• Leonard Rosenman (1924-2008) - Oscar-winning composer of the scores for Barry Lyndon and Bound for Glory. He also received nominations for his scores for Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home and Cross Creek. Other scores he composed include those for East of Eden, Rebel Without a Cause, RoboCop 2, Fantastic Voyage, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Battle for the Planet of the Apes, Race with the Devil, Hell is for Heroes, Hellfighters, A Man Called Horse, The Car, the 1980 remake of The Jazz Singer and the 1978 animated adaptation of The Lord of the Rings. He died of a heart attack March 4, in Woodland Hills, California. (Variety)

• Carole Barnes (1944-2008) - British television newsreader who appears as herself in Shaun of the Dead. She died following a stroke March 8, in Brighton, England. (The Guardian)
• Sidney Beckerman (1920-2008) - Producer of Marathon Man, Kelly's Heroes, Joe Kidd, Red Dawn and Inchon. He also was president of Allied Artists, where he oversaw the production of Cabaret, and he was executive producer of The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension and The Sicilian. He died of cancer February 25, in Los Angeles. (Variety)
• John Bliss (1930-2008) - Actor who appears in A Face in the Crowd, Intolerable Cruelty, The Miracle Worker, The Thing with Two Heads, Imaginary Heroes and Art School Confidential. He died of complications related to an abdominal aneurysm February 28, in Los Angeles. (Variety)

