Best of
Film

2009

Inglourious Basterds


Quentin Tarantino - 2009
     From the brilliant writer/director behind the iconic films Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill, and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, comes Tarantino's most ambitious movie: a World War II epic starring Brad Pitt and filmed on location in Germany and France. The action tale follows the parallel story of a guerrilla-like squad of American soldiers called "The Basterds" and the French Jewish teenage girl Shosanna who find themselves behind enemy Nazi lines during the German occupation. When the Inglourious Basterds encounter Shosanna at a propaganda screening at the movie house she runs, they conspire to launch an unexpected plot to end the war. Pitt plays Lieutenant Aldo Raine -- the leader of the Basterds. Raine is an illiterate hillbilly from the mountains of Tennessee who puts together a team of eight Jewish-American soldiers to hunt down the Nazis. Filled with Tarantino's trademark electric dialogue and thrilling action sequences, Inglourious Basterds is one of the most celebrated films of the twenty-first century.

Fantastic Mr. Fox: The Making of the Motion Picture


Wes Anderson - 2009
    Fox tells the story of the Fox Family. After twelve years, the Fox Family’s quiet home life proves too much for Mr. Fox’s natural animal instincts. When his young nephew arrives, Mr. Fox slips back into his old ways as a smart bird thief and, in doing so, endangers not only his beloved family, but the whole animal community as well.In Fall 2009, audiences will cheer as award-winning director Wes Anderson (Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Darjeeling Limited) brings us his take on the tale: a blockbuster stop-motion animation film shot entirely in high definition. Starring the voice talents of George Clooney (Michael Clayton), Meryl Streep (Doubt), Bill Murray (Lost in Translation), and Jason Schwartzman (Marie Antoinette), the movie is sure to please fans of the original story as well as enchant new generations.Fantastic Mr. Fox: The Making of the Motion Picture is a family-friendly behind-the-scenes look at the creation of the film. Filled with photos, script pages, storyboards, and interviews with cast and crew, this book is a delightful and intriguing peek at the magic that happens as the filmmakers bring to life one of children’s literature’s most beloved characters: the outrageous, audacious, Fantastic Mr. Fox.

Save the Cat!® Strikes Back: More Trouble for Screenwriters to Get Into … and Out Of


Blake Snyder - 2009
    Inspired by questions from his workshops, lectures, and emails, Blake listened and provides new tips, tactics, and techniques to solve your writing problems and create stories that resonate: - The 7 warning signs you might have a great idea ─ or not - The sure-fire template for can’t-miss loglines - The difference between structure and formula  - The Transformation Machine that allows you to track your hero’s growth step-by-step - The 5 questions to keep your story’s spine straight - The 5-Point Finale to finish any story - The Save the Cat!® Greenlight Checklist that gets to the heart of every development issue  - The right way to hear notes, deal with problematic producers, and dive into the rewrite with the right attitude - Why and when an agent will appear - How to discover the potential for greatness in any story - How to avoid panic, doubt, and self-recrimination… and what it takes to succeed and dare to achieve your dreams Get ready to face trouble like a pro… and strike back! ------------------------ In his 20-year career as a screenwriter and producer, Blake Snyder sold dozens of scripts, including co-writing Blank Check, which became a hit for Disney, and Nuclear Family for Steven Spielberg. His book, Save the Cat!® The Last Book on Screenwriting You'll Ever Need, was published in May 2005, and is now in its twentieth printing. Blake conducted sold-out workshops and seminars around the globe and consulted for Disney and DreamWorks. Along with guiding screenwriters, novelists and other creative thinkers, Blake's method has become the "secret weapon" of many development executives, managers, and producers for its precise, easy, and honest appraisal of what it takes to write and develop stories in any media. Blake Snyder passed away in August, 2009, but he lives on in his films and his books, in the advice that will never grow old, with the spirit that will continue to thrive and inspire.

Stanley Kubrick's Napoleon: The Greatest Movie Never Made


Alison Castle - 2009
    Slated for production immediately following the release of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kubrick’s "Napoleon" was to be at once a character study and a sweeping epic, replete with grandiose battle scenes featuring thousands of extras. To write his original screenplay, Kubrick embarked on two years of intensive research; with the help of dozens of assistants and an Oxford Napoleon specialist, he amassed an unparalleled trove of research and preproduction material, including approximately 15,000 location scouting photographs and 17,000 slides of Napoleonic imagery. No stone was left unturned in Kubrick's nearly-obsessive quest to uncover every piece of information history had to offer about Napoleon. But alas, Kubrick’s movie was not destined to be: the film studios, first M.G.M. and then United Artists, decided such an undertaking was too risky at a time when historical epics were out of fashion. TASCHEN’s tribute to this unmade masterpiece makes Kubrick’s valiant work on "Napoleon" available to fans for the first time. Based on the original 2009 limited edition which featured ten books hidden inside of a carved out reproduction of a Napoleon history book, this publication brings all the original elements together in one volume. Herein, all of the books from the original edition are reproduced in facsimile: correspondence, costume studies, location scouting photographs, research material, script drafts, and more. Kubrick’s final draft is reproduced in its entirety. The text book features the complete original treatment, essays examining the screenplay in historical and dramatic contexts, an essay by Jean Tulard on Napoleon in cinema, and a transcript of interviews Kubrick conducted with Oxford professor Felix Markham. The culmination of years of research and preparation, this unique publication offers readers a chance to experience the creative process of one of cinema’s greatest talents as well as a fascinating exploration of the enigmatic figure that was Napoleon Bonaparte. *Includes access to searchable/downloadable online research database: Kubrick's complete picture file of nearly 17,000 Napoleonic images*

The Art of Pixar Short Films


Amid Amidi - 2009
    Their contagious energy economical storytelling, and rambunctious humor set the stage perfectly for the ward-winning films that follow. They also harken back to a bygone era of showmanship, when serials and shorts summoned and focused movie watchers' attention for the big show to follow. In The Art of Pixar Short Films, respected animation journalist Amid Amidi examines the legacy of short filmmaking at the Emeryville, California, studio in interviews with the directors, producers, artists, and animators who created For the Birds, Lifted, and eleven other iconic shorts.More than 250 full-color illustrations, pencil sketches, storyboards, photographs, and final rendered frames showcase the vision of a talented group of artist, as well as their storytelling prowess; these films often foego dialogue in favor of communicating with emotion (Luxo Jr.), music (Boundin' and One Man Band), and perfectly time pratfall humor (Knick Knack).This beautifully desiged and studiously researched book is a strong addition to animation and film scholarship, an intimate tour inside the most admired animation studio at work today.

Universal Studios Monsters: A Legacy of Horror


Michael Mallory - 2009
    Universal Studios Monsters: A Legacy of Horror explores all of these enduring characters, chronicling both the mythology behind the films and offering behind-the-scenes insights into how the films were created. Universal Studios Monsters is the most complete record of the horror films of this legendary studio, with biographies of major personalities who were responsible for the most notable monster melodramas in film history. The stories of these films and their creators are told through interviews with surviving actors and studio employees. A lavish photographic record, including many behind-the-scenes shots, completes the story of how these classics were made. This is a volume no fan of imaginative cinema will want to be without.

Robert Altman: The Oral Biography


Mitchell Zuckoff - 2009
    After an all-American boyhood in Kansas City, a stint flying bombers in World War II, and jobs ranging from dog tattoo entrepreneur to television director, Robert Altman burst onto the scene in 1970 with M*A*S*H. He reinvented American filmmaking, and went on to produce such masterpieces as McCabe & Mrs. Miller, Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts, and Gosford Park. In Robert Altman, Mitchell Zuckoff has woven together Altman's final interviews; an incredible cast of voices including Meryl Streep, Warren Beatty, Paul Newman, among scores of others; and contemporary reviews and news accounts into a riveting tale of an extraordinary life.

The Pixar Treasures


Tim Hauser - 2009
    It begins with a group of animators who were inspired by Walt Disney films. In the late 1970s and early '80s, John Lasseter, Brad Bird, and Joe Ranft were hired into an apprenticeship program at Walt Disney Productions. The last of Disney's golden age artists, including animators Eric Larson, Milt Kahl, Frank Thomas, and Ollie Johnston mentored the young dreamers, and as Pixar later developed, their work would draw heavily from this direct connection with Walt Disney's "Nine Old Men." The tale continues with Pixar's foray into computer animation, and the resulting success of Toy Story. With chapters on A Bug's Life; Monsters, Inc.; Finding Nemo; The Incredibles; Cars; Ratatouille; and WALL*E, Hauser's narrative covers the struggles, growth, and successes of an incredible animation studio. And it gives readers a sneak peak at the newest Disney*Pixar film, Up. Filled with unique removable keepsakes, The Pixar Treasures is an essential collector's item for every Pixar fan.

Hammer Glamour


Marcus Hearn - 2009
    Bursting at the seams with rare and previously unpublished photographs from Hammer’s archive and private collections worldwide, and featuring many new interviews, Hammer Glamour is a lavish, full colour celebration of Hammer’s female stars, including Ingrid Pitt, Martine Beswick, Caroline Munro, Barbara Shelley, Joanna Lumley, Nastassja Kinski, and of course Raquel Welch (who can forget her fur bikini in One Million Years B. C.?)

Kazan on Directing


Elia Kazan - 2009
    His list of Broadway and Hollywood successes—A Streetcar Named Desire (stage and screen), All My Sons, Death of a Salesman, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, On the Waterfront, East of Eden, Baby Doll, America America, to name only a few—is a testament to his profound impact on the art of directing. Kazan’s insights into these and other classic stage works shaped their subsequent productions—and continue to do so. There is no directorial achievement in America equal to his.This remarkable book, drawn from his notebooks, letters, interviews, and autobiography, reveals Kazan’s method: how he uncovered for himself the “spine” or core of each script and each character; how he analyzed each piece in terms of his own experience; how he determined the specifics of his production, from casting and costuming to set design and cinematography. And we see how he worked with writers on scripts and with actors on interpretation.The final section, “The Pleasures of Directing”—essays Kazan was writing in his last decade—is informal, provocative, candid, and passionate; a wise old pro sharing the secrets of his craft, advising us how to search for ourselves in each project, how to fight the system, and how to have fun doing it.Published in Kazan’s centenary year, this monumental, revelatory book, edited by Robert Cornfield, is essential reading for everyone interested in American movies and theatre.

