Elia Kazan Summary

Elia Kazan (born 1909) is known as the preeminent director of works by Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams. Kazan emerged as the leading exponent of psychological realism via his film and stage produ... Read more

Critical Essay by Bosley Crowther The warm and compassionate story of a slum-pent family in Brooklyn's Williamsburg which was told with such rich and genuine feeling in "A Tree Grows in... Read more

Critical Essay by FranÇois Truffaut All great filmmakers aspire to be free from the constraints of drama; they dream of making a film without progression, without psychology, in which the spec... Read more

Critical Essay by Ernest Callenbach Kazan is a director who gets powerful performances from his actors…. Where he has had strong scripts also, as in Streetcar Named Desire, the under-rated Eas... Read more

Critical Essay by Jim Kitses Questions of personal conscience, individual freedom and social responsibility have often supplied Kazan with his material; in this sense Kazan can be said to have become... Read more

Critical Essay by Pauline Kael Monroe Stahr, the young hero of Scott Fitzgerald's The Last Tycoon, is meant to represent the last of a breed; he's an individualistic artist-businessman ... Read more

Critical Essay by Gordon Gow Gentle by comparison with the thrusting mainstream of current cinema, Elia Kazan's film of The Last Tycoon evokes a romanticism which persists and glows against th... Read more

Critical Essay by Karel Reisz That even the most talented and successful directors are, with varying frequency, obliged to accept subjects in which they can have little real interest is, it seems, pa... Read more