"I would not think of arguing with your interpretation or offering another, as I have always felt that it is always the best policy to let the film speak for itself." As one of the most acclaimed and influential film directors of the post-war era, Stanley Kubrick enjoyed a unique reputation and position among the directors of his time. He had a brilliant career with relatively few films. An outsider, he worked beyond the confines of Hollywood, which he disliked, maintaining complete control of his projects and making films according to his own ideas and time constraints. For him, cinema was an art form and, unlike Hollywood, not a business. Working in a wide range of styles, from dark comedy to horror, crime to drama, Kubrick was an enigma, living and creating in almost total isolation, far from the watchful eye of the media. His films reflected his obsessive nature, perfectionist masterpieces that remain among the most thoughtful and visionary films ever made. Stanley Kubrick was born on July 26, 1928 in the Bronx. In 1942, while still in high school, he initially showed an interest in photography, which was introduced to him by his father2. Stanley's father, Jacques Kubrick, spent his life as a doctor. His first brush with fame came when Look magazine published one of his first photographs of a newspaper salesman overwhelmed by headlines announcing the death of President Roosevelt. Shortly thereafter, Kubrick began working at Look magazine as an apprentice photographer. In 1946 he became a reporter for the magazine and traveled throughout the United States and Europe. While a student at Columbia University, Kubrick became interested in cinema and regularly attended screenings at the Museum of Modern Art. To supplement his income, he played chess for money in Greenwich Village. In 1951, at the age of twenty, Kubrick and a school friend, Alfred Singer, used their life savings to finance his first film, Day of the Fight, a sixteen-minute documentary. about the boxer Walter Cartier. This short film was later purchased by RKO for the This Is America series and screened in theaters in New York. Encouraged by his success, Kubrick left his job at Look and devoted himself to filmmaking full time. Soon, RKO assigned him to direct a short film for the Pathe Screenliner documentary series. The title, Flying Padre, was a nine-minute film... middle of the paper... range that almost all of his films were successful among moviegoers but received less than favorable reviews from critics. Stanley Kubrick died on March 7, 1999, in his sleep, of a heart attack, just five days after Warner Brothers' final cut, without ever seeing the film in theaters. I personally agree that he followed his cinematic dreams with relentless passion, regardless of time, money or commercial success. His perfectionist traits were as well known as his solitary and highly private life. He left us all one of cinema's most inspiring, diverse and overall brilliant legacies. In the eyes of many viewers his films and he himself will never be forgotten.8 References: Ankeny, Jason. Stanley Kubrick Biography. Yahoo! Movies. May 5, 2001. http://movies.yahoo.com/shop.htmCiment, Michel. Kubrick and the fanatic. Trans. Gilbert Adair. Growingfamily.com network. April 30, 2001. http://www.growingfamily.com network/kubrick263kf.htm“Stanley Kubrick Biography.” Cosmopolis. 23 April 2001 http://www.cosmoplis.ch/english/cosmozero/kubrick.htm“Stanley Kubrick and his films”. Essortment.com. April 23, 2001. http://kyky.essortment.com/stanelykubric_rrvd.htm