Detective Leonard Makes an Entrance

Closed Circuit Reverse Osmosis

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During and after the convention, several suspicious fires were set in Bakersfield. During March , another series of arsons were committed along the California coast in close conjunction with a conference of arson investigators in Pacific Grove, California. In late and early , another series of arson fires broke out in southern California, this time in and around the Los Angeles metropolitan area.

The flier described the modus operandi of the suspected serial arsonist in the Los Angeles area. Scott Baker of the California State Fire Marshal's Office was at that meeting and told Campuzanno about the series of arsons investigated by Casey and about Casey's suspicions that the perpetrator was an arson investigator from the Los Angeles area.

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Consequently, Campuzanno and two of his colleagues met with Casey, obtained a copy of the fingerprint that Casey had recovered, and this time matched it to Orr on April 17, with the help of improved fingerprint technology. Orr was then investigated and watched for several months. A federal grand jury handed down an indictment, and after Orr was present at a suspicious fire [19] he was arrested December 4.

On July 31, , a jury in a federal court convicted Orr of three counts of arson in a five count indictment, and the judge in that case sentenced Orr to three consecutive terms of ten years in prison. On June 25, , a jury in a California state court convicted Orr of four counts of first-degree murder from the hardware store fire with special circumstances in a 25 count indictment, deadlocking on only one of the 25 counts, which was subsequently dismissed at the request of the prosecution.

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Orr is currently serving his life sentence at California State Prison, Centinela. Some arson investigators and an FBI criminal profiler have deemed Orr to be possibly one of the worst American serial arsonists of the twentieth century.

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Orr's story was chronicled by bestselling true crime author Joseph Wambaugh in a book titled Fire Lover. The film's title is a reference to Orr's novel, which tells the story of a fireman who is also a serial arsonist. Arson investigators believe the book chronicles real acts of arson due to similarities with fires they believe Orr himself had set.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

John Leonard Orr

For other people named John Orr, see John Orr disambiguation. Retrieved 15 March Theoretical and Practical Issues in Behavioral Profiling. The Pillow Pyro - Casefile: But Nora finds it exciting, and soon Nick is tracking down Wynant the Thin Man of the title who proves to be a murder victim. This brings him into contact with all sorts of unsavory characters who eventually wind up at the Charles's Christmas party where the guilty party is unmasked. James Wong Howe Editing: Cedric Gibbons Original Music: What makes the film so entertaining is not the unraveling of the murder but the movie's central relationship of Nora and Nick Charles, one that redefined the screen depiction of marriage.

It also helped to set the tone and style of a new, then-emerging Hollywood genre - the screwball comedy. When he learned that the studio had the rights to Hammett's novel, The Thin Man , Van Dyke thought the story of private eye Nick Charles and his wife Nora would make a terrific film. He also knew exactly who should play Nick and Nora.

The two had developed a bantering friendship, and their between-the-scenes repartee was charming and lighthearted. That was exactly what The Thin Man needed.

MGM executives didn't agree. Both actors came with a lot of baggage, and studio bosses couldn't see them as the glamorous detective duo. In the end Van Dyke had his way, and proved that he knew what he was doing. He instructed the husband-and-wife screenwriting team of Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich to play up Nick and Nora's affectionate banter in their script for The Thin Man , and to make the mystery secondary.

That was easy enough for the Hacketts, whose own marriage and personal style was very Nick-and-Nora. And for Powell and Loy, it was a delight to play, from their first appearance in the film, with Nick instructing a bartender on the finer points of shaking a martini, and Nora making a grand comic entrance by falling on her face. The Thin Man was shot on a "B"-movie budget, very quickly -- accounts vary between 12 and 18 days. Their on-screen chemistry was so dynamic that the public came to believe the two were married in real life. And thanks to Van Dyke's direction and the witty script, Powell and Loy created something fresh and new for the screen, a married couple who enjoy each other's company, unfettered by mundane responsibility or children although, regrettably, they were saddled with a son later in the series.

Prior to this, marriage in movies was usually depicted in one of two ways: But Nick and Nora are already married at the start. They are young, attractive and healthy; rich enough not to worry about money Nick is apparently quite content to live off his wife's wealth ; and unsaddled by any charge except their dog. The alcohol also flows abundantly whenever Nick and Nora are together - it had only been two years since Prohibition - but it is never presented as a problem or something sinful but simply as the fuel for the wacky fun and snappy dialogue that transpires during the movie.

Murder By Death () -- (Movie Clip) Good God, What An Entrance!

Certainly it's the little details Van Dyke and company create around Nick and Nora's domestic life that stick in the memory. Take the unconventional Christmas setting, Nora wrapped in a "stifling" fur coat too pretty to shed, Nick reclined on the couch shooting ornaments off the tree with a pop gun. Or watch them walking their dog down the street on Christmas Day. As Nick talks to the police about his current case, the couple pass by trees, light poles, fire hydrants, all barely noticed. Their dog, Asta, is out of frame, the only evidence of him is the leash Nora is holding.

