Peter Arne - Biography

Peter Arne was for a short time the perfect villain in British film. After a couple of roles in war movies (La flamme pourpre (1954) and The Cockleshell Heroes (1955)) and a Tarzan movie (Tarzan et le safari perdu (1957)) he became a villain in Strangers' Meeting (1957). From than on he continued to play sinister types in Le justicier (1958), Tueurs à gages (1958), Le mouchard (1959), Les conspiratrices (1960), Les chevaliers du démon (1961) and Le secret de Monte-Cristo (1961). He was very convincing as a Cromwell officer, an Italian camp commander or a Nazi officer. Several times he had sword fights as a devious count. In 1962 he was a pirate sidekick of Christopher Lee in L'attaque de San Cristobal (1962), but a new kid on the block by the name of Oliver Reed challenged him and killed him halfway through the picture. It seemed like a symbolic fight because for a while Oliver Reed played the roles in Hammer Pictures that Peter Arne could have played and Arne moved to TV roles. His days as a leading actor were over and he continued work in TV and in bit parts in features. Sometimes directors he worked with before brought him back for a little role. In 1972 he got a nice break with "The Stallion", a TV movie in which he starred with a horse. He was also in a couple of Blake Edwards movies. He became an antique dealer with his sister as a sideline. He died at the age of 63.