Red, White Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms


Frank B. Wilderson III - 2009
    Offering an unflinching account of race and representation, Frank B. Wilderson III asks whether such films accurately represent the structure of U.S. racial antagonisms. That structure, he argues, is based on three essential subject positions: that of the White (the “settler,” “master,” and “human”), the Red (the “savage” and “half-human”), and the Black (the “slave” and “non-human”). Wilderson contends that for Blacks, slavery is ontological, an inseparable element of their being. From the beginning of the European slave trade until now, Blacks have had symbolic value as fungible flesh, as the non-human (or anti-human) against which Whites have defined themselves as human. Just as slavery is the existential basis of the Black subject position, genocide is essential to the ontology of the Indian. Both positions are foundational to the existence of (White) humanity.Wilderson provides detailed readings of two films by Black directors, Antwone Fisher (Denzel Washington) and Bush Mama (Haile Gerima); one by an Indian director, Skins (Chris Eyre); and one by a White director, Monster’s Ball (Marc Foster). These films present Red and Black people beleaguered by problems such as homelessness and the repercussions of incarceration. They portray social turmoil in terms of conflict, as problems that can be solved (at least theoretically, if not in the given narratives). Wilderson maintains that at the narrative level, they fail to recognize that the turmoil is based not in conflict, but in fundamentally irreconcilable racial antagonisms. Yet, as he explains, those antagonisms are unintentionally disclosed in the films’ non-narrative strategies, in decisions regarding matters such as lighting, camera angles, and sound.

Farber on Film: The Complete Film Writings of Manny Farber


Manny Farber - 2009
    Champion of what he called "termite art" (focused, often eccentric virtuosity as opposed to "white elephant" monumentality), master of a one-of-a-kind prose style whose jazz-like phrasing and incandescent twists and turns made every review an adventure, he has long been revered by his peers. Susan Sontag called him "the liveliest, smartest, most original film critic this country ever produced"; for Peter Bogdanovich, he was "razor-sharp in his perceptions" and "never less than brilliant as a writer."Farber was an early discoverer of many filmmakers later acclaimed as American masters: Val Lewton, Preston Sturges, Samuel Fuller, Raoul Walsh, Anthony Mann. A prodigiously gifted painter himself, he brought to his writing an artist's eye for what was on the screen. Alert to any filmmaker, no matter how marginal or unsung, who was "doing go-for-broke art and not caring what comes of it," he was uncompromising in his contempt for pretension and trendiness-for, as he put it, directors who "pin the viewer to the wall and slug him with wet towels of artiness and significance."The excitement of his criticism, however, has less to do with his particular likes and dislikes than with the quality of attention he paid to each film as it unfolds, to the "chains of rapport and intimate knowledge" in its moment-to-moment reality. To transcribe that knowledge he created a prose that, in Robert Polito's words, allows for "oddities, muddles, crises, contradictions, dead ends, multiple alternatives, and divergent vistas." The result is critical essays that are themselves works of art.Farber on Film contains this extraordinary body of work in its entirety for the first time, from his early and previously uncollected weekly reviews for The New Republic and The Nation to his brilliant later essays (some written in collaboration with his wife, Patricia Patterson) on Godard, Fassbinder, Herzog, Scorsese, Altman, and others. Featuring an introduction by editor Robert Polito that examines in detail the stages of Farber's career and his enduring significance as writer and thinker, Farber on Film is a landmark volume that will be a classic in American criticism.

Master Shots Vol 1, 1st edition: 100 Advanced Camera Techniques to Get an Expensive Look on Your Low-Budget Movie


Christopher Kenworthy - 2009
    By using powerful master shots and well-executed moves, directors can develop a strong style and stand out from the crowd. Most low-budget movies look low-budget because the director is forced to compromise at the last minute. Master Shots gives you so many powerful techniques that youll be able to respond, even under pressure, and create knock-out shots. Even when the clock is ticking and the light is fading, the techniques in this book can rescue your film and make every shot look like it cost a fortune. Each technique is illustrated with samples from great feature films and computer-generated diagrams for absolute clarity.

Heads On and We Shoot: The Making of Where the Wild Things Are


Michelle Quint - 2009
    Misunderstood and rebellious, Max sets sail to the land of the Wild Things, where mischief reigns. But how do you turn one of the world′s favorite children′s books into a movie?This film incorporates the most dynamic elements of voice performance, live-action puppetry, and computer animation into a live-action adventure story that captures the magic of the book-and takes it to a new dimension. In order to preserve the realistic nature of the film, the Wild Things are not created digitally. Instead, Spike Jonze brings these characters to life in the form of physical suits built by the Jim Henson Company. These creatures, operated by a suit performer, interact with the live actor playing Max on set in front of the camera. After principal photography is finished, CGI is being used to make the creatures completely lifelike and convincing.HEADS ON AND WE SHOOT unveils the unique collaboration behind this highly anticipated film-the combined work of Maurice Sendak, Spike Jonze, Dave Eggers, and all the cast and crew. The book design is heavily image-based, a mix of early sketches, storyboards, character designs, and extensive behind-the-scenes photographs that show both incredible live-action puppetry and computer animation. The text includes forewords by Jonze and Eggers, interviews with the cast and crew, stories from on and off the set, and early drafts of the screenplay. The resulting book will be simultaneously a beautiful object for collectors, an insider′s guide for devotees, and an intimate window into the creative process.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind


Christopher Grau - 2009
    Beginning with a helpful introduction that places each essay in context, specially commissioned chapters examine the following topics:philosophical issues surrounding love, friendship, affirmation and repetitionthe role of memory (and the emotions) in personal identity and decision-makingthe morality of imagination and ethical importance of memoryphilosophical questions about self-knowledge and knowing the minds of othersthe aesthetics of the film considered in relation to Gondry's other works and issues in the philosophy of perceptionIncluding a foreword by Michel Gondry and a list of further reading, this volume is essential reading for students interested in philosophy and film studies.

Star Wars: Frames


George Lucas - 2009
    For two years Lucas went through more than 150,000 frames per film, editing more than 1 million frames down to the 1,416 images that now comprise Star Wars: Frames, a testament to the hard work, craftsmanship, and dedication evident in every frame of every film. Star Wars: Frames brings together Lucas’s personal shot-by-shot selections into a lavishly designed two-volume hardcover set—one volume for the Original Trilogy and one volume for the Prequel Trilogy. For collectors and fans, Star Wars: Frames is the ultimate look on this grand project devoted to a cinematic phenomenon—and the ultimate Star Wars collector’s tome.Please note: All the images in Star Wars: Frames are presented as they are seen on screen, with none of the alterations that usually take place when an image is released for publication (digital enhancements, airbrushing, and so on). They will therefore have, occassionally, motion-blur or other anomalies inherent in a 1/24th-of-a-second extraction. Each double-page spread of frames is intended to be viewed from left to right top, then left to right bottom. Praise for Star Wars: Frames: “Wonderful.” —Star Wars Insider magazine “George Lucas and company pored over the Star Wars films to distill the story into its visual essence and packaged the resulting images in the new book, Frames.” —Fast Company’s Co.Create blog “Stunning.” —Boing Boing “This edition is solid.”  —Gizmodo

Videohound's Golden Movie Retriever


Jim Craddock - 2009
    More than 30,000 entries supply all the basic information, along with an entertaining review/plot synopsis.

Cinematography for Directors: A Guide for Creative Collaboration


Jacqueline B. Frost - 2009
    This is the only book that focuses exclusively on the relationship between the director and cinematographer.

Charmed by Audrey: Life on the Set of Sabrina


Mark Shaw - 2009
    Life magazine assigned one of its top young photographers, Mark Shaw, to shoot a feature, and he spent weeks with the star on and around the set. Shaw's extraordinary level of access resulted in an amazing array of photos and over 60 rolls of film that captured the budding ing�nue's charm and grace on set and in everyday life. The images chronicled Hepburn waking up at home, having her hair washed at the beauty parlor, reading, relaxing, studying the script, chatting with her costars and director Billy Wilder, and acting in one of her most famous roles. Through the handful of photographs published in Life for the Sabrina article have become iconic images of Hepburn, the majority of the negatives were misplaced and never published. Rediscovered 50 years later, these photographs offer a stunning visual biography of Hepburn's youth and rising star.

The Making of On Her Majesty's Secret Service


Charles Helfenstein - 2009
    Based on years of research, hundreds of interviews, and exclusive access to the archives of author Ian Fleming, screenwriter Richard Maibaum, and director Peter Hunt, this inside look features never-before-published script details, storyboards, production documents, interviews, memos, marketing material, call sheets, and hundreds of rare, behind-the-scenes photographs of the cast and crew, including sequences and entire sets not seen in the film. From novel to script to screen, this book details the incredible journey of making the most unique entry in the James Bond film series, the longest running, most successful film franchise in history. This is not the white-washed "authorized" story, but the real story.

Grey Gardens [With CD]


Sara Maysles - 2009
    Little Edie's magical aphorisms ("Raccoons and cats become a little bit boring," she sighs towards the end of the film, "I mean for too long a time ") are gems of unwitting camp, and between her observations, her costumes, the incredibly bizarre mother daughter tensions, the cats, raccoons and the beautiful ruins of Grey Gardens itself, "doing nothing" amounts to everything; indeed, it amounts to a tragicomedy of enormous emotional punch.This eclectic volume offers a myriad of collaged illustrations, photographs, film stills, production notes and other archival materials alongside transcripts of the Beales' own stories and conversations edited from unreleased "Grey Gardens" sound recordings. Structured to mirror the Maysles' own approach to the world of the Beales, it closely resembles the enchanting clutter of the mansion, a self-contained world littered with mementos and telling ephemera. It also reproduces unpublished photographs by both Albert and David Maysles. With an introduction by Albert Maysles, drawings and illustrations by Albert's daughter, Rebekah Maysles and an appendix with the full transcript of "Grey Gardens," as well as an audio CD of sound recordings capturing the Beales at their best, this book is the essential companion to the film and a beautiful testimony to its legacy. The 60-minute CD that comes with the book contains conversations with the Beales and their friends, songs and poetry recited by the two Edies and audio of the Beales during and after watching the film for the first time.

On the Camera Arts and Consecutive Matters: The Writings of Hollis Frampton


Hollis Frampton - 2009
    It was a time when artists working in diverse disciplines were beginning to pick up cameras and produce films and videotapes, well before these practices were understood or embraced by institutions of contemporary art. This collection of Frampton's writings presents his critical essays (many written for Artforum and October) along with additional material, including lectures, correspondence, interviews, and production notes and scripts. It replaces—and supersedes—the long-unavailable Circles of Confusion, published in 1983.Frampton ranged widely over the visual arts in his writing, and the texts in this collection display his unique approaches to photography, film, and video, as well as the plastic and literary arts. They include critically acclaimed essays on Edward Weston and Eadweard Muybridge as well as appraisals of contemporary photographers; the influential essay, “For a Metahistory of Film,” along with scripts, textual material, and scores for his films; writings on video that constitute a prehistory of the digital arts; a dialogue with Carl Andre (his friend and former Phillips Andover classmate) from the early 1960s; and two inventive, almost unclassifiable pieces that are reminiscent of Borges, Joyce, and Beckett.

