Celebrity Biographies
Roy Ward Baker
Roy Ward Baker was a director highly appreciated, especially by horror fans, as he directed several of the best films from the specialized production company Hammer. He was also the author of The Last Night of the Titanic , a reconstruction of the tragedy of the famous ocean liner, from which James Cameron drank for his version. The filmmaker died in London at the age of 93, on October 5, 2010.
Roy Horace Baker was born in the British capital on December 19, 1916. His father, a market fishmonger, took him when he was 12 years old to the opening of a Leicester Square cinema. “I froze in my seat. I decided that as soon as I finished school I would dedicate myself to the cinema”, recalled the director.
He started at the bottom, at the production company Gainsborough Pictures. He became an assistant to Alfred Hitchcock , in Alarm on the Express . During World War II he served in the Army Film Unit, in charge of shooting films for the training of soldiers. One of his superiors was Eric Ambler , novelist and screenplay writer, who would later write The October Man for him , a Hitchcock-style intrigue film starring John Mills , which he would repeat under his orders in several titles, such as Morning Departure and The Singer . not the Song .
In the 50s, the filmmaker who was signed by Roy Baker at the time – he added the “Ward” when he specialized in horror – alternated shooting in his native country with Hollywood productions. There he was responsible for Niebla en la alma , with Marilyn Monroe , Anne Bancroft and Richard Widmark , and Night Without Sleep , with Linda Darnell .
In 1958 he shot The Last Night of the Titanic , a reconstruction of the sinking of the Titanic, with a script by his old friend Ambler. The film was produced by the Rank Organization, but despite the success of the film, they refused to finance Baker, in his project to adapt the novel Saturday Night and Sunday Morning , by Alan Sillitoe . Since then he has moved away from the big screen for a bit and devoted himself to television episodes of series such as The Avengers or The Saint .
He returned to the cinema specializing in horror, especially in works for the production company Hammer, for which he shot What Happened Then? (1967), third and excellent installment of the Professor Quatermass series. He was also responsible for Moon zero two and Dr. Jekyll and his sister Hyde From him. In addition, he directed one of the company’s all-star franchise installments, The Scars of Dracula , with Christopher Lee . With the other great actor of the Hammer company, Peter Cushing , he filmed Haven in Grim and the successful Kung Fu vs. the Seven Golden Vampires., which combined the fashion of vampires with that of oriental martial arts and action movies.
His last job was The Monster Club , with another of the great horror actors, Vincent Price . It was a tape of episodes shot for Amicus, another British production company specializing in horror, which was not up to the rest of his filmography.