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Menahem Golan, 2004

Menahem Golan (Hebrew: מנחם גולן‎) (born Menahem Globus on May 31, 1929 in Tiberias, Israel) is an Israeli director and producer who is most famous for his association with Cannon Films Inc., a company he ran with his cousin Yoram Globus. Cannon produced a long line of movies during the 1980s and early 1990s, such as Delta Force, Runaway Train and some of Death Wish sequels.

Golan has produced movies for such stars as Sylvester Stallone, Chuck Norris, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Charles Bronson. As a director, however he is probably most known for his 1977 film Operation Thunderbolt (Mivtsa Yonatan), about the Israeli raid on Entebbe airport in Uganda. He is also well known for producing the 1978 film Eskimo Limon (Lemon Popsicle) which remains the most popular Israeli film of all time (nearly 1/3 of the country went to see it on its release). Lemon Popsicle went on to be a big international hit, spawning many sequels and an American remake named The Last American Virgin.

In 1986 Cannon was then taken over by Pathe Communications. Golan resigned and The Cannon group folded in the early 1990s. Golan then formed 21st Century Pictures immediately following Cannon's collapse and produced several medium budgeted films. Golan also is known as the ringleader for trying to bring Spider-Man to the screen, which was planned in 1986 and struggled for years to produce the Marvel comics character, but he failed after 21st Century Pictures went bankrupt and folded in 1996, along with Carolco Pictures, another production company that agreed to help Golan finance the film. Sony eventually got the "Spider-Man" rights and produced the film in 2002. Today Golan still produces and occasionally directs films.

Golan produced several comic book style movies in the latter half of the 1980's. Perhaps most notably, Masters of the Universe starred Dolph Lundgren and was loosely based on a series of graphic novels by Jack Kirby. In 1988, Cannon Films gained infamy after their UK based production of Superman IV: The Quest For Peace failed in theaters and provoked a negative backlash from fans.

Cannon had intended to produce Spider-Man at their studio in Elstree, United Kingdom, Milton Keynes, United Kingdom and shoot the exteriors in Tel-Aviv, Israel. Rumours at the time suggested that Dolph Lundgren would play the Green Goblin. It was also said that Spider-Man creator Stan Lee had been approached to cameo as J. Jonah Jameson.

The movie theater in the Azrieli building in Tel-Aviv, Israel bears the name of the Golan-Globus company.

Golan was responsible for the 1980 musical The Apple, an unusual moral fable with a rock-disco track which appears on a number of lists of all-time-worst movies.

• Menahem Golan at the Internet Movie Database