Ronald Neame

Ronald Neame CBE, BSC (23 April 1911 – 16 June 2010) was an English filmmaker. Beginning his career as a cinematographer, for his work on the British war film One of Our Aircraft Is Missing he received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. During a partnership with director David Lean, he produced Brief Encounter (1945), Great Expectations (1946), and Oliver Twist (1948), receiving two nominations for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Neame then moved into directing, and some notable films included, The Man Who Never Was (1956), which chronicled Operation Mincemeat, a British WWII deception operation, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969), starring Maggie Smith in an Academy Award–winning title role, and the action-adventure disaster film The Poseidon Adventure (1972). He also directed I Could Go On Singing (1963), Judy Garland's last film, and Scrooge (1970), starring Albert Finney.

For his contributions to the film industry, in 1996 Neame was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) and received two BAFTA Awards, including the BAFTA Fellowship, BAFTA's highest honour.

Life and career Early years Born in Hendon, London, Neame was the son of photographer Elwin Neame and actress Ivy Close. He studied at University College School and Hurstpierpoint College. His father died in 1923, and Neame took a job with the Anglo-Persian Oil Company as an office boy. Later, through his mother's contacts in the British film industry, Neame started at Elstree Studios as a messenger boy.

He was fortunate enough to be hired as an assistant cameraman on Blackmail (1929), the first British talkie, directed by a young Alfred Hitchcock. Neame's own career as a cinematographer began with the musical comedy Happy (1933), and he continued to develop his skills in various "quota quickies" films for several years.

His credits as cinematographer include Major Barbara (1941), In Which We Serve (1942), and One of Our Aircraft Is Missing. At the 15th Academy Awards, In Which We Serve won an Academy Honorary Award, and Neame was nominated for an Best Special Effects for his camerawork on One of Our Aircraft Is Missing.

As producer and screenwriter

Following the success of In Which We Serve, director David Lean, associate producer Anthony Havelock-Allan, and cinematographer Neame formed a new production company together, Cineguild. Though the company only produced nine films between 1944 and 1950, it launched the directing careers of Lean and Neame and the producing career of Havelock-Allan.

The trio's first three films were adaptations of Coward's works: This Happy Breed, Blithe Spirit, and Brief Encounter. All three films were Directed by Lean, shot by Neame, produced by Havelock-Allan, and co-written from all three. Brief Encounter, which was adapted from Coward's one-act play Still Life, earned all three partners an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay nomination.

Following their success adapting Coward, the trio decided to adapt the works of Charles Dickens. Their screenplay for their first adaptation, Great Expectations, earned the trio another Academy Award nomination. The film also marked an important shift in Neame's career, as it was his first film on which he was not cinematographer. Instead, he served as a producer alongside Havelock-Allan. The next year, he made his directorial debut with Take My Life, again produced by Havelock-Allan.

Cineguild's next film, Oliver Twist, was the beginning of the end for the production company. The film received criticism for antisemitism as a result of Alec Guinness' portrayal of Fagin. It was Havelock-Allan's last film with the company. Neame produced one more film for Cineguild, Lean's The Passionate Friends, before leaving to write, produce, and direct Golden Salamander. Lean's next film, Madeleine, was Cineguild's last, and the only Cineguild production without Neame or Havelock-Allan.

Following Cineguild's dissolution, Neame produced The Magic Box (1951), a screen biography directed by John Boulting about the life of British camera inventor William Friese-Greene, which was the film project for the Festival of Britain.

As director Neame made his directorial debut under the Cineguild banner, with Take My Life (1947), which was released by British producer J. Arthur Rank's General Film Distributors in the United Kingdom in 1947 and by Rank's Eagle-Lion Films in the United States in 1949. Neame began a transition to the American film industry at the suggestion of Rank, who asked him to study the Hollywood production system.

He worked again with Alec Guinness (whom he had worked with on Great Expectations and Oliver Twist), this time as director, in three films: The Card (1952), The Horse's Mouth (1958), and Tunes of Glory (1960). Neame described Tunes of Glory as "the film I am proudest of". The break required two surgical procedures from which Neame never recovered.

In an interview in 2006, he jokingly stated, "When people ask me about the secret to my longevity, I say the honest answer is two large vodkas at lunchtime and three large scotches in the evening. All my doctors have said to me, 'Ronnie, if you would drink less, you'd live a lot longer.' But, they're all dead, and I'm still here at 95."

Filmography

Producer only

Director of photography only