Jonathan Demme, "Silence of the Lambs" and "Philadelphia" Director, Dead at 73

[Miles Archer]

Jonathan Demme, 'Silence of the Lambs' and 'Philadelphia' Director, Dead at 73



http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/news/jonathan-demme-philadelphia-director-dead-at-73-w478940

Jonathan Demme, the Oscar-winning director of Philadelphia and The Silence of the Lambs and the filmmaker who revolutionized concert movies with his 1984 Talking Heads movie Stop Making Sense, died Wednesday morning from complications due to heart disease and esophageal cancer. He was 73.

Demme's family confirmed the filmmaker's death to Indiewire.

After breaking into the industry as a writer and director for exploitation-movie king Roger Corman in the early 1970s, Demme made a name for himself with the 1980 drama Melvin and Howard, which chronicled the story of gas-station attendant Melvin Dummar's encounter with reclusive millionaire Howard Hughes that left the Utah resident as the beneficiary of Hughes' fortune.

Though he specialized in whimsical, humanistic comedy-dramas and live-performance films like Stop Making Sense and his Spalding Gray monologue movie Swimming to Cambodia (1987), it was his adaptation of Thomas Harris' serial-killer novel The Silence of the Lambs in 1991 that won him a Best Director Oscar, introduced the character of Hannibal Lecter into the popular consciousness and established horror movies as the equivalent of prestige films.

[joeybee12]

1. I didn't know he did Melvin and Howard

Sad. RIP

[ProfessorGAC]

2. "Stop Making Sense"

I think that's the best concert movie ever. Actually, none of those movies listed in the excerpt were anything but terrific.