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.

Fear: The Autobiography of Dario Argento


Dario Argento - 2014
    For many years Argento's ground-breaking shockers like Deep Red, Suspiria, Inferno and Opera meant box-office gold. Now the maverick auteur, lauded as the Italian Hitchcock and the Horror Fellini, has written his autobiography, revealing all about his fascinating life, his dark obsessions, his talented family, his perverse dreams, and his star-crossed work.With candour and honesty, Fear lifts the lid on Argento's glittering career, from his childhood mixing with glamorous Italian movie stars to his start in the fledgling field of cinema criticism, Argento shares compelling anecdotes about his life growing up in La Dolce Vita Rome. Born into a family that breathed cinema, as a child Dario Argento was a voracious devourer of books and films. Bored by school so much that he fled to Paris, the young Dario felt at ease only in the darkness of a cinema - where he found fertile soil in which his solitary nature and overflowing imagination could flourish.But it was his experience as a journalist that led to his life-changing encounter with Sergio Leone, for whom he and Bernardo Bertolucci wrote the script for Once Upon a Time in the West. Meanwhile, the mind of the future director developed a desire as ambitious as it was magnificent: to make a film in a new style, distinct from all others. Channelling the films of Hitchcock, Lang and Antonioni triggered a wealth of ideas that changed the history of cinema.His first film came out in 1970 - The Bird with the Crystal Plumage. In no time at all the name of Dario Argento was known across the globe. And soon enough a series of classic films including Deep Red and Suspiria saw the light of the projector beam. Dario Argento is a maverick auteur who captured his personal demons on celluloid.At last, his fascinating life story can be told: his passions, his loves, his fears. In his autobiography, alongside the tale of an inspirational film director making his mark on the world, one glimpses the anxieties of a driven but shy man, in love with cinema and life itself. Adapted from the Italian translation and illustrated with rare photographs, the award-winning and critically acclaimed Master of Terror tells all. So put on your black leather gloves and start turning the pages of Fear for the answer to every question you've ever wanted to ask about the weird and wonderful world of Dario Argento.

Phantom Lady: Hollywood Producer Joan Harrison, the Forgotten Woman Behind Hitchcock


Christina Lane - 2020
    A few short years later, she was Alfred Hitchcock’s confidante and one of the Oscar-nominated screenwriters of his first American film, Rebecca. Harrison had quickly grown from being the worst secretary Hitchcock ever had to one of his closest collaborators, critically shaping his brand as the “Master of Suspense.” Forging her own public persona as the female Hitchcock, Harrison went on to produce numerous Hollywood features before becoming a television pioneer as the producer of Alfred Hitchcock Presents. A respected powerhouse, she acquired a singular reputation for running amazingly smooth productions— and defying anyone who posed an obstacle. She built most of her films and series from the ground up. She waged rough-and-tumble battles against executives and censors, and even helped to break the Hollywood blacklist. She teamed up with many of the most respected, well-known directors, writers, and actors of the twentieth century. And she did it all on her own terms. Author Christina Lane shows how this stylish, stunning woman became Hollywood’s most powerful female writer-producer—one whom history has since overlooked.

Foxy: My Life in Three Acts


Pam Grier - 2010
    Others may know her from her role as Kit Porter on "The L Word." But that only defines one part of the legend that is Pam Grier. Foxy is Pam's testimony of her life, past and present. In it, she reveals her relationships with Richard Pryor, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Freddie Prinze Sr., among others. She unveils her experiences as a backup singer and a blaxploitation star. In particularly candid and shocking chapters, she shares-for the first time-her view of those films and the persecution that blacks, especially women, needed to endure to make a name for themselves . . . including how it felt to be labeled one of the most beautiful women alive, yet not be permitted to try on clothes in a department store because of the color of her skin. And in words sure to inspire many, she tells the story of her ongoing battle with cancer. From her disappointments to her triumphs, nothing is held back. With FOXY, Pam wishes to impart life lessons to her readers-and hopes to touch their hearts.