Clint Eastwood Icon: The Ultimate Film Art Collection


David Frangioni - 2009
    He is a nameless vigilante, a vengeful detective, a bare-knuckle boxer, a Secret Service agent, and countless other definitive screen archetypes now embedded in our shared pop-culture consciousness. However you define him, Clint Eastwood has a powerful and extremely recognizable image that exists as something beyond the narratives of his films.Clint Eastwood ICON presents an unprecedented collection of film art surrounding the legendary actor. This comprehensive trove gathers together poster art, lobby cards, studio ads, and esoteric film memorabilia from around the world. From his early roles as the nameless gunslinger in Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Westerns, to the vigilante films of the 1970s and 1980s, through his directorial roles and latest releases, Clint Eastwood ICON captures the powerful presence and quiet intensity that turned Eastwood into the definitive American hero.

Citizen Kane


Herman J. Mankiewicz - 2009
    Mankiewicz and Orson Welles which has been specially formatted for Kindle publication.

A.I. Artificial Intelligence: From Stanley Kubrick to Steven Spielberg: The Vision Behind the Film


Cynthia L. Breazeal - 2009
    A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001) was a collaboration between two cinematic giants: Stanley Kubrick and Steven Spielberg. Here, the directors’ combined visions and sensibilities are presented along with the work of their remarkably talented colleagues—above all, Chris Baker, the film’s conceptual artist.At the heart of the book are Baker’s drawings, many never before seen. Commissioned by Kubrick and used in Spielberg’s eventual production designs, the drawings display Baker’s imagination and rare technical skill. Accompanying the drawings are extracts from Kubrick’s notebooks, stills from the finished film, and photographs of behind-the-scenes action, highlighting the use of pioneering special effects, animatronic work, and the “virtual studio.”

Cutting Rhythms: Shaping the Film Edit


Karen Pearlman - 2009
    Much rarer are books on how an editor thinks and makes decisions. Faced with hundreds of hours of raw footage, a film editor must craft the pieces into a coherent whole. Rhythm is a fundamental tool of the film editor; when a filmmaker adjust the length of shots in relation to one another, he or she affects the entire pace, structure, and mood of the film. Until this book, rhythm was considered a matter of intuition; good editors should just 'know' when to make a cut.Cutting Rhythms breaks down the issue of rhythm in an accessible way that allows filmmakers to apply the principles to their own work and increase their creativity. This book offers possibilities rather than prescriptions. It presents questions editors or filmmakers can ask themselves about their work, and a clear and useful vocabulary for working with those questions.Filled with timeless principles and thought-provoking examples from a variety of international films, this book is destined to become a staple in the filmmaker's library.

Greenscreen Made Easy: Keying and Compositing Techniques for Indie Filmmakers


Jeremy Hanke - 2009
    Rather than chasing high-end cameras that you will probably never get your hands on, discover the most popular cameras and setups for Indie filmmakers that will give you the biggest bang for your buck on screen. Explore how to create and set up your screen, illuminate the greenscreen cleanly, light your subjects dynamically, and manipulate your camera to get the best possible production footage.

On Directing and Dramaturgy: Burning the House


Eugenio Barba - 2009
    This is the theatre for which many of us, directors and leaders of groups, trained for a long time....." - from the IntroductionOn Directing is Eugenio Barba's unprecedented account of his own life and work. This is a major retrospective of Barba's working methods, his practical techniques, and the life experiences which fed directly into his theatre-making.On Directing is an inspirational resource. It is a dramaturgy of dramaturgies, and a professional autobiography, from one of the most significant and influential directors and theorists working today. It provides unique insights into a philosophy and practice of directing for the beginning student, the experienced practitioner, and everyone in between.

The Reel Truth: Everything You Didn't Know You Need to Know About Making an Independent Film


Reed Martin - 2009
    Reed Martin interviewed more than one hundred luminaries from the independent film world to discuss the near misses that almost derailed their first and second films and identify the close shaves that could have cut their careers short. Other books may tell you the best way to make your independent film or online short, but no other book describes so candidly how to spot and avoid such issues and obstacles as equipment problems, shooting-day snafus, postproduction myths, theatrical distribution deal breakers, and dozens of other commonly made missteps, including the top fifty mistakes every filmmaker makes.From personal experience and his years as a freelance reporter covering independent film for USA Today and Filmmaker magazine, Martin uncovers the truth about the risks and potential rewards that go with chasing celluloid glory. Whether you're writing a screenplay, looking for financing, about to start shooting, or thinking about investing time and money (or someone else's money) in an independent film, The Reel Truth is a must-read.

Errol Morris: Interviews


Livia Bloom - 2009
    Morris (b. 1948) has created some of America's most innovative, lasting cinematic works. Generations of filmmakers, scholars, cinephiles, and film fans turn again and again to such works as The Thin Blue Line; Fast, Cheap and Out of Control; Academy Award-winner The Fog of War; and Standard Operating Procedure.Throughout his career--which has included stints as a private eye, film programmer, and commercial director--Morris has honed a unique formal and technical cinematic approach. A Morris film is characterized by intense personal interviews; dramatic re-creations; a haunting, modernist musical atmosphere; and a keen sense of complexity, irony, and black humor. With each new film, Morris challenges and redefines what a documentary can be. This volume features startling interviews from throughout his career, as well as intimate, never-before-published discussions.

Rose Alley


Jeremy M. Davies - 2009
    When violence erupts on the streets of Paris in May 1968, a hapless international film crew finds itself stranded during the shooting of a preposterous low-budget blue movie about notorious 18th century erotic poet John Wilmot, the Earl of Rochester. A deadpan and digressive behind-the-scenes catalog of the actors, filmmakers, bystanders, and subjects involved in this movie, ROSE ALLEY is also a fantastical and venomous love letter to French film and literature, obsessive collectors, pornography, language, revolution, misanthropy, the joys of cross-cultural misunderstanding, and other peculiar objects of affection. As Harry Mathews writes, "you have no excuse not to read this book."

Lata Mangeshkar...in Her Own Voice


Nasreen Munni Kabir - 2009
    The tuneful purity and timeless quality of her voice have had a profound impact. For over six decades, as the much loved singer, she has reigned supreme in Indian film music and has been conferred in 2001, the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian honour. Lata Mangeshkar has recorded more songs than anyone else in the world and yet, despite her extraordinary fame, she is a deeply private person who has mostly shied away from glitz and glamour. "Lata Mangeshkar - in Her Own Voice," a series of fascinating conversations between Lata Mangeshkar and Nasreen Munni Kabir, takes us into the world of India's most gifted singer and reveals the person behind the voice that has provided the soundtrack for the lives of billions.

Federico Fellini: The Films


Tullio Kezich - 2009
    This definitive and important contribution on Federico Fellini chronicles the body of work of one of the most influential and revered directors of all time, and one of Italy’s most important modern cultural icons. It features the great director’s own drawings, sketches, storyboards, notes, and commentary along with behind-the-scenes photographs—both on set and off—and covers each film from the entire span of his career. Largely never before published, the material collected in this lavishly illustrated volume is drawn primarily from the archives of the Fellini Foundation and from the Fellini family’s private collection. This major tribute is certain to be a must-have for any serious cinephile, fan, or student.

Bride of Golden Images


Eve Golden - 2009
    It's taken me nearly ten years-oh, I keep busy-but here is the sequel, Bride of Golden Images (if Abbott and Costello were in this book, yes, it would have been called Abbott and Costello Meet Golden Images). "As in the first book, these articles have all been seen in CI and FGA. But, also as in Golden Images, I have gone over them with a fine-toothed comb: rewriting, doing additional research, and handing it over to my fabulous editor, Richard Kukan, so that clunky phrasing and just plain bad writing can be fixed. "I loved writing for CI and FGA (I basically ran out of subjects, so only do an occasional piece for them now, such as a recent tribute to the late Anita Page). What other publication will happily print pieces on the Duncan Sisters? Judy Tyler? Jimmy Durante? The research and writing were fun for me, and I hope that comes through in these articles. It was an additional kick for me to be able to illustrate this book with photos from The Everett Collection, where I work as an archivist. Bride of Golden Images covers the talkie years, from the late 1920s through the 1960s. It's an eclectic collection of superstars, second bananas, character actors, and stage stars dipping their toes into the movies. Some of them immortal (Garbo, Dietrich, Crawford, Monroe). Some fondly remembered mostly by movie and pop-culture buffs (Carmen Miranda, Edward Everett Horton, Betty Grable, Inger Stevens, Constance Bennett). And then, those whose stories are known only to us few real fanatics: Lyda Roberti, the Hilton sisters, Helen Kane, Renate Muller, Phillips Holmes. If I can bring those people back to life for just a few moments, I will be, as Edith King Hall wrote in a 1900 children's book, 'the happiest little girl in all of Toyland.'

The Big Picture: Filmmaking Lessons from a Life on the Set


Tom Reilly - 2009
    In The Big Picture, he explores the art and the craft of filmmaking from the vantage point of someone actually running the movie set. Using examples unlike any of those in other books on film, Reilly exposes not only the power and the personalities, but the secrets of the pros.  He shares the insights he gleaned while working with more than sixty Oscar-winning professionals?from Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, and Vanessa Redgrave to Sydney Pollack, Sven Nykvist, and Barbra Streisand.            In these fifty entertaining, illuminating short essays, Reilly invites you to join him on the film set. What is it like to shoot a love scene? How do you do a full body burn? What is it like to film in the Everglades or in a morgue? What is blocking or matching, and how long should a script be? How do you decide when to build a set? Why is the color palette so critical?  Is night shooting worth the suffering?            The Big Picture delivers the surprising answers to these and other fascinating questions about what it takes to make a feature film, offering a glimpse into what it’s like when the lights are bright, the camera is rolling, and the moviemakers are calling the shots.

No Country for Old Men: From Novel to Film


Lynnea Chapman King - 2009
    The film earned praise from critics worldwide and was honored with four Academy Awards(R), including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay. In No Country for Old Men: From Novel to Film, scholars offer varied approaches to both the novel and the award-winning film. Beginning with several essays dedicated entirely to the novel and its place within the McCarthy canon, the anthology offers subsequent essays focusing on the film, the adaptation process, and the Coen Brothers more broadly. The book also features an interview with the Coen brothers' long-time cinematographer Roger Deakins. This entertaining and enriching book for readers interested in the Coen Brothers' films and in McCarthy's fiction is an important contribution to both literature and film studies.

