Writing and Film Career
In the late 1930s, Ruesch moved to the United States, publishing short fiction in popular magazines. In 1946, he returned to Naples to continue writing. His most popular novels include Top of the World (Harper, 1950), The Racer (Ballantine, 1953), and South of the Heart: A Novel of Modern Arabia (Coward-McCann, 1957).
In The New York Times Book Review review of Top of the World, Max Eastman called Mr. Ruesch "a born storyteller," and the novel is "a brilliant feat of poetic imagination." Ironically, Hans Ruesch had never seen an Eskimo. He based his story on the Oscar-winning film Eskimo (1933), directed by W.S. van Dyke.
Director Nicholas Ray wrote the screenplay for the movie of Ruesch’s novel, Top of the World. It debuted in Europe under the name, Les Dents du Diable. In 1961, it was released in the United States as The Savage Innocents. Anthony Quinn starred as Inuk, an Inuit Eskimo, who has had little contact with white men. At a trading post, Inuk accidentally kills a missionary, who insulted him by refusing the traditional Inuit (sexual) hospitality of wife-sharing. Inuk is pursued by a Javert-like police trooper, Peter O’Toole, in his first movie role. Mr. O'Toole refused to be credited with this movie, because his voice was dubbed. This movie was nominated for the Golden Palm award at the 1960 Cannes Film Festival.
Drawing on his experiences in European auto racing, Ruesch wrote the novel The Racer. It was released as the film The Racers (1955). Kirk Douglas starred as Gino Borgesa, a reckless Formula One driver, ensnared by speed, adrenaline, and a Hollywood 1950s romance. The movie was shot at several classic circuits, including Monaco, the Nürburgring, the Mille Miglia, and Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps, with the climactic race at Reims-Gueux.
Read more about this topic: Hans Ruesch
Famous quotes containing the words writing, film and/or career:
“He who should inspire and lead his race must be defended from travelling with the souls of other men, from living, breathing, reading and writing in the daily, time-worn yoke of their opinions.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“His education lay like a film of white oil on the black lake of his barbarian consciousness. For this reason, the things he said were hardly interesting at all. Only what he was.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“He was at a starting point which makes many a man’s career a fine subject for betting, if there were any gentlemen given to that amusement who could appreciate the complicated probabilities of an arduous purpose, with all the possible thwartings and furtherings of circumstance, all the niceties of inward balance, by which a man swings and makes his point or else is carried headlong.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)