André De Toth

The son of a Hungarian military officer, Andre De Toth studied law at the University of Budapest. His academic career was shelved when De Toth became involved with the Hungarian film industry, where he served in several artistic and technical capacities before graduating to director in 1938. After completing five features in the space of one year, he was brought to England by fellow Hungarian Alexander Korda, who hired DeToth as second unit director on The Thief of Baghdad (1940). A full-fledged Hollywood director by 1943, DeToth specialized in westerns and adventure films; one of these, Slattery's Hurricane (1949), co-starred the director's then-wife Veronica Lake, whose fame was diminishing even as her husband's was descending. DeToth is best known for his brace of 3-D films of the 1950s, House of Wax (1953) and The Stranger Wore a Gun (1953); the fact that DeToth had lost one eye did not diminish his lifelong fascination with stereoscopic photography, nor his expertise in this field. In 1950, DeToth was nominated for an Oscar for his work on the screenplay of The Gunfighter (1950). Though his last official directorial credit was for 1970's El Condor, DeToth made several significant (and uncredited) contributions to the 1978 big-budgeter Superman: The Movie. In 1994, Andre De Toth published Fragments a memoir.

~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide