Book picks similar to
The Logic of Images: Essays and Conversations by Wim Wenders
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cinema
art
non-fiction
Laura Mulvey, Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema
Carolina Hein - 2006
These changes can be seen in every field of life. For instance, the way of supplying basic needs or the way how to make own life better, but also certain norms and values are quite different today. Instead of visiting a theatre in order to be entertained, people can watch TV or use the internet. If a man and a woman live together unmarried, hardly anybody will be shocked about that fact. But often certain attitudes are anchored in society and can hardly be changed. One example is the determination which individual role men and women are likely to play as members of a society and how their image appears in every culture. It is especially interesting to see how the media represent women, the so called -weaker sex-. The following pages respond with the representation of women through the years. Additionally, they deal with problems and consequences coming up because of the difference between men and women.
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
Anne Lamott - 1994
[It] was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother's shoulder, and said. 'Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.'"With this basic instruction always in mind, Anne Lamott returns to offer us a new gift: a step-by-step guide on how to write and on how to manage the writer's life. From "Getting Started,' with "Short Assignments," through "Shitty First Drafts," "Character," "Plot," "Dialogue." all the way from "False Starts" to "How Do You Know When You're Done?" Lamott encourages, instructs, and inspires. She discusses "Writers Block," "Writing Groups," and "Publication." Bracingly honest, she is also one of the funniest people alive.If you have ever wondered what it takes to be a writer, what it means to be a writer, what the contents of your school lunches said about what your parents were really like, this book is for you. From faith, love, and grace to pain, jealousy, and fear, Lamott insists that you keep your eyes open, and then shows you how to survive. And always, from the life of the artist she turns to the art of life.
The Big Goodbye: Chinatown and the Last Years of Hollywood
Sam Wasson - 2020
and Fosse comes the revelatory account of the making of a modern American masterpiece Chinatown is the Holy Grail of 1970s cinema. Its twist ending is the most notorious in American film and its closing line of dialogue the most haunting. Here for the first time is the incredible true story of its making.In Sam Wasson's telling, it becomes the defining story of the most colorful characters in the most colorful period of Hollywood history. Here is Jack Nicholson at the height of his powers, as compelling a movie star as there has ever been, embarking on his great, doomed love affair with Anjelica Huston. Here is director Roman Polanski, both predator and prey, haunted by the savage death of his wife, returning to Los Angeles, the scene of the crime, where the seeds of his own self-destruction are quickly planted. Here is the fevered dealmaking of "The Kid" Robert Evans, the most consummate of producers. Here too is Robert Towne's fabled script, widely considered the greatest original screenplay ever written. Wasson for the first time peels off layers of myth to provide the true account of its creation.Looming over the story of this classic movie is the imminent eclipse of the '70s filmmaker-friendly studios as they gave way to the corporate Hollywood we know today. In telling that larger story, The Big Goodbye will take its place alongside classics like Easy Riders, Raging Bulls and The Devil's Candy as one of the great movie-world books ever written.Praise for Sam Wasson:"Wasson is a canny chronicler of old Hollywood and its outsize personalities...More than that, he understands that style matters, and, like his subjects, he has a flair for it." -
The New Yorker
"Sam Wasson is a fabulous social historian because he finds meaning in situations and stories that would otherwise be forgotten if he didn't sleuth them out, lovingly." - Hilton Als
The Warrior's Camera: The Cinema of Akira Kurosawa - Revised and Expanded Edition
Stephen Prince - 1990
Rashomon, which won both the Venice Film Festival's grand prize and an Academy Award for best foreign-language film, helped ignite Western interest in the Japanese cinema. Seven Samurai and Yojimbo remain enormously popular both in Japan and abroad. In this newly revised and expanded edition of his study of Kurosawa's films, Stephen Prince provides two new chapters that examine Kurosawa's remaining films, placing him in the context of cinema history. Prince also discusses how Kurosawa furnished a template for some well-known Hollywood directors, including Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and George Lucas.Providing a new and comprehensive look at this master filmmaker, The Warrior's Camera probes the complex visual structure of Kurosawa's work. The book shows how Kurosawa attempted to symbolize on film a course of national development for post-war Japan, and it traces the ways that he tied his social visions to a dynamic system of visual and narrative forms. The author analyzes Kurosawa's entire career and places the films in context by drawing on the director's autobiography--a fascinating work that presents Kurosawa as a Kurosawa character and the story of his life as the kind of spiritual odyssey witnessed so often in his films. After examining the development of Kurosawa's visual style in his early work, The Warrior's Camera explains how he used this style in subsequent films to forge a politically committed model of filmmaking. It then demonstrates how the collapse of Kurosawa's efforts to participate as a filmmaker in the tasks of social reconstruction led to the very different cinematic style evident in his most recent films, works of pessimism that view the world as resistant to change.
