Biography
Employed at RKO studios from 1931 through the 1950s, this distinguished and hard-working cinematographer was involved in 91 major film projects and two extended television series. In 1931, he was hired as second cameraman and operator on nine projects. In 1936, Wild shot his first feature, Wallace Fox's sports drama
Racing Lady. In 1937, Wild shot the
William Christy Cabanne comedy
Don't Tell the Wife (1937), about a get-rich scheme gone awry.
Portia on Trial and
Lloyd Corrigan's romance-comedy
Lady Behave followed.
Wild shared an Oscar nomination with Ernest Miller for Republic's
Army Girl (1938). The story combines a romantic comedy with a dramatic ending involving military tests between horses and tanks.
A rash of Westerns for director
David Howard, starring
George O'Brien, followed, including
Painted Desert (1938) and
Trouble in Sundown (1939). A break in this activity was
The Rookie Cop (1939) (aka
Swift Vengeance) starring
Tim Holt. Four more Westerns followed, interrupted by the Charles E. Roberts comedy Dog-Gone (1939).
Between 1939 and 1942, there were five more Howard Westerns (including
Dude Cowboy, Six-Gun Gold), seven
Edward Killy-directed Westerns (
Cyclone on Horseback, Come On Danger), as well as McCarey's
Millionaires in Prison,
Jack Hively's
Laddie and his sophisticated mystery
The Saint in Palm Springs, the comedy A Quiet Fourth with
Edgar Kennedy, and
George Marshall's
Valley of the Sun with
Lucille Ball.
In 1942, Wild was entrusted with the (uncredited) shooting of additional scenes for
Orson Welles' classic
The Magnificent Ambersons.
Wild then shot two Tarzan movies, several more Westerns and war films like
Robert Wise's
Mademoiselle Fifi (1944) and Edward Dmytryck's
Till the End of Time (1946), about three GI's who have difficulty readjusting to civilian life.
Wild then created many film noir classics: Dmytryck's Murder, My Sweet (1944) (aka Farewell My Lovely) from the
Raymond Chandler novel, Dmytryck's
Cornered (1945), Edwin L. Marin's
Johnny Angel (1945) and
Nocturne (1946),
Jean Renoir's
The Woman on the Beach (1947),
Irving Pichel's
They Won't Believe Me (1947),
André De Toth's
Pitfall (1948), Felix E. Feist's
The Threat (1949),
Don Siegel's
The Big Steal (1949), uncredited additional scenes for
Nicholas Ray's
Born to Be Bad (1950),
John Farrow's
His Kind of Woman (1951),
Robert Stevenson's
The Las Vegas Story (1952), and
Josef von Sternberg's
Macao (1952) with
Robert Mitchum and
Jane Russell. He also shot the crime films
Strange Bargain (1949), Walk Softly, Stranger (1950), and
Gambling House (1951).
After the star-studded musical
Two Tickets to Broadway (1951), Wild worked on other
Jane Russell vehicles:
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) with Monroe and Russell, the musical comedy
The French Line (1954), and the adventure Underwater! (1955).
Other significant features included the comedy
Affair With a Stranger (1953) with
Jean Simmons and
Victor Mature,
She Couldn't Say No (1954) with Simmons and
Robert Mitchum, and
The Conqueror (1956) with
John Wayne and
Susan Hayward.
In 1959, Wild became director of photography for the TV series Law of the Plainsmen and
The Twilight Zone. ~ "Blue" Gene Tyranny, All Movie Guide