Translating Time: Cinema, the Fantastic, and Temporal Critique


Bliss Cua Lim - 2009
    Despite the historicity of clock-time itself, the modern concept of time is considered universal and culturally neutral. What Walter Benjamin called “homogeneous, empty time” founds the modern notions of progress and a uniform global present in which the past and other forms of time consciousness are seen as superseded. In Translating Time, Bliss Cua Lim argues that fantastic cinema depicts the coexistence of other modes of being alongside and within the modern present, disclosing multiple “immiscible temporalities” that strain against the modern concept of homogeneous time. In this wide-ranging study—encompassing Asian American video (On Cannibalism), ghost films from the New Cinema movements of Hong Kong and the Philippines (Rouge, Itim, Haplos), Hollywood remakes of Asian horror films (Ju-on, The Grudge, A Tale of Two Sisters) and a Filipino horror film cycle on monstrous viscera suckers (Aswang)—Lim conceptualizes the fantastic as a form of temporal translation. The fantastic translates supernatural agency in secular terms while also exposing an untranslatable remainder, thereby undermining the fantasy of a singular national time and emphasizing shifting temporalities of transnational reception.Lim interweaves scholarship on visuality with postcolonial historiography. She draws on Henri Bergson’s understanding of cinema as both implicated in homogeneous time and central to its critique, as well as on postcolonial thought linking the ideology of progress to imperialist expansion. At stake in this project are more ethical forms of understanding time that refuse to domesticate difference as anachronism. While supernaturalism is often disparaged as a vestige of primitive or superstitious thought, Lim suggests an alternative interpretation of the fantastic as a mode of resistance to the ascendancy of homogeneous time and a starting-point for more ethical temporal imaginings.

Mack Sennett's Fun Factory: A History and Filmography of His Studio and His Keystone and Mack Sennett Comedies, with Biographies of Players and Personnel


Brent E. Walker - 2009
    The filmography covers the more than 1,000 films Sennett produced, directed, wrote or appeared in between 1908 and 1955, including casts, credits, synopses, production and release dates, locations, cross-references of remade stories and gags, footage excerpted in compilations, identification of prints existing in archives, and other information. The book, featuring 280 photographs, also contains biographies of several hundred performers and technical personnel connected with Sennett.

Changeling (Film): Clint Eastwood, J. Michael Straczynski, Angelina Jolie, Wineville Chicken Coop Murders, Ron Howard, Imagine Entertainment, Brian Grazer, ... Robert Lorenz, Universal Studios


J. Michael Straczynski - 2009
    Michael Straczynski. Based on real life events in 1928 Los Angeles, the film stars Angelina Jolie as a woman who is reunited with her missing son-only to realize he is an impostor. She confronts the city authorities, who vilify her as an unfit mother and brand her delusional. The dramatized incident was connected to the "Wineville Chicken Coop" kidnapping and murder case. Changeling explores female disempowerment, political corruption, child endangerment and the repercussions of violence. Ron Howard intended to direct, but scheduling conflicts led to his replacement by Eastwood. Howard and Imagine Entertainment partner Brian Grazer produced, alongside Malpaso Productions' Robert Lorenz and Eastwood. Universal Pictures financed and distributed the film

Film Is Hell: How I Sold My Soul to Make the Crappiest Movies in History


Matthew Howe - 2009
    Film Is Hell: How I Sold My Soul to Make the Crappiest Movies in History chronicles the outrageous exploits of Sultan Film Productions, a small band of rebel filmmakers who risk death and arrest to produce movies so awful they set the international standard for bad. In their heydey, Sultan?s founders helped create a lucrative niche for low-budget action films during the 1980s home video boom. But when big-budget powerhouses flooded the market in the 1990s, Sultan found itself struggling to survive. Limited resources forced the company to pursue a new strategy?substituting grit, stamina and ingenuity for a reasonable budget. At the heart of Film Is Hell is the narrator?s tale of his personal journey, which is strangely tragic and utterly hilarious. In his literary debut, cinematographer Matthew Howe relates a brutally honest and gripping account of the toll his work takes on his finances, his life and most of all, his psyche. Film Is Hell is both a poignant memoir and a guided tour through the underbelly of the low-budget action film business. The book follows the Sultan crew?s reckless and comedic adventures as they scam their way on board nuclear submarines, hang precariously out of biplanes, get run over by tanks, brave cattle stampedes, and infiltrate Navy SEAL exercises. Howe also recounts his run-ins with such celebrities as Samuel L. Jackson, Mayor Rudy Giuliani, John F. Kennedy, Jr., and Julie Andrews. Writing, producing and shooting for Sultan, Howe endures harrowing, 20-hour workdays and frustrating waits for elusive back-end fees. His desperation and despair escalate each time he has to sacrifice quality due to budget and time constraints. So why would he pass up the opportunity to shoot the critically acclaimed indie film Judy Berlin and the Oscar winning Boys Don?t Cry to stick with Sultan? In Film Is Hell, Howe explores his fateful missteps and makes his peace with them.

Warren Oates: A Wild Life


Susan Compo - 2009
    With his rugged looks and measured demeanor, Oates crafted complex characters that were at once brazen and thoughtful, wild and subdued. Warren Oates: A Wild Life is the first book-length look at the actor whom friends remember as a hard-living, hard-drinking man who was kind and caring, but also as mean as a blue-eyed devil.Born in the small town of Depoy in rural western Kentucky, Oates began his career in the late 1950s with bit parts in television westerns. During this time he met infamous director Sam Peckinpah, establishing a creative relationship and destructive friendship that would spawn some of Oates’s most celebrated and unforgettable roles in films such as Ride the High Country (1962), The Wild Bunch (1969), and Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974). Parts in Major Dundee (1965), In the Heat of the Night (1967) Two-Lane Blacktop (1971), Badlands (1973), and Stripes (1981) show Oates’s penchant for working with seminal filmmakers—directors as diverse and talented as Monte Hellman, Terrence Malick, Ivan Reitman, and Steven Spielberg.With remarkable range and depth he created colorful characters onscreen even as his life offscreen was full of drama, alcohol and drugs. With an engaging style and through careful research, author Susan Compo skillfully captures the nuances of Oates’s life in the first biography of this beloved actor.

Just When You Thought It Was Safe: A JAWS Companion


Patrick A. Jankiewicz - 2009
    Learn the terrifying true story that inspired JAWS! Hear how such classic lines as "Smile, You sonnuva--" and "We need a bigger boat!" were created. Finally, a book about the entire JAWS series! Meet all the first shark's victims, discover behind-the-scenes facts and gossip on JAWS! Encounter those responsible for JAWS 2, JAWS 3-D and JAWS: THE REVENGE! Find out about the aborted JAWS sequel, NATIONAL LAMPOON'S JAWS 3 PEOPLE 0 and which JAWS sequel was supposed to start with the shark eating Chief Brody!" Journalist PAT JANKIEWICZ, writer for FANGORIA and STARLOG takes an incisive look at the amazing story of the entire JAWS franchise!

The Visual Effects Producer: Understanding the Art and Business of Vfx


Charles Finance - 2009
    Also included is a companion website (www.focalpress.com/cw/finance-9780240...) with forms and documents for you to incorporate into your own VFX production workflows.

Xiao Wu, Platform, Unknown Pleasures: Jia Zhangke's Hometown Trilogy


Michael Berry - 2009
    Highlighting Jia’s use of underground shooting techniques, brilliant cinematic language and engagement with other literary and cinematic works, Berry explores the central themes in Jia’s oeuvre: destruction and change, stagnation and movement, the individual versus society, political culture versus popular culture, and, of course, the ceaseless search for home.

TCM Classic Movie Crosswords


Turner Classic Movies - 2009
    Collected here for the first time are 80 challenging and entertainingpuzzles from the guide, featuring clues that will test film fans' knowledge and prompt rediscovery or investigation of classic movie favorites. With a foreword by TCM host Robert Osborne and puzzles interspersed with all-new trivia features focused on classic film stars, this appealing package is sure to please crossword puzzle fans and film buffsalike.

More House


Hannah Calder - 2009
    Two movies share a cast, a crew, and a set. More House, where Granny lives, and straight out of Victorian literature, is the scene of a Gothic period piece. In the other movie, The Lord wields his scepter over another cast of characters including the cook, the butler, the groom, and the maids. Meanwhile, the Girl and her son, Joey, move uneasily between the overlapping, and sometimes fusing, scenarios. Dark, erotic, disturbing, MORE HOUSE is an exuberant display of imagination and wordplay, and showcases an impressive new writing talent. "For a generation of skeptic believers, a new sort of novel, the novel equivocal about its status as a novel. Like Lawrence Braithwaite's More at 7:30, Hannah Calder's MORE HOUSE displays its 'more-ness' right in its title, and lives up to that promise in sequence after sequence of cinematic sweep and ambition. We used to say, everything but the kitchen sink, but Calder gives us the kitchen sinks of two centuries. In the main story of Joey--discontent in death as in life--and his mother--bent forever to her job, like the mother in Intolerance--Calder's prose simmers with hallucinatory heat. She is the most generous and attentive of writers, and one whose experiments crackle and blaze like wildfire, sweeping the landscape of her dreams like panopticon pinlights"--Dodie Bellamy.

Music, Sound, and Silence in Buffy the Vampire Slayer


Janet K. Halfyard - 2009
    This volume, the first devoted to the show's imaginative and widely varied use of music, sound, and silence, helps to develop an increasingly important and inadequately covered area of research - the many roles of music in contemporary television. In addressing this significant gap, this book provides an exemplary overview of the functions of music and sound in the interpretation of a television show. This is done through analyses that focus on scoring and source music, the title theme, the music production process, the critically acclaimed musical episode (voted number 13 in Channel Four's One Hundred Greatest Musicals), the symbolic and dramatic use of silence, and the popular reception of the show by its international fan base. In keeping with contemporary trends in the study of popular musics, a variety of critical approaches are taken from musicology, cultural studies, and media and communication studies, specifically employing critique, musical analysis, industry studies, and hermeneutics.

Growing Up with Monsters


Carla Laemmle - 2009
    Enjoy Carla's tale of growing up on her uncles Universal Studio Lot from 1921 to 1937 and not only witnessing the filming of such early classics as The Hunchback of Notre Dame in 1923, but actually being in The Phantom of the Opera in 1925 and Dracula in 1931, where her "bit" part was that of having the first line of spoken dialogue in that perennial classic vampire film. Beware of vampires and hearses, but enjoy her story's verses! Wonderfully illustrated by MAD Magazines Jack Davis and Hermann Mejia. Foreword provided by master of horror and sci-fi, Ray Bradbury.