2001: A Space Odyssey
Peter Krämer - 2010
It has been celebrated for its beauty and mystery, its realistic depiction of space travel and dazzling display of visual effects, the breathtaking scope of its story, which reaches across millions of years, and the thought-provoking depth of its meditation on evolution, technology and humanity's encounters with the unknown. 2001 has been described as the most expensive avant-garde movie ever made and as a psychedelic trip, a unique expression of the spirit of the 1960s and as a timeless masterpiece. Peter Krämer's insightful study explores the complex origins of the film, the unique shape it took and the extraordinary impact it made on contemporary audiences. Drawing on new research in the Stanley Kubrick Archive at the University of the Arts London, Krämer challenges many of the widely-held assumptions about the film. He argues that 2001 was Kubrick's attempt to counter the deep pessimism of his previous film, Dr Strangelove (1964), which culminates in the explosion of a nuclear 'doomsday' device, with a more hopeful vision of humanity's future, facilitated by the intervention of mysterious extra-terrestrial artifacts. This study traces the project's development from the first letter Kubrick wrote to his future collaborator Arthur C. Clarke in March 1964 all the way to the dramatic changes Kubrick made to the film shortly before its release by MGM in April 1968. Krämer shows that, despite – or, perhaps, because of – Kubrick's daring last-minute decision to turn the film itself into a mysterious artifact, 2001 was an instant success with both critics and general audiences, and has exerted enormous influence over Hollywood's output of science fiction movies ever since. The book argues that 2001 invites us to enjoy and contemplate its sounds and images over and over again, and, if we are so inclined, to take away from it an important message of hope.
Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures
Mary Ruefle - 2012
—New York Times Book ReviewNo writer I know of comes close to even trying to articulate the weird magic of poetry as Ruefle does. She acknowledges and celebrates in the odd mystery and mysticism of the act—the fact that poetry must both guard and reveal, hint at and pull back... Also, and maybe most crucially, Ruefle’s work is never once stuffy or overdone: she writes this stuff with a level of seriousness-as-play that’s vital and welcome, that doesn’t make writing poetry sound anything but wild, strange, life-enlargening fun. -The Kenyon ReviewProfound, unpredictable, charming, and outright funny...These informal talks have far more staying power and verve than most of their kind. Readers may come away dazzled, as well as amused... —Publishers WeeklyThis is a book not just for poets but for anyone interested in the human heart, the inner-life, the breath exhaling a completion of an idea that will make you feel changed in some way. This is a desert island book. —Matthew DickmanThe accomplished poet is humorous and self-deprecating in this collection of illuminating essays on poetry, aesthetics and literature... —San Francisco ExaminerOver the course of fifteen years, Mary Ruefle delivered a lecture every six months to a group of poetry graduate students. Collected here for the first time, these lectures include "Poetry and the Moon," "Someone Reading a Book Is a Sign of Order in the World," and "Lectures I Will Never Give." Intellectually virtuosic, instructive, and experiential, Madness, Rack, and Honey resists definition, demanding instead an utter—and utterly pleasurable—immersion. Finalist for the 2012 National Book Critics Circle Award.Mary Ruefle has published more than a dozen books of poetry, prose, and erasures. She lives in Vermont.
Ray Harryhausen: An Animated Life
Ray Harryhausen - 2004
In the animator's own words, accompanied by hundreds of previously unpublished photographs, sketches, and storyboards from his personal archive, this book details Harryhausen's entire film career, from 20 Million Miles to Earth and Earth vs. The Flying Saucers to Clash of the Titans and Jason and the Argonauts. In words and images, this book explains the basics of special effects and stop-motion animation, along the way telling entertaining tales of working with the film stars of the day, such as Laurence Olivier, Maggie Smith, and Lionel Jeffries. Film buffs will relish such revelations as how Raquel Welch was picked up by a flying dinosaur in One Million Years B.C., why the octopus in Mysterious Island was really only a sixtopus, and what Medusa's blood was made from in Clash of the Titans.