• J. Michael Bloom (c.1940-2008) - Talent agent who headed J. Michael Bloom and Associates and then Meridian Artists. He died of complications from pneumonia February 21, in Los Angeles. (Variety)
• Ola Brunkert (1946-2008) - Drummer for ABBA. He appears with the band in ABBA: The Movie. He died in an accident in his home March 16, on the Spanish island of Mallorca. (CNN)
• Giuseppe Di Stefano (1921-2008) - Opera tenor who can be heard prominently on the soundtracks of Scorsese's Mean Streets and Goodfellas. He also appears in the 1995 Italian film Lo Zio di Brooklyn (The Uncle from Brooklyn) and in archive footage in the recent documentary Callas Assoluta. He died March 3, in Lombardy, Italy, from injuries sustained from a 2004 attack. (Variety)
• Milton Ebbins (1914-2008) - Talent manager with significant ties to the Rat Pack and the Kennedy White House. He produced Salt and Pepper and One More Time, both starring Rat Packers Sammy Davis Jr. and Peter Lawford, as well as Johnny Cool, which featured Davis and Joey Bishop, Billie, which was also produced by Lawford, and the TV spin-off of the Thin Man films. He died of heart failure March 4, in Los Angeles. (Variety)
• Erwin Geschonneck (1906-2008) - German actor who survived the concentration camps to become a member of Bertolt Brecht's Berlin Ensemble and then a star in East German cinema. He starred in a number of Frank Beyer's films, including the Oscar-nominated Jakob, der Lügner (Jakob the Liar), and he appears in Paul Verhoeven's Das Kalte Herz (The Cold Heart). He died March 12 in Berlin. (NY Times)
• E. Gary Gygax (1938-2008) - Co-creator of the game Dungeons & Dragons, which spawned a 2000 movie. He also appears in the 2004 gaming documenary Uber Goober. He died of an abdominal aortic aneurysm March 4, in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. (Variety)
• Jeff Healey (1966-2008) - Blind guitarist who acted alongside Patrick Swayze in Road House. He also composed the score to the 1996 film No Way Home, which starred Tim Roth. He died of cancer March 2, in Toronto. (Rees/CNN)
• Bob Hubar (c.1951-2008) - Producer of Peter Greenaway's 8½ Women, Paul Ruven's Filmpje!, Ian Kerkhof's Wasted! and Paul Tickell's Christie Malry's Own Double-Entry and Crush Proof. He died March 11 in Amsterdam. (Het Parool)
• Jeff Hyde (1955-2008) - Special effects technician who worked on Bull Durham, Smokey and the Bandit, Evil Dead II, Darkman, The Outsiders and Rumble Fish. He died of cancer March 5. (Entertainment Insiders)
• J. Paul Huntsman (1952-2008) - Sound editor who worked on The Illusionist, Starsky & Hutch, The Fabulous Baker Boys, The Karate Kid, Scent of a Woman, To Die For, Deep Impact, The Peacemaker, Racing Stripes, St. Elmo's Fire, Grumpier Old Men, Pay It Forward, Deep Blue Sea, The Firm, Blue Chips, Poltergeist II: The Other Side, Major League, Manhunter and Eddie and the Cruisers. He also was a producer on the upcoming Biggie Smalls biopic Notorious. He died of brain cancer February 21, in Glendale, California. (Variety)
• George Justin (c.1917-2008) - Production exec who worked as VP of Production Management at Paramount from 1972-1975, as Executive Production Manager at Orion Picures from 1979 to 1981 and as Senior VP of Production Managment at MGM from 1981-1983. Films he had involvement in, as some sort of producer or production manager, include On the Waterfront, A Face in the Crowd, Marathon Man, The Deep, The Owl and the Pussycat, 12 Angry Men, Long Day's Journey Into Night, The Fugitive Kind, The Graduate, Up the Down Staircase, Murphy's Romance, Eyes of Laura Mars and The Anderson Tapes. He also appears in small roles in Chinatown and Shampoo. He died March 9, in Santa Monica, California. (Variety)
• Howard Metzenbaum (1917-2008) - Former U.S. Senator, from Ohio, who has a cameo in Dave. He died March 12 near Fort Lauderdale, Florida. (AP)
• William J. Moraskie (c.1925-2008) - International film executive who worked for Columbia, CIC, UIP, Cannon and Carolco. He died following a brief illness March 2, in Boynton Beach, Florida. (Variety)
• Byron Morgan (1921-2008) - Documentary filmmaker for NASA. He died of pulmonary failure February 13, in Paramount, California. (Washington Post)
• Akemi Negishi (1934-2008) - Japanese actress who starred in Akira Kurosawa's Red Beard, Dodesukaden (Clickety-Clack), I Live in Fear and The Lower Depths, as well as Joseph von Sternberg's Anatahan, Toshiya Fujita's Lady Snowblood, Norifumi Suzuki's Sex and Fury and Ishirô Honda's King Kong vs. Godzilla and Half Human. She died of cancer March 11, in Kawasaki, Kanagawa, Japan. (IMDb)
• John Polonia (c.1968-2008) - Horror filmmaker who, with his brother MarkM, wrote, directed, produced, edited and acted in such direct-to-video B movies as Feeders, Feeders 2: Slay Bells, Peter Rottentail, Razorteeth, Splatter Beach and The House That Screamed. He died of a heart aneurysm February 25. (Jennifer/Fangoria)
• Gayne Rescher (1925-2008) - Three-time Emmy Award-winning cinematographer who mostly worked on TV movies and miniseries. Features he shot include Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Elia Kazan's A Face in the Crowd, Paul Newman's Rachel, Rachel, Peter Yate's John and Mary, Elaine May's A New Leaf and Otto Preminger's Such Good Friends. He died following a long illness February 29, in Gig Harbor, Washington. (Variety)
• Alex Sharp (?-2008) - Stuntman for The Goonies, In the Line of Fire, Bullitt, Planet of the Apes, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, Battle for the Planet of the Apes, Spartacus, The Great Race, It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, The War Wagon, Catch-22, Dirty Harry, Diamonds Are Forever, What's Up, Doc? and the remake of Bedazzled. He appears in Pee-Wee's Big Adventure as a cowboy. He died March 6. (The High Chaparral Blog)
• Gloria Shayne (1923-2008) - Co-writer of the Christmas tune "Do You Hear What I Hear", which was given a new context when it was featured in Gremlins. She died of lung cancer March 6, in Stamford, Connecticut. (LA Times)
• Dave Stevens (1955-2008) - Comic book artist who created The Rocketeer. He served as a co-producer on the 1991 Disney adaptation of his graphic novel. Before this, he worked at Hanna- Barbera animation studios, then was the storyboard artist who designed the truck fight sequence for Raiders of the Lost Ark and was the storyboard artist for John Landis' music video for Michael Jackson's "Thriller". He also appears in the documentary Frazetta: Painting with Fire, about artist Frank Frazetta. He died of complications from leukemia March 10, in Turlock, California. (Variety)
• Malvin Wald (1917-2008) - Oscar-nominated screenwriter of Jules Dassin's The Naked City, which was co-written (uncredited and un-nominated) by infamously blacklisted screenwriter Albert Matz. He also scripted 1957's Man on Fire, starring Bing Crosby, Outrage, on which he was credited as an associate producer, The Dark Past, Paroxismus (aka Venus in Furs) and Al Capone, which starred Rod Steiger in the title role. He died March 6 in Sherman Oaks, California. (Variety)
• Trevor Williams (1931-2008) - Production designer for Futureworld, Pretty Baby, The Changeling, Alamo Bay, Alan Quatermain and the Lost City of Gold, Revenge of the Nerds II: Nerds in Paradise, Last of the Dogmen, Who's Harry Crumb? and the first five Police Academy movies. As an art director, he worked on Dillinger, Walter Hill's Hard Times and Mazes and Monsters. He died of a heart attack February 14, in Devonshire, England. (Variety)
• Arthur 'Jack' Wodell Jr. (c.1938-2008) - Film marketing executive who consulted studios on print advertising and electronic placement. He died of heart failure February 23, in Windsor, California. (Variety)

Tags: a face in the crowd, abba, AFaceInTheCrowd, cinematical, jakob the liar, JakobTheLiar, marathon man, MarathonMan, planet of the apes, PlanetOfTheApes, star trek, StarTrek, the rat pack, the rocketeer, TheRatPack, TheRocketeer