Observational Cinema: Anthropology, Film, and the Exploration of Social Life


Anna Grimshaw - 2009
    Anna Grimshaw and Amanda Ravetz provide the first critical history and in-depth appraisal of this movement, examining key works, filmmakers, and theorists, from Andre Bazin and the Italian neorealists, to American documentary films of the 1960s, to extended discussions of the ethnographic films of Herb Di Gioia, David Hancock, and David MacDougall. They make a new case for the importance of observational work in an emerging experimental anthropology, arguing that this medium exemplifies a non-textual anthropology that is both analytically rigorous and epistemologically challenging.

Shadows & Light: Journeys with Outlaws in Revolutionary Hollywood


Gary Warner Kent - 2009
    It is written by writer/director, actor, stuntman, special effects guru, production manager Gary Kent.An officer in this revolution, Kent compiled credits on over one hundred motion pictures and won several major film awards. This book is Kent's homage to the artistic, talented makers of magic, who began on the bottom of the dog-pile making biker flicks and nudie cuties and today find themselves on top of the Hollywood heap. The book is filled with memories, reminiscences, inside information, heretofore unknown facts, anecdotes and photos accumulated over forty-some years in independent, outrageous and courageous cinema. Kent provides a glimpse into the mystery of preparing stunt, action and special effects sequences without resorting to computer graphics and offers an inside take at the making of some favorite motion pictures, from concept to release.The books features stories of William Shatner, Ann-Margret, Brian De Palma, Bruce Campbell, Ed Wood, Charles Manson, Frank Zappa, Duane Eddy, the Hells Angels and others.

Watchmen: The Art of the Film


Peter Aperlo - 2009
    Discover how director Zack Snyder (300) and his crew faithfully recreated the intricately detailed world and characters of the legendary graphic novel in the eagerly awaited film.From the New York City of an alternate 1985 to the surface of Mars, the film adaptation of Watchmen is a triumph of design, filled with unique characters and layer upon layer of arresting detail.Featuring scores of production designs, set photos, costume sketches, storyboards and other pieces of conceptual art, Watchmen: The Art of the Film is a lavish celebration of a comic book made real.

Hollywood Monster: A Walk Down Elm Street with the Man of Your Dreams


Robert Englund - 2009
    The sadistic killer with the flame-charred face. The knife-blade claws. The razor-sharp wit. Freddy...But you've never seen him like this. Unflinching. Uncensored. Unmasked.Meet Robert Englund, the award-winning actor best known for his role as Freddy Krueger -- the legendary horror icon featured on the American Film Institute's "100 Greatest Heroes and Villains" roster -- a character as unforgettable and enduring as Bela Lugosi's Dracula and Boris Karloff's Frankenstein. Now, for the first time, the man behind the latex mask tells his story in this captivating new memoir, published to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the first A Nightmare on Elm Street film.You see, Robert Englund is no monster at all, but a deeply funny, charming Hollywood veteran. Packed with Robert's hilarious stories, playful self-deprecation, and a generous helping of never-before-revealed A Nightmare on Elm Street trivia, Hollywood Monster offers an unparalleled look at the beloved film icon. With insider savvy and gallows humor, Robert recounts his audition for Wes Craven, the inspiration for Freddy's character, the grueling makeup sessions, his soon-to-be-famous costars, the often disastrous on-set blunders, and the wave of popularity that propelled this humble California surfer kid all the way to the top.Of course, fame and fortune as Freddy came years after the young actor shared a trailer with screen legend Henry Fonda, was punched in the face by Richard Gere, took down Burt Reynolds, and muscled his way between Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sally Field, and Jeff Bridges.But soon after his high-profile stint in the groundbreaking TV miniseries V, Robert Englund took on the most celebrated role of his career -- the macabre and wisecracking killer who quickly became a household name. From the moment Freddy Krueger dragged his claws across a rusty pipe in the opening dream sequence, a legend had been unleashed -- and a star was born. This is his story.

America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Film Registry


Daniel Eagan - 2009
    Unlike opinionated "Top 100" and arbitrary "Best of" lists, these are the real thing: groundbreaking films that make up the backbone of American cinema. Some are well-known, such as Citizen Kane, The Jazz Singer, All Quiet on the Western Front, The Birth of a Nation, and Boyz n the Hood. Others are more obscure, such as Blacksmith Scene, The Blue Bird, The Docks of New York, Star Theatre, and A Bronx Morning. Daniel Eagan's beautifully written and authoritative book is for anyone who loves American movies and who wants to learn more about them.

Chris Marker: La Jetee


Janet Harbord - 2009
    This short film--a postapocalyptic story composed almost entirely of black-and-white still photographs -- has been praised by cultural theorists and Netflix subscribers alike. In this illustrated study of "La Jetee," Janet Harbord focuses in part on the film's treatment of time -- its shifts from a pre-war past to a projected future a further future of the future (each with its own signature images and sound) -- arguing that in this way it addresses the nature of consciousness and the simultaneity of time-frames that we inhabit. Harbord moves easily from a close reading of the film to discussions of broader cultural issues, lucidly piecing together the enigma that is "La Jetee.""

Neo-Noir


Mark Bould - 2009
    It knows the rules of the game - and how to break them. From Point Blank (1998) to Oldboy (2003), from Get Carter (2000) to 36 Quai des Orfevres (2004), from Catherine Tramell to Max Payne, neo-noir is a transnational global phenomenon. This wide-ranging collection maps out the terrain, combining genre, stylistic and textual analysis with Marxist, feminist, psychoanalytic and industrial approaches. Essays discuss works from the US, UK, France, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and New Zealand; key figures, such as David Lynch, the Coen Brothers, Quentin Tarantino and Sharon Stone; major conventions, such as the femme fatale, paranoia, anxiety, the city and the threat to the self; and the use of sound and colour.

Afterimages of Gilles Deleuze's Film Philosophy


D.N. Rodowick - 2009
    Author of more than twenty books on literature, music, and the visual arts, Deleuze published the first volume of his two-volume study of film, Cinema 1: The Movement-Image, in 1983 and the second volume, Cinema 2: The Time-Image, in 1985. Since their publication, these books have had a profound impact on the study of film and philosophy. Film, media, and cultural studies scholars still grapple today with how they can most productively incorporate Deleuze’s thought.The first new collection of critical studies on Deleuze’s cinema writings in nearly a decade, Afterimages of Gilles Deleuze’s Film Philosophy provides original essays that evaluate the continuing significance of Deleuze’s film theories, accounting systematically for the ways in which they have influenced the investigation of contemporary visual culture and offering new directions for research.Contributors: Raymond Bellour, Centre Nationale de Recherches Scientifiques; Ronald Bogue, U of Georgia; Giuliana Bruno, Harvard U; Ian Buchanan, Cardiff U; James K. Chandler, U of Chicago; Tom Conley, Harvard U; Amy Herzog, CUNY; András Bálint Kovács, Eötvös Loránd U; Patricia MacCormack, Anglia Ruskin U; Timothy Murray, Cornell U; Dorothea Olkowski, U of Colorado; John Rajchman, Columbia U; Marie-Claire Ropars-Wuilleumier, U Paris VIII; Garrett Stewart, U of Iowa; Damian Sutton, Glasgow School of Art; Melinda Szaloky, UC Santa Barbara.

Time Out Film Guide 2010


Time Out Guides - 2009
    Every review lists credits for cast and other key creative personnel.The guide covers every area of world cinema (it has stronger international coverage than any other film guide): classic silents and 1930s comedies, documentaries and the avant-garde, Europe and Asia, the Hollywood mainstream and B-movie horrors.

The Ultimate Book of Sports Movies: Featuring the 100 Greatest Sports Films of All Time


Ray Didinger - 2009
    Especially sports movies, where every underdog has his day, every team achieves glory, and every hero gets his moment of redemption. Next to watching Monday Night Football, there's nothing more enjoyable than plopping down on the couch with the remote and a bottle of beer and firing up the special-edition DVD of Rocky, Hoosiers, Caddyshack, or any other fan favorite.Now, two nationally renowned sports media personalities take on the task of ranking the top 100 sports movies of all time, including entertaining and informative lists, special features, and contributions from over 75 top sports figures. From drama to comedy to tragedy to documentary, all the greatest sports films are here, brought to life through detailed summaries, fun facts and trivia, behind-the-scenes revelations, plus images from the greatest moments in sports film history.Original comments from some of the top personalities in sports and entertainment--including Peyton and Eli Manning, Charles Barkley, Tony Romo, James Gandolfini, Bill Parcells, Dennis Quaid, Arnold Palmer, and many more--provide further insight and marketing punch.

Star Trek: The Art of the Film


Mark Cotta Vaz - 2009
    Abrams’ new vision of the greatest space adventure of all time, Star Trek features a young, new crew venturing boldly where no man has gone before, as it tells the story of how the brash Starfleet cadet James T. Kirk first meets a Vulcan named Spock, and earns the Captain’s chair of the Starship Enterprise. The film quickly became a critical and commercial smash hit worldwide, as audiences — confirmed Trekkers and newcomers alike — thrilled to a state-of-the-art action epic which both respected the legacy of Gene Roddenberry’s archetypal modern myth and forged ahead into an exciting future of its own.Star Trek: The Art of the Film is a lavishly illustrated celebration of that new vision, tracing the evolution of the movie’s look through a stunning array of previously unseen pre-production paintings, concept sketches, costume and set designs, unit photography and final frames.Written by New York Times-bestselling author Mark Cotta Vaz in close co-operation with the film’s production team, and including a Foreword by J.J. Abrams, this is the essential companion to the film.

Beware of Dug! (Up: Movie Tie In)


Annie Auerbach - 2009
    The two embark on an unforgettable adventure, which includes a mad villain and a sixteen-foot-tall bird. Children will love the humor and adventure in this storybook, which retells scenes from the Disney*Pixar feature film, Up.

Alice Guy Blaché: Cinema Pioneer


Joan Simon - 2009
    From 1896 to 1907, she created films for Gaumont in Paris. In 1907, she moved to the United States and established her own film company, Solax. From 1914 to 1920, Guy Blaché was an independent director for a number of film companies. Despite her immensely productive and creative career, Guy Blaché’s indispensable contribution to film history has been overlooked. She entered the world of filmmaking at its nascent stage, when films were seen primarily as a medium in the service of science or as an adjunct to selling cameras. Working with Gaumont cameramen and cameras and the new technical advances for the projection of film, she became one of the film pioneers ushering in the new era of motion pictures as a narrative form. Written by cinema history experts and curators, this handsome volume brings to light a critical new mass of Guy Blaché’s film oeuvre in an effort to restore her to her rightful place in film history.