Who the Hell's in It: Conversations With Hollywood's Legendary Actors
Peter Bogdanovich - 2000
He started out as an actor (he debuted on the stage in his sixth-grade production of Finian’s Rainbow); he watched actors work (he went to the theater every week from the age of thirteen and saw every important show on, or off, Broadway for the next decade); he studied acting, starting at sixteen, with Stella Adler (his work with her became the foundation for all he would ever do as an actor and a director).Now, in his new book, Who the Hell’s in It, Bogdanovich draws upon a lifetime of experience, observation and understanding of the art to write about the actors he came to know along the way; actors he admired from afar; actors he worked with, directed, befriended. Among them: Lauren Bacall, Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, John Cassavetes, Charlie Chaplin, Montgomery Clift, Marlene Dietrich, Henry Fonda, Ben Gazzara, Audrey Hepburn, Boris Karloff, Dean Martin, Marilyn Monroe, River Phoenix, Sidney Poitier, Frank Sinatra, and James Stewart.Bogdanovich captures—in their words and his—their work, their individual styles, what made them who they were, what gave them their appeal and why they’ve continued to be America’s iconic actors.On Lillian Gish: “the first virgin hearth goddess of the screen . . . a valiant and courageous symbol of fortitude and love through all distress.” On Marlon Brando: “He challenged himself never to be the same from picture to picture, refusing to become the kind of film star the studio system had invented and thrived upon—the recognizable human commodity each new film was built around . . . The funny thing is that Brando’s charismatic screen persona was vividly apparent despite the multiplicity of his guises . . . Brando always remains recognizable, a star-actor in spite of himself. ” Jerry Lewis to Bogdanovich on the first laugh Lewis ever got onstage: “I was five years old. My mom and dad had a tux made—I worked in the borscht circuit with them—and I came out and I sang, ‘Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?’ the big hit at the time . . . It was 1931, and I stopped the show—naturally—a five-year-old in a tuxedo is not going to stop the show? And I took a bow and my foot slipped and hit one of the floodlights and it exploded and the smoke and the sound scared me so I started to cry. The audience laughed—they were hysterical . . . So I knew I had to get the rest of my laughs the rest of my life, breaking, sitting, falling, spinning.”John Wayne to Bogdanovich, on the early years of Wayne’s career when he was working as a prop man: “Well, I’ve naturally studied John Ford professionally as well as loving the man. Ever since the first time I walked down his set as a goose-herder in 1927. They needed somebody from the prop department to keep the geese from getting under a fake hill they had for Mother Machree at Fox. I’d been hired because Tom Mix wanted a box seat for the USC football games, and so they promised jobs to Don Williams and myself and a couple of the players. They buried us over in the properties department, and Mr. Ford’s need for a goose-herder just seemed to fit my pistol.”These twenty-six portraits and conversations are unsurpassed in their evocation of a certain kind of great movie star that has vanished. Bogdanovich’s book is a celebration and a farewell.From the Hardcover edition.
Directing the Story: Professional Storytelling and Storyboarding Techniques for Live Action and Animation
Francis Glebas - 2008
They will learn classic visual storytelling techniques such as conveying meaning with images and directing the viewer's eye. Glebas also teaches how to spot potential problems before they cost time and money, and he offers creative solutions on how to solve them.
The Films of Akira Kurosawa
Donald Richie - 1965
Through his long and distinguished career he managed, like very few others in the teeth of a huge and relentless industry, to elevate each of his films to a distinctive level of art. His Rashomon—one of the best-remembered and most talked-of films in any language—was a revelation when it appeared in 1950 and did much to bring Japanese cinema to the world's attention. Kurosawa's films display an extraordinary breadth and an astonishing strength, from the philosophic and sexual complexity of Rashomon to the moral dedication of Ikiru, from the naked violence of Seven Samurai to the savage comedy of Yojimbo, from the terror-filled feudalism of Throne of Blood to the piercing wit of Sanjuro.