But as the mystery plot is discussed, what we end up watching is the way the Charles's forward gait is repeatedly interrupted, without comment or notice, by Asta stopping and pulling back on the leash. Nothing is made of it; certainly there's nothing inherently interesting about a dog doing his daily business. But this sort of causal off-handed detail about the couple's life is the hallmark of what a movie can do better than any other artistic medium.

Audiences adored The Thin Man , and so did critics. It was a huge hit, and turned around the careers of Powell and Loy. The Thin Man and its sequels also created another star - "Asta," the Charles's wire-haired terrier. It was a breed that hadn't been particularly popular in this country, but the "Thin Man" films changed all that, creating a national craze for wire-haired terriers.

Asta was played by several dogs, but Myrna Loy later recalled that she and Powell were never allowed to make friends with any of them, because the dogs' trainer didn't want to break their concentration. In fact, Loy claimed that the first Asta, whose real name was "Skippy," bit her, "so our relationship was hardly idyllic. The huge success of The Thin Man led to five sequels over the years, all of them starring Powell and Loy as the Charleses: In addition to their appearances in the other Thin Man films, Powell and Loy proved to be such a popular and natural screen couple that they were paired in seven other movies: The two had also appeared together previously in Manhattan Melodrama The Thin Man spawned a number of other mystery-comedy movies featuring a sleuth either amateur or professional and his wife or girlfriend, who insinuates herself into his cases.

Among the better known are The Ex-Mrs. North , which also became a TV series in the s. The Thin Man , along with It Happened One Night and Twentieth Century , is credited with setting the style and tone for what would become one of the most popular Hollywood genres for a time, the screwball comedy. Skippy the wire-haired terrier made such an indelible impression as the Charles's dog Asta that he became the best-known dog in the country, second only to President Franklin Roosevelt's Scottish terrier Fala. He also spawned a craze for the breed leading to overbreeding by "puppy mills" cranking them out to meet demand.

The Thin Man skyrocketed Loy and Powell into the upper echelons of box office stars. Contrary to popular perception, the "Thin Man" of the title does not refer to William Powell's character but to the victim who disappears early on in the film. Because of the box office success of the picture, however, the name was kept throughout the series even though the character died in the first one. In the s, playwright Lillian Hellman, who had a long relationship with Dashiell Hammett, said the character of Nora Charles was based on her.

Van Dyke started as a child actor in vaudeville and worked as a gold miner, lumberjack, railroad laborer and mercenary soldier before landing in the motion picture business. One of Van Dyke's first jobs in film was assistant director to D. Griffith on Intolerance He perfected his craft in the silent years on quickie programmers and now-forgotten features, earning a reputation as a loyal and efficient house director who could bring anything in on time and under budget.

A strict Christian Scientist, Van Dyke refused medical intervention when suffering from cancer. Unable to cope with the pain and illness further, he took his own life in at the age of Although many critics and directors looked down on "One-Take" Van Dyke during his day, scorning the speed and impersonality with which he cranked out projects, many of his films were huge hits. Perhaps carelessness and haste are precisely the qualities responsible for the breezy charm of Trader Horn , Tarzan, the Ape Man Myrna Loy was cast in Van Dyke's production of Manhattan Melodrama , and her first scene required her to run out of a building, through a crowd and jump into a car.

Leonard Read

The scene was shot on a back lot at night, and Van Dyke, ever the speedy director, didn't take the time to introduce Loy to the man she'd be doing the scene with. According to Loy, when Van Dyke called "action," she jumped into the car and "landed smack on William Powell's lap. He looked up nonchalantly: They also wrote the screenplay for the holiday classic It's a Wonderful Life They worked with director Van Dyke a total of seven times. The film's cinematographer, James Wong Howe, was one of the few Asians to make a major career in Hollywood, pictures from until his last, Funny Lady A master of black-and-white cinematography, he received nine Academy Award nominations and won for The Rose Tattoo and Hud Madame, I'm afraid you shall take the dog out.

It's all right, Leo. And, uh, my wife. Well, you might have mentioned me first on the billing. This will make six martinis. Will you bring me five more martinis, Leo? And line them up right here. What are you drinking? Oh, that's a mistake. But it's so pretty. Say, listen, is he working on a case? A case of scotch.

Pitch in and help him. I hope I don't like it. Well you'll have to keep them anyway. Man at the aquarium said he wouldn't take them back. Would you mind putting that gun away? My wife doesn't mind, but I'm very timid. I was shot twice in the Tribune. I read that you were shot five times in the tabloids.

He didn't come anywhere near my tabloids. How'd you like Grant's Tomb? I'm having a copy made for you. Waiter, will you serve the nuts? I mean, will you serve the guests the nuts.

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