Mastering Photographic Composition, Creativity, and Personal Style


Alain Briot - 2009
    Following his successful first book, Mastering Landscape Photography, Briot goes beyond the conventional rules of composition and takes on a fresh, new approach to teaching the art of photography. Based upon his personal experiences as an artist, teacher, and photographer, he opens new doors to the reader-doors leading to new ways of seeing and composing images. Briot approaches fine art photography as being a combination of art and technique. In this new book he addresses both of these by presenting artistic and technical information. On the artistic side, Briot introduces artistic concepts that have been rarely, if ever, associated with photography. On the technical side, he presents numerous tools that can help you learn how to create better photographs and provides technical solutions to common photographic problems. The author practices photography as a fine art. What matters most to him is how photography can be used to express feelings and emotions. For Briot, a good photograph must be both artistically inspired and technically excellent. To have just one of these two elements is not enough for a fine art photograph to be successful. Topics include: - How to compose with color, with black and white, and with light - Why you need to consider your audience while composing a photograph - Recreate the emotions you felt when you captured your photographs - How the elements of color-hue, contrast, and saturation-work in your images - How to control the elements that have a visual effect in your photographs - How to draw upon your personal way of seeing and then share your vision - How to diagnose image maladies and apply the proper remedies - How to define a color palette for a specific photograph - How to use compositional elements to develop a personal style Forweword by Tony Sweet

Robert Bresson: A Passion for Film


Tony Pipolo - 2009
    In thirteen features over a forty-year career, he held to an uncompromising moral vision andaesthetic rigor that remain unmatched. Robert Bresson: A Passion for Film is the first comprehensive study to give equal attention to the films, their literary sources, and psycho-biographical aspects of the work. Concentrating on the films' cinematographic, imagistic, narrative, and thematicstructures, Pipolo provides a nuanced analysis of each film-including nearly 100 illustrations-elucidating Bresson's unique style as it evolved from the impassioned Les Anges du p�che to such disconsolate meditations on the world as The Devil Probably and L'Argent. Special attention is also given topsychosexual aspects of the films that are usually neglected. Bresson has long needed a thoroughgoing treatment by a critic worthy to the task: he gets it here. From it emerges a provocative portrait of an extraordinary artist whose moral engagement and devotion to the craft of filmmaking arewithout equal.

The Night of the Hunter: A Biography of a Film


Jeffrey Couchman - 2009
    It provides the first major study of the long-lost first-draft screenplay by James Agee and confronts a fifty-year controversy about the authorship of the film. This is a story of artistic convergence on many levels--of novelist and director, director and actor, and cinematic form and tastes. The novel, a 1953 debut from Davis Grubb, was a popular and critical success, remaining on the New York Times best-seller list for four months. Hollywood responded to its atmospheric lyricism, and in the hands of first time director Charles Laughton, the book became a film that is equal parts thriller, allegory, and fever dream, filled with slow, inexorable suspense. On the set, Laughton functioned both as an auteur and a collaborator to create his vision of the book, mixing cinematic flourishes both realistic and abstract in sometimes tense situations. The talents that clashed or came together along the road from book to movie make the final film a product of rich stylistic contradiction and rewarding complexity. Through biography, production history, and critical analysis of the novel and film, author Jeffrey Couchman makes the case that this initially overlooked cinematic gem is a prismatic work that continually reveals new aspects of itself.

Philosophy in the Twilight Zone


Noël Carroll - 2009
     Features essays by eminent contemporary philosophers concerning the over-arching themes in The Twilight Zone, as well as in-depth discussions of particular episodes Fuses popular cult entertainment with classical philosophical perspectives Acts as a guide to unearthing larger questions - from human nature to the nature of reality and beyond - posed in the series Includes substantial critical and biographical information on series creator Rob Serling

Militainment, Inc.: War, Media, and Popular Culture


Roger Stahl - 2009
    offers provocative, sometimes disturbing insight into the ways that war is presented and viewed as entertainment-or "militainment"-in contemporary American popular culture. War has been the subject of entertainment for centuries, but Roger Stahl argues that a new interactive mode of militarized entertainment is recruiting its audience as virtual-citizen soldiers. The author examines a wide range of historical and contemporary media examples to demonstrate the ways that war now invites audiences to enter the spectacle as an interactive participant through a variety of channels-from news coverage to online video games to reality television. Simply put, rather than presenting war as something to be watched, the new interactive militainment presents war as something to be played and experienced vicariously. Stahl examines the challenges that this new mode of militarized entertainment poses for democracy, and explores the controversies and resistant practices that it has inspired.This volume is essential reading for anyone interested in the relationship between war and media, and it sheds surprising light on the connections between virtual battlefields and the international conflicts unfolding in Iraq and Afghanistan today.

Will Hay


Graham Rinaldi - 2009
    Working closely with Hay's family, Graham Rinaldi's definitive tribute to the respected comic actor, takes a close look into Hay's on and off-screen personae. Drawing upon Hay's own writings; - newspaper articles, notes from his astronomy observations and pilot's logbooks and extracts from his unfinished and previously unpublished autobiography I Enjoyed Every Minute - the book gives a unique insight into Hay's childhood, his continuous thirst for knowledge and his passion for aviation, astronomy and comedy.This book is illustrated throughout with previously unpublished photographs from Hay's family albums including a rare photograph of Hay with Amy Johnson, plus memorabilia from his performing career. Extensive research into Hay's stage work includes extracts from his original Fourth Form at St Michael's sketches, The Will Hay Radio Programme and, for the first time, from all of his revue and variety shows including Nosey Knows and Moonstruck for Fred Karno.

Paris Movie Walks: Ten Guided Tours Through the City of Lights! Camera! Action!


Michael Schürmann - 2009
    From Truffaut and Godard to Hanks and Hepburn, Paris has been a magnet for filmmakers and movie stars, whose careers don't seem complete unless they've made at least one film in the world's most romantic location. Now see it from a whole new angle through the lenses of famous directors. Four walks take you past all of Paris's famous sites while telling which stars walked these same streets before you and where they paused to kiss or kill. Four more explore hidden nooks that tourists often overlook, and two offer a taste of the Old Paris of '30s and '40s film classics. In addition, a Further Afield chapter features locations that allow you to explore some of Paris's flea markets, green spaces, suburbs, and other areas of interest to visitors and moviemakers. Along the way, the author provides commentary to enrich your appreciation of what you're seeing as you sip a glass of wine or enjoy a coffee at a sidewalk cafe. Each walk starts and ends at a Metro stop for easy access from wherever you may be staying in the City of Light. Maps make it easy to follow the routes, and a film index guides you to the locations used in 160 films, ranging from The Bourne Identity, The Da Vinci Code, and The Devil Wears Prada to oldies but goodies like Charade and Sabrina and such French New Wave classics as Breathless and The 400 Blows. A fresh, fun, low-cost way to explore Paris-for the first time or the fiftieth.

The Apartment Plot: Urban Living in American Film and Popular Culture, 1945 to 1975


Pamela Wojcik - 2009
    From the baby boom years into the 1970s, the apartment plot was not only key to films; it also surfaced in TV shows, Broadway plays, literature, and comic strips, from The Honeymooners and The Mary Tyler Moore Show to Subways are for Sleeping and Apartment 3-G. By identifying the apartment plot as a film genre, Wojcik reveals affinities between movies generally viewed as belonging to such distinct genres as film noir, romantic comedy, and melodrama. She analyzes the apartment plot as part of a mid-twentieth-century urban discourse, showing how it offers a vision of home centered on values of community, visibility, contact, mobility, impermanence, and porousness that contrasts with views of home as private, stable, and family-based. Wojcik suggests that the apartment plot presents a philosophy of urbanism related to the theories of Jane Jacobs and Henri Lefebvre. Urban apartments were important spaces for negotiating gender, sexuality, race, and class in mid-twentieth-century America.

Divas on Screen: Black Women in American Film


Mia Mask - 2009
    Interpreting each woman's celebrity as predicated on a brand of charismatic authority, Mia Mask shows how these female stars have ultimately complicated the conventional discursive practices through which blackness and womanhood have been represented in commercial cinema, independent film, and network television.Mask examines the function of these stars in seminal yet underanalyzed films. She considers Dandridge's status as a sexual commodity in films such as Tamango, revealing the contradictory discourses regarding race and sexuality in segregation-era American culture. Grier's feminist-camp performances in sexploitation pictures Women in Cages and The Big Doll House and her subsequent blaxploitation vehicles Coffy and Foxy Brown highlight a similar tension between representing African American women as both objectified stereotypes and powerful, self-defining icons. Mask reads Goldberg's transforming habits in Sister Act and The Associate as representative of her unruly comedic routines, while Winfrey's daily television performance as self-made, self-help guru echoes Horatio Alger narratives of success. Finally, Mask analyzes Berry's meteoric success by acknowledging the ways in which Dandridge's career made Berry's possible.

Deleuze and the Cinemas of Performance: Powers of Affection


Elena del Rio - 2009
    Drawing on Gilles Deleuze's philosophy of the body, and on Deleuze-Spinoza's relevant concepts of affect and expression, Elena del R�o examines a kind of cinema that she calls 'affective-performative'. The features of this cinema unfold via detailed and engaging discussions of the movements, gestures and speeds of the body in a variety of films by Douglas Sirk, Rainer W. Fassbinder, Sally Potter, Claire Denis, and David Lynch. Key to the book's engagement with performance is a consistent attention to the body's powers of affection. Grounding her analysis in these powers, del R�o shows the insufficiency of former theoretical approaches in accounting for the transformative and creative capacities of the moving body of performance.Deleuze and the Cinemas of Performance will be of interest to any scholars and students of film concerned with bodily aspects of cinema, whether from a Deleuzian, a phenomenological, or a feminist perspective.Key Features*The first study of the interface between Deleuzian theory and film performance.*A sustained consideration of the links between the body of performance and the body of affect.*A reevaluation of central concepts in earlier film theory-from fetishistic spectacle and performativity to Brechtian distanciation, sadomasochism, and narcissism.*An analysis of the relation of the performative body to a feminist politics.*New readings of classical melodramas as well as contemporary independent cinemas.

