Clive Donner, the British film director whose movies helped set the tone for the swinging sixties, died Tuesday at the age of 84, his family said.

Swinging sixties British film director dies
Updated at: 0900 PST, Thursday, September 09, 2010


LONDON: Clive Donner, the British film director whose movies helped set the tone for the swinging sixties, died Tuesday at the age of 84, his family said.

He had been suffering from Alzheimer's disease and died in London.

Donner's career began at Pinewood Studios outside London when he was 15, his cousin Gavin Asher said.

"One of the things he was most proud of was what he did for the careers of quite a lot of British actors including Alan Bates, David Hemmings and Ian McKellen," he said.

"A lot of them went on to eclipse his fame and success but he was very giving in that sense."

Donner directed "Nothing But The Best", a 1964 comedy featuring Bates and Denholm Elliott.

He directed 1965 comedy "What's New Pussycat?", starring Peter Sellers, Peter O'Toole, Woody Allen, and Ursula Andress, and "Luv" (1967), featuring Jack Lemmon and Peter Falk.

Coming of age film "Here We Go Round The Mulberry Bush" (1968) captured the spirit of the times.

"He was a man of the sixties and those films were the very essence of swinging London," Asher said.

Donner later moved to Los Angeles to work in television.

He and his late wife had no children.