Kenneth Cooper Annakin was born on
August 10, 1914 in Beverly, Yorkshire, England. A former salesman and
journalist, Ken Annakin got into the film industry making documentary shorts.
His feature debut was, “Holiday Camp” (1947). He worked steadily thereafter,
mainly in light comedies. One of his more atypical films was the dark thriller “Across
the Bridge” (1957), based on a Graham Greene story. It boasted an acclaimed
performance by Rod Steiger as the villain and a distinct "noir" feel
to it, unlike anything Annakin had done before (or, for that matter, since).
In the 1960s he was one of several
British directors--e.g., Guy Green, John Guillermin--who specialized in turning
out all-star, splashy, big-budget European/American co-productions, shot on the
Continent. He was one of the directors of the epic World War II spectacle “The
Longest Day” (1962) and went solo on “Battle of the Bulge” (1965), both of
which were financial--if not exactly critical--successes. He also directed “Those
Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines” (1965), his
only euro-western was “Call of the Wild” (1972) with Charlton Heston. which was less successful. His final film
was “Genghis Khan: The Story of a Lifetime” (2010), a film that was started in
1992 under Annakin's direction but never completed. In 2009 it was restarted
again and Annakin was hired to assemble the existing footage for release, but
died before completing the job. Italian director Antonio Margheriti finished up
and the film was released in 2010.
Annakin died on April 22, 2009 in
Beverly Hills, California.
Today we remember Ken Annakin on what
would have been his 100th birthday.
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