Ken Russell: Re-Viewing England's Last Mannerist


Kevin Flanagan - 2009
    In this anthology, Kevin Flanagan has compiled essays that simultaneously place Russell's films within various academic contexts-gender studies, Victorian studies, and cultural criticism-on the one hand and expand the foundational history of Russell's career on the other. Ken Russell: Re-Viewing England's Last Mannerist recontextualizes the director's work in light of new approaches to film studies and corrects or amends previous scholarship. This collection tackles Russell's mainstream successes (Tommy, Altered States) and his seldom-seen masterpieces (The Debussy Film, Mahler), as well as his critical flops (Salome's Last Dance, Lady Chatterley's Lover). The book also includes information on Russell's most obscure television films, insights on his controversial films of the 1970s, and a new consideration of Russell's career in light of his recent return to amateur filmmaking. Representing a significant collaboration among scholars, Ken Russell: Re-Viewing England's Last Mannerist reflects a newly revived interest in the work of this important filmmaker.

Bakhtin and the Movies: New Ways of Understanding Hollywood Film


Martin Flanagan - 2009
    Martin Flanagan uses Bakhtins notions of dialogism, chronotope and polyphony to address fundamental questions about film form and reception, focusing particularly on the way cinematic narrative utilizes time and space in its very construction.

Johnny Depp


Paul Duncan - 2009
    Few are so angelically androgynous and masculine in the same breath. From teen hearth-throb to an accomplished actor who has worked with art house directors such as Emir Kusturica, Terry Gilliam, Roman Polanski, Jim Jarmusch, and John Waters, Depp has built himself wildly successful and unconventional career. Movie Icons is a series of photo books that feature the most famous personalities in the history of cinema. These 192-page books are visual biographies of the stars.

Writing Television Sitcoms


Evan S. Smith - 2009
    This new edition of Writing Television Sitcoms features the essential information every would-be teleplay writer needs to know to break into the business, including: - Updated examples from contemporary shows such as 30 Rock, The Office and South Park - Shifts in how modern stories are structured - How to recognize changes in taste and censorship - The reality of reality television - How the Internet has created series development opportunities - A refined strategy for approaching agents and managers - How pitches and e-queries work - or don't - The importance of screenwriting competitions

130 Projects to Get You Into Filmmaking


Elliot Grove - 2009
    Author and filmmaker Elliot Grove introduces students to the craft of making movies by explaining simple techniques and advising on use of readily available, low-budget equipment and software. He devotes special attention to-- The Lingo: film industry vocabulary and money-raising techniques Getting Organized: necessary equipment and how to get it The Shoot: cameras, lighting, sound, storyboards, and more Looking Good: makeup, stunts, special effects, and more Post Production: the editor's role, and much more Additional chapters describe the role of directors and advise students on how to publicize, market, and distribute a film, how to choose a formal film course, and how to turn film training into a professional career. More than 250 color photos and illustrations.

The Personal Camera: Subjective Cinema and the Essay Film


Laura Rascaroli - 2009
    The essay film, together with its cognate forms--the diary, the travelogue, the notebook and the self-portrait--is cinema in the first person. It is a cinema of thought, of investigation and self-reflection, in which the filmmaker, instead of withdrawing behind the camera, comes out into the open, to say 'I', to take responsibility, and to address and engage with the spectator within a shared space of embodied subjectivity. Authorial, experimental and radical, essayistic cinema belongs within the lineage of avant-garde and political filmmaking and responds above all to the need we feel today for more contingent, autobiographical, private forms of expression. This study provides a unique insight into an intricate but fascinating field, by engaging with the work of directors such as Jean-Luc Godard, Chris Marker, Harun Farocki, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Alexander Sokurov, Michelangelo Antonioni, Derek Jarman, Federico Fellini, Wim Wenders, Jonas Mekas and Agn's Varda.

Life As We Show It: Writing on Film


Brian Pera - 2009
    Life As We Show It provides a provocative and thoughtful perspective on the relationship between film and watcher and the experience of viewing life through screen-colored glasses.Other contributors include: Stephen Beachy, Robert Gluck, Fanny Howe, David Trinidad, Lidia Yuknavitch, Veronica Gonzalez, Kevin Killian, Myriam Gurba, Abdellah Taïa, and Dodie Bellamy.

Korean Film Directors: Bong Joon-Ho


Jung Ji-youn - 2009
    Despite earlier strong support for his short film "Incoherence" in 1994, Bong appeared headed for failure.Three years later, however, the tables turned again for Bong. His thriller "Memories of Murder." based on a real-life unsolved serial killer case from recent Korean history, proved a hit. Already noted from its earlier stages as having an outstanding script and being a potentially excellent genre film, "Memories of Murder" drew six million viewers to theaters in Korea alone, received awards at various film festivals, and introduced Bong's name to countries such as the United States, France and Japan. Another three years later, Bong sent ripples through society once again with the sci-fi/monster/disaster film "The Host," setting a Korean box office record of 13 million viewers and achieving the broadest overseas distribution for any Korean film.

The Wrestler


Darren Aronofsky - 2009
    Once a hugely successful WWF wrestler, Randy the Ram now ekes out a living performing for diehard wrestling fans from the 1980s in high school gyms and community centers around New Jersey. But when he suffers a heart attack, Randy’s doctor tells him he needs to lay off the steroids and stop wrestling altogether. Forced out of show business, Randy begins to evaluate the state of his life. But the pull of the spotlight is too strong and he attempts once again to find his way back into the ring. Featuring actors Mickey Rourke, Academy award–winning Marisa Tomei, and Evan Rachel Wood, this book is an extension of Aronofsky’s filmic vision, and will contain film stills, the original shooting script, still photos, original art, and observations by its creators, cast, and crew.

How to do Shakespeare


Adrian Noble - 2009
    Any actor will find this book invaluable. For any student of Shakespeare it should be essential.' (From the Foreword by Ralph Fiennes)'How can I bring the text alive, make it vivid, how do I make people hear it for the first time? How can I enter into that world and not feel a stranger. How can I not feel clumsy and inept? ... How can I speak it without sounding artificial or "actory"? In other words, how can I make it real ...?'Adrian Noble has worked on Shakespeare with everyone from oscar-nominated actors to groups of schoolchildren. Here he draws on several decades of top-level directing experience to shed new light on how to bring some of theatre's seminal texts to life.He shows you how to approach the perennial issues of performing Shakespeare, including:wordplay - using colour and playing plain, wit and comedy, making language muscular building a character - different strategies, using the text, Stanislavski and Shakespeare shape and structure - headlining a speech, playing soliloquys, determining a speech's purpose and letting the verse empower you dialogue - building tension, sharing responsibility and 'passing the ball'.This guided tour of Shakespeare's complex but unfailingly rewarding work stunningly combines instruction and inspiration.

The New Horror Handbook


A.S. Berman - 2009
    Freddy? Jason? Michael Myers? Please! Since the waning days of the 20th century, a renegade band of directors have renounced the cartoon trappings of recent horror flicks and reclaimed the genre for a new generation of fans. Their work is darker, nothing is off limits, and every frame is as beautiful as its contents are disturbing. The New Horror Handbook introduces you to the leaders of this "new horror" movement, including Eli Roth (Hostel, Cabin Fever), Greg McLean (Wolf Creek, Rogue), Vincenzo Natali (Cube, Splice) and John Fawcett (Ginger Snaps, The Dark). The Handbook also examines what's happening on the fringes of modern horror, where you will meet: * Steve Niles, the comic book phenom who dragged horror comics out of their 50-year rut with the hit series 30 Days of Night * Rodrigo Gudino, who started Rue Morgue magazine -- the voice of the "new horror" movement -- just so he could break into horror filmmaking himself * America's youngest horror film director, and the grown-up documentary crew who captured her every move for a film of their own * Horror filmmaker Joe Monks, who just might also be America's only blind director * And many more!

The A to Z of Horror Cinema


Peter Hutchings - 2009
    Horror films range from the subtle and the poetic to the graphic and the gory but what links them all is their ability to frighten, disturb, shock, provoke, delight, irritate, amuse, and bemuse audiences. Horror's capacity to serve as an outlet to capture the changing patterns of our fears and anxieties has ensured not only its notoriety but also its long-term survival and its international popularity. Above all, however, it is the audience's continual desire to experience new frights and evermore-horrifying sights that continue to make films like The Exorcist, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween, Night of the Living Dead, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Psycho, Ringu, and The Shining captivate viewers. The A to Z of Horror Cinema traces the development of horror cinema from the beginning of the 20th century to the present day. This is done through a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries. Entries cover all the major movie villains, including Frankenstein and his monster, the vampire, the werewolf, the mummy, the zombie, the ghost, and the serial killer; the film directors, producers, writers, actors, cinematographers, make-up artists, special effects technicians, and composers who have helped to shape horror history; significant production companies and the major films that have come to stand as milestones in the development of the horror genre; and the different national traditions in horror cinema as well as horror's most popular themes, formats, conventions, and cycles.

Cars: The Rookie


Alan J. Porter - 2009
    See how Lightning McQueen became a Piston Cup sensation in this pulse-pounding collection CARS: THE ROOKIE reveals McQueen's scrappy origins as a local short track racer who dreams of the big time...and recklessly plows his way through the competition to get there Along the way, he meets Mack, who help McQueen catch his lucky break.

Reflections on Blaxploitation: Actors and Directors Speak


David Walker - 2009
    With their afros picked to spherical perfection and their guns blazing, big bad soul brothers and super sexy sisters lit up movie theaters across the country. Never before had black men and women appeared on screen in quite this way. In time, these films would be called "blaxploitation." And while it has long been debated exactly which film launched the blaxploitation era, the financial success of Melvin Van Peebles's Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song and Gordon Parks's Shaft helped open the flood gates for the more than 200 films that are now considered blaxploitation. Reflections on Blaxploitation: Actors and Directors Speak is a collection of interviews with many of the men and women who defined the genre. In candid conversations, some of the most important figures of the era describe what it was like to work on these films and what impact they had on American culture. Among those interviewed are such icons as Jim Brown (Slaughter), Antonio Fargas (Foxy Brown), Gloria Hendry (Hell Up in Harlem), Jim Kelly (Black Belt Jones), Ron O'Neal (Superfly), William Marshall (Blacula), and Fred Williamson (Hammer). Also featured here are some of the most influential names behind the scenes, including Larry Cohen (Black Caesar), Oscar Williams (Five on the Black Hand Side), and Melvin Van Peebles. This volume also includes a filmography of every known (or rumored) blaxploitation film, including their availability on VHS and DVD.

Czech and Slovak Cinema: Theme and Tradition


Peter Hames - 2009
    Linking interwar and postwar cinemas together with developments during the post-Communist period, the volume considers interactions among theme, genre, and visual style and the way in which a range of styles and traditions has extended across different historical periods and political regimes. Czech and Slovak cinema are a unique avenue into Central European film history.

