Reginald Mills - Beyond The Archers

Beyond The Archers

Mills edited seven films with Joseph Losey, a promising American director who came to Britain in the early 1950s after being blacklisted in the US. Mills edited Losey's first British film, The Sleeping Tiger (1954). Perhaps the most successful film of their collaboration was The Servant (1963), which is considered to be a turning point in Losey's career. The film had a screenplay by playwright Harold Pinter; it was the first of three "extraordinary" films Losey did with Pinter. Mills had a fairly public artistic dispute with Pinter about the editing of The Servant that likely led to the end of Mills' collaboration with Losey. Losey and Mills did make one final film together (King & Country - 1964) that did not involve Pinter. Reginald Beck, who had edited two films with Losey prior to 1964, subsequently became Losey's principal editor in a "great partnership" that extended to 1985.

Other prominent credits from the 50s and 60s were The Spanish Gardener (directed by Philip Leacock - 1956) and Joseph Strick's film Ulysses (1967), which adapted James Joyce's celebrated 1922 novel. Interviewing Strick in 2009, Henry K. Miller wrote, "the long montage sequence that accompanies Molly is a tour de force. Mills 'added something to the picture,' says Strick, describing a quick-cut counterpoint to Molly's fantasy about picking up a sailor."

Mills directed the 1971 ballet film The Tales of Beatrix Potter; the film, which is without dialogue, weaves dances choreographed by Sir Frederick Ashton and performed by the members of the Royal Ballet. The film received some favorable reviews, and has been released to DVD (2004) and to Blu-ray (2011), the latter a restored version celebrating the film's 40th anniversary. Mills subsequently produced the documentary Franco Zeffirelli: A Florentine Artist (1973) based on the filming of Zeffirelli's Brother Sun, Sister Moon; the documentary was not included in the 2004 DVD release of the film.

He received BAFTA nominations for his editing of two films with director Franco Zeffirelli: Romeo and Juliet (1968) and Jesus of Nazareth (1977). Mills was the supervising editor for Zeffirelli's Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972). Mills last credit was as consulting editor on still another Zeffirellli picture, The Champ (1979).