Sidney J. Furie

1933-02-25 · Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Toronto-born Sidney J. Furie has enjoyed a distinguished career that has spanned over six decades. Having worked in every genre, Furie has directed films starring Marlon Brando, Frank Sinatra, Robert Redford, Diana Ross, Michael Caine, Peter O'Toole, Rodney Dangerfield, Barbara Hershey, Gene Hackman, Donald Sutherland, Laurence Olivier, and countless others. He is most known for the espionage classic The Ipcress File (1965), the landmark biopic Lady Sings the Blues (1972), the franchise-generating Iron Eagle (1986), the Scorsese-beloved horror saga The Entity (1982), and the Vietnam combat chronicle The Boys in Company C (1978), which later partly inspired Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket. His first two films, A Dangerous Age (1957) and A Cool Sound from Hell (1959), both independently financed, were two of the first English Canadian features ever made, produced before he emigrated to London in 1960. He became an important figure in the British New Wave, especially with The Boys (1962) and his realist drama The Leather Boys (1964), a critical darling that became a popular cult film.