia with Experiment Perilous with Paul Henreid at RKO but the film was not made Instead he made Whistle Stop for United Artists I didnt do the pictures I wanted to he later said of this time Moguy returned to France where he made Bethsabee 1947 In 1947 he announced he would direct the first BelgianHollywood co production New Yorks Origin a story of the Belgian refugees who established New York The film was not made Source Article Léonide Moguy from Wikipedia in English licensed under CCBYSA 30