Eisenstein on the Audiovisual: The Montage of Music, Image and Sound in Cinema


Robert Robertson - 2009
    Less is known about his remarkable and extensive writings, which present a continent of ideas about film.  Here Robert Robertson explores a significant area of Eisenstein’s thought: his ideas about the audiovisual in cinema, which are more pertinent today than ever before with the advent of digital technology--music and sound now act as independent variables combined with the visual medium to produce a truly audiovisual result. Eisenstein explored in his writings this complex exciting subject with more depth and originality than any other practitioner. Eisenstein on the Audiovisual is essential reading for anyone who deals with the audiovisual in cinema and related audiovisual forms, including theatre, opera, dance and multimedia.

One Power in the 'Verse: Finding God in Firefly and Serenity


Paul Lytle - 2009
    In ONE POWER IN THE ’VERSE, God’s presence in FIREFLY and its sequel SERENITY is explored in detail, respect, and awe. With careful scholarship, author Paul Lytle shows that God is inexorably woven into the fabric of the ’verse . . . and why it’s better that way.

The Documentary Handbook


Peter Lee-Wright - 2009
    The practical advice and wisdom here is second to none.' Tony Steyger, Principal Lecturer, Southampton Solent University, UKThe Documentary Handbook is a critical introduction to the documentary film, its theory and changing practices. The book charts the evolution of documentary from screen art to core television genre, its metamorphosis into many different types of factual TV programme and its current emergence in forms of new media. It analyses those pathways and the transformation of means of production through economic, technical and editorial changes.The Documentary Handbook explains the documentary process, skills and job specifications for everyone from industry entrants to senior personnel, and shows how the industrial evolution of television has relocated the powers and principles of decision-making. Through the use of professional Expert Briefings it gives practical pointers about programme-making, from research, developing and pitching programme ideas to their production and delivery through a fast-evolving multi-platform universe.

Encyclopedia of French Film Directors 2 Volume Set


Philippe Rege - 2009
    Early silent pioneers Georges M�li�s, Alice Guy Blach� and others followed in the footsteps of the Lumi�re brothers and the tradition of important filmmaking continued throughout the 20th century and beyond. In Encyclopedia of French Film Directors, Philippe R�ge identifies every French director who has made at least one feature film since 1895. From undisputed masters to obscure one-timers, nearly 3,000 directors are cited here, including at least 200 filmmakers not mentioned in similar books published in France. Each director's entry contains a brief biographical summary, including dates and places of birth and death; information on the individual's education and professional training; and other pertinent details, such as real names (when the filmmaker uses a pseudonym). The entries also provide complete filmographies, including credits for feature films, shorts, documentaries, and television work. Some of the most important names in the history of film can be found in this encyclopedia, from masters of the Golden Age--Jean Renoir and Ren� Clair--to French New Wave artists such as Fran�ois Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard.

Visual Effects Arsenal: Vfx Solutions for the Independent Filmmaker


Bill Byrne - 2009
    This essential toolkit provides techniques for creating effects seen in movies such as 300, Spiderman 3, Predator and others, with lessons on how-to: * splatter blood or digitally lop someone's arm off* create a scene with actors running from an explosion* create the twin effect (same actor, same location, 2 performances)* produce space-ship dog fightsOrganized in a ?cookbook? style, this allows you to reference a certain effect in the index and immediately access concise instructions to create that effect. Techniques are demonstrated in each of the most popular software tools- After Effects, Final Cut Studio, Shake, Photoshop, and Combustion are all covered. Brilliant, 4-color presentation provides inspiration and stimulating visual guidance to the lessons presented, while the companion DVD contains project media files enabling you to put concepts learned into immediate practice.

Terrorism in American Cinema: An Analytical Filmography, 1960-2008


Robert Cettl - 2009
    But this early terrorist cinema was centered largely around the Bomb--who had it, who would use it, when--and differs greatly from the terrorist cinema that would follow. Changing world events soon broadened the cinema of terrorism to address emerging international conflicts, including Black September, pre-9/11 Middle Eastern conflicts, and the post-9/11 War on Terror. This analytical filmography of American terrorist films establishes terrorist cinema as a unique subgenre with distinct thematic narrative and stylistic trends. It covers all major American films dealing with terrorism, from Otto Preminger's Exodus (1960) to Ridley Scott's Body of Lies (2008).

I've Met All My Heroes from A to Z


Ron Mâsak - 2009
    There are hundreds more stories and, who knows...if you like, I may just tell you some more of them.

Cadillac Records: Music from the Motion Picture Soundtrack


Hal Leonard Corporation - 2009
    Based on the true story of Southside Chicago's Chess Records, this Sony Pictures film follows the highs and lows of a small recording studio and its talented roster of soon-to-be legends, including Muddy Waters, Etta James, Howlin' Wolf, and Chuck Berry. Songs include: I'm a Man * At Last * No Particular Place to Go * I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man * 6 O'Clock Blues * Last Night * My Babe * Bridging the Gap * and more.

Screening Nostalgia: Populuxe Props and Technicolor Aesthetics in Contemporary American Film


Christine Sprengler - 2009
    She offers a lucid analysis of the development of nostalgia in American society and culture, navigating a path through the key debates and aligning herself with recent attempts to recuperate its critical potential. This journey opens up the myriad permutations of nostalgia across visual and material culture and their interface with cinema, with the 1950s emerging as a privileged moment. Four case studies (Sin City, Far From Heaven, The Aviator and The Good German) analyse the ways in which aspects of visual design such as props, costume and colour contribute to the nostalgic aesthetic, allowing for both critical distance and emotion. Written with verve, style and impressive attention to detail, Screening Nostalgia is an invaluable addition to existing scholarship. It is also essential reading for anyone interested in the ways in which we access the past through cinema.- - Pam Cook, Professor Emerita in Film, University of Southampton

Catherine Breillat


Douglas Keesey - 2009
    Keesey also discusses the literature, films, paintings and photos that have influenced Breillat's work, and extends this to show how Breillat's films have influenced other filmmakers and artists in turn.A lively and accessible introduction, this book will appeal to students and researchers, as well as all those with an interest in gender studies, French film and contemporary cinema.

Clint Eastwood Icon: The Ultimate Film Art Collection


David Frangioni - 2009
    He is a nameless vigilante, a vengeful detective, a bare-knuckle boxer, a Secret Service agent, and countless other definitive screen archetypes now embedded in our shared pop-culture consciousness. However you define him, Clint Eastwood has a powerful and extremely recognizable image that exists as something beyond the narratives of his films. Clint Eastwood ICON presents an unprecedented collection of film art surrounding the legendary actor. This comprehensive trove gathers together poster art, lobby cards, studio ads, and esoteric film memorabilia from around the world. From his early roles as the nameless gunslinger in Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Westerns, to the vigilante films of the 1970s and 1980s, through his directorial roles and latest releases, Clint Eastwood ICON captures the powerful presence and quiet intensity that turned Eastwood into the definitive American hero.

Knave of Spades


Alan Titchmarsh - 2009
    So leaving the comfort and familiarity of his adored Yorkshire home, Alan Titchmarsh still had a lot to prove. A less than distinguished school record meant his new chosen path in life—as a gardener—had a lot to make up for. And it did. Alan’s apprenticeship at Kew Gardens brought him the best training and above all companionship he could want as he began his new southern life. Meanwhile he was also beginning to tread the boards—finding his love of stage and song with a local operatic society. And then of course there was the other love he discovered. From its fumbling beginnings Alan was to begin another journey as confirmed romantic—at last finding the love of his life. In this witty and warm coming of age memoir Alan Titchmarsh proves once again why he is a British national treasure.

The Futurist: The Life and Films of James Cameron


Rebecca Keegan - 2009
    It’s a distinction he’s long been building, through a directing career that includes such cinematic landmarks as The Terminator, Aliens, The Abyss, and the highest grossing movie of all time, Titanic. The Futurist is the first in-depth look at every aspect of this audacious creative genius—culminating in an exclusive behind-the-scenes glimpse of the making of Avatar, the movie that promises to utterly transform the way motion pictures are created and perceived. As decisive a break with the past as the transition from silents to talkies, Avatar pushes 3-D, live action, and photo-realistic CGI to a new level. It rips through the emotional barrier of the screen to transport the audience to a fabulous new virtual world.            With cooperation from the often reclusive Cameron, author Rebecca Keegan has crafted a singularly revealing portrait of the director’s life and work. We meet the young truck driver who sees Star Wars and sets out to learn how to make even better movies himself—starting by taking apart the first 35mm camera he rented to see how it works. We observe the neophyte director deciding over lunch with Arnold Schwarzenegger that the ex-body builder turned actor is wrong in every way for the Terminator role as written, but perfect regardless. After the success of The Terminator, Cameron refines his special-effects wizardry with a big-time Hollywood budget in the creation of the relentlessly exciting Aliens. He builds an immense underwater set for The Abyss in the massive containment vessel of an abandoned nuclear power plant—where he pushes his scuba-breathing cast to and sometimes past their physical and emotional breaking points (including a white rat that Cameron saved from drowning by performing CPR). And on the set of Titanic, the director struggles to stay in charge when someone maliciously spikes craft services’ mussel chowder with a massive dose of PCP, rendering most of the cast and crew temporarily psychotic.            Now, after his movies have earned over $5 billion at the box office, James Cameron is astounding the world with the most expensive, innovative, and ambitious movie of his career. For decades the moviemaker has been ready to tell the Avatar story but was forced to hold off his ambitions until technology caught up with his vision. Going beyond the technical ingenuity and narrative power that Cameron has long demonstrated, Avatar shatters old cinematic paradigms and ushers in a new era of storytelling.                                                                                                  The Futurist is the story of the man who finally brought movies into the twenty-first century.

Michael Haneke's Cinema: The Ethic of the Image


Catherine Wheatley - 2009
    In this first English-language introduction to, and critical analysis of, his work, each of Haneke's eight feature films are considered in detail. Particular attention is given to what the author terms Michael Haneke's 'ethical cinema' and the unique impact of these films upon their audiences.Drawing on the moral philosophy of Immanuel Kant and Stanley Cavell, Catherine Wheatley, introduces a new way of marrying film and moral philosophy, which explicitly examines the ethics of the film viewing experience. Haneke's films offer the viewer great freedom whilst simultaneously imposing a considerable burden of responsibility. How Haneke achieves this break with more conventional spectatorship models, and what its far-reaching implications are for film theory in general, constitute the principal subject of this book.