Melinda Dillon in the context of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind"

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⭐ Core Definition: Melinda Dillon

Melinda Ruth Dillon (October 13, 1939 – January 9, 2023) was an American actress. She was nominated for a 1963 Tony Award for her Broadway debut in the original production of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her roles in Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and Absence of Malice (1981). She is well-known for her role as Mrs. Parker in the holiday classic A Christmas Story (1983). Her other film roles include Bound for Glory (1976), Slap Shot (1977), F.I.S.T. (1978), The Muppet Movie (1979), Harry and the Hendersons (1987), Captain America (1990), The Prince of Tides (1991), To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar (1995), How to Make an American Quilt (1995), Magnolia (1999), for which she was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild Award, and Reign Over Me (2007).

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👉 Melinda Dillon in the context of Close Encounters of the Third Kind

Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a 1977 American science fiction drama film written and directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Richard Dreyfuss, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, Bob Balaban, Cary Guffey, and François Truffaut. The film depicts the story of Roy Neary, an everyday blue-collar worker in Indiana, whose life changes after an encounter with an unidentified flying object (UFO), and Jillian Guiler, a single mother whose three-year-old son Barry is abducted during the same UFO manifestation.

Close Encounters was a long-cherished project for Spielberg. In late 1973, he developed a deal with Columbia Pictures for a science-fiction film. Though Spielberg received sole credit for the script, he was assisted by Paul Schrader, John Hill, David Giler, Hal Barwood, Matthew Robbins, and Jerry Belson, all of whom contributed to the screenplay in varying degrees. The title is derived from Ufologist J. Allen Hynek's classification of close encounters with extraterrestrials, in which the third kind denotes human observations of extraterrestrials or "animate beings". Douglas Trumbull served as the visual effects supervisor, while Carlo Rambaldi designed the aliens.

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Melinda Dillon in the context of Reign Over Me

Reign Over Me is a 2007 American buddy drama film written and directed by Mike Binder, produced by his brother Jack Binder, and starring Adam Sandler, Don Cheadle, Jada Pinkett Smith, Liv Tyler, Donald Sutherland, Saffron Burrows, and Binder himself. The film follows the story of former college roommates and old friends Alan and Charlie, the latter of whom is struggling with depression after the death of his wife and daughters in the September 11 attacks. This was Melinda Dillon's final film role.

Distributed by Columbia Pictures, the film was theatrically released on March 23, 2007, and on DVD and Blu-ray on October 9, 2007. It is the first of two films produced by Madison 23 Productions, a drama subsidiary of Sandler's Happy Madison Productions.

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Melinda Dillon in the context of Magnolia (film)

Magnolia is a 1999 American drama film written, directed and co-produced by Paul Thomas Anderson. It stars an ensemble cast, including Jeremy Blackman, Tom Cruise, Melinda Dillon, Philip Baker Hall, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ricky Jay, William H. Macy, Alfred Molina, Julianne Moore, John C. Reilly, Jason Robards (in his final film role), and Melora Walters. The film is an epic mosaic of interrelated characters in search of happiness, forgiveness, and meaning in the San Fernando Valley. The script was inspired by the music of Aimee Mann, who contributed several songs to its soundtrack.

The film had a limited theatrical release on December 17, 1999, before expanding wide on January 7, 2000. Magnolia received acclaim from critics. It grossed $48.5 million against a $37 million budget. Of the ensemble cast, Cruise was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the 72nd Academy Awards and won the award in that category at the Golden Globes.

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