Edgar Georg Ulmer was born in 1904 in Olomouc, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. His family moved to Vienna soon after his birth. His father died in 1916 while fighting on the Italian-front during World War I and though his mother was still alive, Ulmer and one of his three siblings were sent as war orphans to live with a family in Sweden. He returned to Vienna in 1920, but did not move back in with his mother, with whom he had a contentious relationship. Instead, he moved in with Rudolph and Joseph Schildkraut, a father and son who both acted on stage and in film. He registered at Vienna’s Academy of Fine Arts, though it is uncertain if he ever graduated or even attended. Through the Schildkrauts, he was introduced to theatrical producer and director Max Reinhardt.

Ulmer travelled to New York in 1924 to assist with Reinhardt’s stage production of THE MIRACLE, though the nature of his involvement in the play is inconclusive. He soon made his way west to Hollywood where he found work in the Art Department at Universal Pictures. Though initially hired as a sketch artist, Ulmer was soon receiving assignments as an assistant director, including working under William Wyler on numerous two-reel Westerns. In 1926 he was loaned to Fox Film Corp. to assist art director Rochus Gliese on F. W. Murnau’s SUNRISE (1927). In early 1928 he left his job at Universal and accompanied Gliese to Berlin, where they worked on the set design for Reinhardt’s staging of DIE VERBRECHER (The Criminals). When Gliese suddenly left the production of PEOPLE ON SUNDAY (1930), Ulmer stepped in and co-directed the film with Robert Siodmak. The influential slice-of-life drama was the result of the collaborative efforts of not only Ulmer and Siodmak, but also Curt Siodmak, Billy Wilder, Eugen Schüfftan, and Fred Zinnemann.

Ulmer returned to the United States but struggled to find work of his own as a director, though he assisted in other filmmakers’ productions, such as Murnau’s TABU (1931). His first solo directing opportunity came with the Canadian American co-production DAMAGED LIVES (1933), an educational drama about syphilis that was later censored in many parts of the United States. His friendship with Carl Laemmle, Jr. led to his next, more reputable assignment, THE BLACK CAT (1934). The horror film was the first to pair Bela Lugosi with Boris Karloff and went on to be Universal’s greatest box-office earner for 1934. Despite this success, Ulmer’s career was quickly sidelined due to his personal life. During production of THE BLACK CAT, he had become involved with Shirley Alexander, then a script clerk and wife of Max Alexander, Carl Laemmle’s producer nephew. Laemmle Sr. retaliated by ensuring that Ulmer was blacklisted from the major studios, though not before Ulmer directed THUNDER OVER TEXAS, a minor Western for Max Alexander’s production company, Beacon Pictures. Ulmer and Shirley married in 1935, and she would serve as script supervisor for nearly every one of Ulmer’s subsequent films.

With no directing prospects in Hollywood, the Ulmers moved to New York City. His first film in the wake of his fallout with Carl Laemmle was FROM NINE TO NINE (1936), a British production filmed in Canada based on an original story by the Ulmers. The couple then returned to New York and for the next few years Ulmer directed an array of films aimed at non-mainstream audiences, such as the Ukranian-language films THE GIRL FROM POLTAVA (1937) and COSSACKS IN EXILE (1939); the Yiddish-language films GREEN FIELDS (1937), THE SINGING BLACKSMITH (1939), THE LIGHT AHEAD (1939), and AMERICANER SCHADCHEN (1940); and MOON OVER HARLEM (1939), which featured an all-black cast. He also filmed several educational shorts for the National Tuberculosis Association. Following this spate of films, Ulmer returned to Hollywood in 1941 and signed a contract with Producers Releasing Corporation, one of the low-budget, B movie production companies of Hollywood’s “Poverty Row.” Though he had hoped to find work at one of the major studios, through PRC he was able to direct 11 films over a four-year period, only briefly leaving the studio in 1943 to make two training films for the United States Army Air Force. His wide-ranging work at PRC includes the comedy JIVE JUNCTION (1943), the horror film BLUEBEARD (1944), and the noirs STRANGE ILLUSION (1945) and DETOUR (1945), the latter being the most enduring film of his career. He often co-wrote or re-wrote his scripts for the studio, and he performed script work and served as a second unit director on other productions as well. However, he was frustrated with how little he earned at PRC. When the studio loaned Ulmer to Hunt Stromberg Productions to direct the Hedy Lamarr vehicle THE STRANGE WOMAN (1946), an A production with a large budget, Ulmer was furious with how PRC handled the financial arrangement and chose not to renew his contract.

After his stint with PRC, Ulmer operated as a freelance filmmaker for the remainder of his career. Though the studio had afforded him the opportunity to work steadily and with relatively little interference, it also left him perpetually labeled a B movie director. Consequently, his productions throughout the 1950s and 1960s were remarkably eclectic as he accepted nearly every offer that came his way, often travelling back and forth to Europe for work. Following THE STRANGE WOMAN, one of his more successful ventures, he directed CARNEGIE HALL (1947), a film set and filmed at the titular concert venue which featured performances by Jascha Heifetz, Harry James, Lily Pons, and Arthur Rubinstein, among many others. He then filmed the noir RUTHLESS (1948) in Hollywood before heading to Italy to direct THE PIRATES OF CAPRI (1949). He returned to Hollywood and directed a string of films that included the science fiction horror film THE MAN FROM PLANET X (1951), the comedy BABES IN BAGDAD (1952), the noir MURDER IS MY BEAT (1955), and the Western THE NAKED DAWN (1955). His next project, the Italian co-production HANNIBAL (1959), was shot in Serbia. He then travelled to Texas to shoot two science fiction films, THE AMAZING TRANSPARENT MAN (1960) and BEYOND THE TIME BARRIER (1960), before returning to Europe for his final two films. First, he replaced an ailing Frank Borzage on the French-Italian co-production JOURNEY BENEATH THE DESERT (1961). His final film, the war drama THE CAVERN (1964), was a German, Italian, and American co-production shot in Yugoslavia and Italy. In the final years of his life, Ulmer suffered a series of strokes that left him unable to work. He died at the Motion Picture & Television Fund, then the Motion Picture Home, in 1972.