FrameThrower · Actors · Joseph Cotten
Joseph Cotten
9 films · 573 frames · top-billed in 6 · 1941–1980
Born 15 May 1905 · Petersburg, Virginia, USA · died 6 February 1994
Joseph Cheshire Cotten was an American actor of stage and film. Cotten achieved prominence on Broadway, starring in the original productions of The Philadelphia Story and Sabrina Fair. He is associated with Orson Welles, leading to appearances in Citizen Kane (1941), The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), Journey into Fear (1943), for which Cotten was also credited with the screenplay, and The Third Man (1949). He was a star in his own right with films such as Shadow of a Doubt (1943), Love Letters (1945), Portrait of Jennie (1948), and The Third Man (1949).
Awards
On FrameThrower we have: 9 films · 573 frames · top-billed in 6 · 1941–1980
- Volpi Cup for Best Actor
- star on Hollywood Walk of Fame
How their films are shot
Measured across 573 frames from the 9 films we hold. This is the look of the work Joseph takes, not a claim about any single frame — we index the cast of a film, never the people in a shot.
Across the 9 films we hold, 49% of their frames are night — the look of the work Joseph takes.
Time of day
Lighting
Shot size
Camera angle
Mood
Films in the library
Every poster opens that film — stills, cinematography notes and colour palette.
The Abominible Dr. Phibes
1972 · Dr. Vesalius
The Hellbenders
1967 · Colonel Jonas
The Third Man
1949 · Holly Martins
Shadow of a Doubt
1943 · Uncle Charlie
The Magnificent Ambersons
1942 · Eugene Morgan
Citizen Kane
1941 · Jedediah Leland
Heaven’s Gate
1980 · The Reverend Doctor
Soylent Green
1973 · William R. Simonson
F for Fake
1973 · Self
Often with
Shared films in this library, not a full filmography.
A reference database for filmmakers
FrameThrower is a fully machine-searchable film database and visual reference library — all 573 frames from Joseph Cotten's 9 films, and 5,000+ films besides, indexed frame by frame and readable by AI. Search it in plain language, from a reference image, or by colour; call it from an API, an MCP server or an SDK. It's the reference layer for making the next movie.