George P. Cosmatos

Proficient director of mainstream international and Hollywood genre features. Cosmatos's first memorable feature was "Massacre in Rome" (1973), a solid WWII drama starring Richard Burton and Marcello Mastroianni as, respectively, a Nazi colonel and a priest. He began his entertainment career working with a leading figure in international cinema, as an assistant director on Otto Preminger's epic "Exodus" (1960). In the late 70s, Cosmatos began to specialize in big-budget Hollywood and international action films, starting with the technically flashy, enjoyably old-fashioned adventure-on-a-train film, "The Cassandra Crossing" (1977), and followed up with "Escape to Athena" (1979), a lesser WWII action yarn starring Roger Moore and Telly Savalas.