The Unruly Life of Woody Allen: A Biography


Marion Meade - 2000
    Until now, there has been little scrutiny of that life. The reason: Woody viewed biographers as the Ebola plague, dangerous, uncontrollable contagions that might squish his public persona into mousse. Allen's prolific achievements are all but unparalleled in cinematic history. To fans, his films have always represented an ongoing autobiography, through which he has bared his self-deprecating overanalytical soul to the world. It was not until 1992, when his stormy private life turned into sensational headlines, that the cracks in the familiar persona appeared. The lines separating art and fact, myth and reality, public and private life, became increasingly blurred.Marion Meade has tracked down scores of people in Allen's life who have never before spoken to an Allen biographer: boyhood pals; Brooklyn neighbors and teachers; colleagues Buddy Hackett and Mel Brooks from his early career as a television writer and stand-up comic; actors Maureen Stapleton, Max von Sydow, and Bob Hope; director Sydney Pollack; and the film reviewers who have followed his career for decades -- Vincent Canby, Roger Ebert, Stanley Kauffmann, Andrew Sarris, and John Simon. She also details the numerous examples of art imitating life in Allen's films, particularly the extraordinary saga behind his marriage to the adopted daughter of his long-time lover, Mia Farrow.In reconstructing Allen's life, Meade explores the cult of celebrity in America -- how it is our own infatuation with the rich and famous that has made it possiblefor this supremely talented man to shrewdly manipulate both the media and the moviegoing public.

Dennis Hopper: The Wild Ride of a Hollywood Rebel


Peter L. Winkler - 2011
    Always intent on proving his genius and leaving a legacy, the Emmy and Oscar-nominated Hopper acted in more than 115 movies and four TV series, directed seven films, and passionately pursued an artist's life as a photographer and creator and collector of modern art, embracing the work of artists like Warhol and Lichtenstein before the label "pop art" was even coined. Dennis Hopper: The Wild Ride of a Hollywood Rebel explores Hopper's life from his lonely childhood in Kansas, where he became determined to win the affection of others by becoming a great artist, to his often drug-fueled days and nights in Hollywood and his spiritual home in Taos, New Mexico. From Hopper's early days in Hollywood, where he had an affair with 16-year-old Natalie Wood and took acting lessons from James Dean while making Rebel Without a Cause and Giant, his '60s head trips and the making of Easy Rider, the crushing failure of The Last Movie and his lost years in Taos, to his recovery and political right turn in the '80s, Dennis Hopper: The Wild Ride of a Hollywood Rebel unsparingly documents his journey from a self-destructive bad boy to a reformed member of the Hollywood establishment and iconic survivor of the counterculture. The book also delves into Hopper's tumultuous personal life, including his dramatic attempt to divorce his last wife while he battled terminal cancer. This is the first book to cover the entire life and career of the man who hung out with James Dean, Elvis Presley, and Jack Nicholson, costarred in and directed Easy Rider, and came back big in Blue Velvet, overcoming years of alcoholism and drug addiction. Dennis Hopper: The Wild Ride of a Hollywood Rebel is a must-have for Hopper's fans, film buffs, and readers hooked on celebrity scandals.

The Movies, Mr. Griffith, And Me


Lillian Gish - 1969
    

It's Good to Be the King: The Seriously Funny Life of Mel Brooks


James Robert Parish - 2007
    Offering many insights into the wacky world of Brooks and his many collaborators, as well as an intimate look into his successful marriage to the brilliant and beautiful actress Anne Bancroft, It's Good to Be the King might just be the most delightful, engaging, and entertaining biography you'll ever read.

Lord of Misrule


Christopher Lee - 2003
    In Lord of Misrule, Lee tells the story of his exceptional career, in films like The Curse of Frankenstein, the James Bond classic The Man with the Golden Gun, and more recently, in Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow. After appearing in more than 300 films, and a legend in his own right, Lee undertook one of the most demanding roles of his career as Saruman in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings. Shortly after, as one of the most powerful adversaries in the Star Wars canon, Lee proved that at 80, he is still a commanding screen presence. Written with self–deprecating wit and laced with hilarious anecdotes, Lord of Misrule is a marvelous career history of the man The Guardian called “the coolest actor on the planet.”

The Official Razzie Movie Guide: Enjoying the Best of Hollywood's Worst


John Wilson - 2005
    A paperback guide to 100 of the funniest bad movies ever made, this book covers a wide range of hopeless Hollywood product, and also including rare Razzie ceremony photos and a complete history of everything ever nominated for Tinsel Town's Tackiest Trophy.