Art Matters
Neil Gaiman - 2018
(Neil Gaiman)Drawn from Gaiman's trove of published speeches, poems and creative manifestos, 'ART MATTERS' is an embodiment of this remarkable multimedia artist's vision - an exploration of how reading, imagining, and creating can transform the world and our lives. 'ART MATTERS' brings together four of Gaiman's most beloved writings on creativity and artistry:❖1❖"CREDO", his remarkably concise and relevant manifesto on free expression, first delivered in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo shootings❖2❖"MAKE GOOD ART", his famous 2012 commencement address delivered at the Philadelphia University of the Arts❖3❖"MAKING A CHAIR", a poem about the joys of creating something, even when the words won't come❖4❖"ON LIBRARIES", an impassioned argument for libraries that illuminates their importance to our future and celebrates how they foster readers and daydreamers.'ART MATTERS' is a stirring testament to the freedom of ideas that inspire us to make art in the face of adversity and dares us to choose to be bold.RUNNING TIME ⇰ 49mins.©2018 Neil Gaiman (P)2018 HarperCollins Publishers
Digital Filmmaking
Mike Figgis - 2007
The technology exists, the equipment is much cheaper than it was, the post-production facilities are on a laptop computer, the entire equipment to make a film can go in a couple of cases and be carried as hand luggage on a plane. —Mike FiggisIn this indispensable guide, Academy Award nominee Mike Figgis offers the reader a step-by-step tutorial in how to use digital filmmaking technology so as to get the very best from it. He outlines the equipment and its uses, and provides an authoritative guide to the shooting process—from working with actors to lighting, framing, and camera movement. He dispenses further wisdom on the editing process and the use of sound and music, all while establishing a sound aesthetic basis for the digital format.Offering everything that you could wish to know on the subject, this is a handbook that will become an essential backpocket eference for the digital film enthusiast—whether your goal is to make no-budget movies or simply to put your video camera to more use than just holidays and weddings.
Searching for John Ford
Joseph McBride - 2001
Joseph McBride’s Searching for John Ford surpasses all previous biographies of the filmmaker in its depth, originality, and insight. Encompassing and illuminating Ford’s myriad complexities and contradictions, McBride traces the trajectory of Ford’s life from his beginnings as “Bull” Feeney, the nearsighted, football-playing son of Irish immigrants in Portland, Maine, to his recognition, after a long, controversial, and much-honored career, as America’s national mythmaker. Blending lively and penetrating analyses of Ford’s films with an impeccably documented narrative of the historical and psychological contexts in which those films were created, McBride has at long last given John Ford the biography his stature demands.
Criterion Designs
The Criterion Collection - 2014
This volume gathers highlights from designs commissioned by the Criterion Collection, featuring covers, supplemental art, and never-before-seen sketches and concept art plus a gallery of every Criterion cover since the collection’s first laserdisc in 1984. From avant-garde experiments to big-budget blockbusters, cult favorites to the towering classics of world cinema, the depth and breadth of what film can be is on display in these striking images. Whether painstakingly faithful re-creations or bold re-imaginings, the stunningly diverse designs collected here offer new ways for cinephiles and design aficionados alike to engage with the world’s greatest filmmakers.
Reality Hunger: A Manifesto
David Shields - 2010
YouTube and Facebook dominate the web. In Reality Hunger: A Manifesto, his landmark new book, David Shields (author of the New York Times best seller The Thing About Life Is That One Day You’ll Be Dead) argues that our culture is obsessed with “reality” precisely because we experience hardly any.Most artistic movements are attempts to figure out a way to smuggle more of what the artist thinks is reality into the work of art. So, too, every artistic movement or moment needs a credo, from Horace’s Ars Poetica to Lars von Trier’s “Vow of Chastity.” Shields has written the ars poetica for a burgeoning group of interrelated but unconnected artists in a variety of forms and media who, living in an unbearably manufactured and artificial world, are striving to stay open to the possibility of randomness, accident, serendipity, spontaneity; actively courting reader/listener/viewer participation, artistic risk, emotional urgency; breaking larger and larger chunks of “reality” into their work; and, above all, seeking to erase any distinction between fiction and nonfiction.The questions Reality Hunger explores—the bending of form and genre, the lure and blur of the real—play out constantly all around us. Think of the now endless controversy surrounding the provenance and authenticity of the “real”: A Million Little Pieces, the Obama “Hope” poster, the sequel to The Catcher in the Rye, Robert Capa’s “The Falling Soldier” photograph, the boy who wasn’t in the balloon. Reality Hunger is a rigorous and radical attempt to reframe how we think about “truthiness,” literary license, quotation, appropriation.Drawing on myriad sources, Shields takes an audacious stance on issues that are being fought over now and will be fought over far into the future. People will either love or hate this book. Its converts will see it as a rallying cry; its detractors will view it as an occasion for defending the status quo. It is certain to be one of the most controversial and talked-about books of the year.