Lee Madden, best known for directing Hell's Angels '69, died of complications from pneumonia on April 9 in Camarillo, a town north of Los Angeles. He was 82.
The American International Pictures release Hell's Angels '69, the tale of two brothers who plan on robbing Las Vegas' Caesar's Palace, was the Brooklyn-born Madden's first feature. According to The Hollywood Reporter, it is the only fiction film in which the Oakland Hell's Angels, including leader Sonny Barger, appeared.
Madden's other features were the bikers vs. rednecks adaptation of The Magnificent Seven, Angel Unchained (1970), starring Tyne Daly and Don Stroud, and which Madden also wrote and produced; The Night God Screamed (1971), starring 1940s Fox star Jeanne Crain as a woman pursued by Christian fanatics; and Night Creature (1978), a horror thriller featuring Donald Pleasence, Nancy Kwan, and a killer leopard.
Madden also directed episodes of a handful of television series in the '70s, among them Cade's County, starring Glenn Ford, and The Most Deadly Game, starring Ralph Bellamy.
Additionally, as per the IMDb Madden also directed the 1987 horror comedy Ghost Fever, though the film was released with the infamous "Alan Smithee" directorial credit.
Madden's company, Lee Madden Associates, supplied industrial films and TV commercials mostly to auto companies.
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What was Jeanne Crain doing in a cheap horror movie in the early 70s?