Alfred Hitchcock


Peter Ackroyd - 2015
    Fat, lonely, burning with fear and ambition, his childhood was an isolated one, scented with fish from his father's shop. Afraid to leave his bedroom, he would plan great voyages, using railway timetables to plot an exact imaginary route across Europe. So how did this fearful figure become the one of the most respected film directors of the twentieth century?As an adult, Hitch rigorously controlled the press's portrait of himself, drawing certain carefully selected childhood anecdotes into full focus and blurring all others out. In this quick-witted portrait, Ackroyd reveals something more: a lugubriously jolly man fond of practical jokes, who smashes a once-used tea cup every morning to remind himself of the frailty of life. Iconic film stars make cameo appearances, just as Hitch did in his own films. Grace Kelly, Carey Grant and James Stewart despair of his detached directing style, and, perhaps most famously of all, Tippi Hedren endures cuts and bruises from a real-life fearsome flock of birds.Alfred Hitchcock wrests the director's chair back from the master of control and discovers what lurks just out of sight, in the corner of the shot.

Keith Richards: In His Own Words


Keith Richards - 1994
    Rhythm guitarist with The Rolling Stones for over 30 years, he is also famous in his own right as a solo artist.

David Lynch: Beautiful Dark


Greg Olson - 2008
    Lynch's films delve into the subjective consciousness of his characters to reveal both the depraved darkness and luminous spirituality of human nature. From his experimental shorts of the 1960s to feature films like Eraserhead, The Elephant Man, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive, and INLAND EMPIRE, Lynch has pushed the boundaries of cinematic storytelling. In David Lynch: Beautiful Dark, author Greg Olson explores the surreal intricacies of the director's unique visual and visceral style not only in his full-length films but also his early forays into painting and short films, as well as his television landmark, Twin Peaks. This in-depth exploration is the first full-length work to analyze the intimate symbiosis between Lynch's life experience and artistic expressions: from the small-town child to the teenage painter to the 60-year-old Internet and digital media experimenter. To fully delineate the director's life and art, Olson received unprecedented participation from Lynch, his parents, siblings, old school friends, romantic partners, children, and decades of professional colleagues, as well as on-set access to the director during the production of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. Throughout this study, Olson provides thorough analyses of the filmmaker's works as Lynch conceived, crafted, and completed them. Consequently, David Lynch: Beautiful Dark is the definitive study of one of the most influential and idiosyncratic directors of the last four decades.

Young Winstone


Ray Winstone - 2014
    But how do these uncompromising and often haunting performances square with his off-duty reputation as the ultimate salt-of-the-earth diamond geezer? The answer lies in the East End of his youth. Revisiting the bomb-sites and boozers of his childhood and adolescence, Ray Winstone takes the reader on an unforgettable tour of a cockney heartland which is at once irresistibly mythic and undeniably real. Told with its author's trademark blend of brutal directness and roguish wit, Young Winstone offers a fascinating insight into the social history of East London, as well as a school of hard knocks coming-of-age story with a powerful emotional punch.

Conversations with Mani Ratnam


Baradwaj Rangan - 2012
    Rahman. This book, unique for Indian cinema, illuminates the genius of the man behind these and eighteen other masterly films. For the first time ever, Mani Ratnam opens up here, to Baradwaj Rangan, about his art, as well as his life before films.In these freewheeling conversations, candid, witty, pensive, and sometimes combative, many aspects of his films are explored. Mani elaborates in a personal vein on his choice of themes, from the knottiness in urban relationships (Agni Natchatiram) to the rents in the national fabric (Bombay); his directing of children (Anjali); his artful use of songs; his innovative use of lighting, as also his making films in Hindi and other languages. There are fond recollections of collaborations with stalwarts like Balu Mahendra, P.C. Sreeram, Thotta Tharani, and Gulzar, among many others. And delectable behind-the-scenes stories—from the contrasting working styles of the legendary composer Ilayaraja and Rahman to the unexpected dimensions Kamal Haasan brought to the filming of Nayakan to what Raavan was like when originally conceived. In short, like Mani Ratnam’s films, Conversations with Mani Ratnam surprises, entertains and stimulates.With Rangan’s personal and impassioned introduction setting the Tamil and national context of the films, and with posters, script pages, and numerous stills, this book is a sumptuous treat for serious lovers of cinema as well as the casual moviegoer looking for a peek behind the process.