Book picks similar to
Ivan the Terrible by Sergei Eisentein


cinema
modernism-and-post-modernism-stuff
new-york
plays

The Krays


Philip Ridley - 1997
    Ronnie and Reggie Kray are school ground bullies brought up by a domineering mother and two devoted aunts. National Service and spells in prison expose the brutality that helps establish the twin brothers as the kings of 1960s gangland London.Philip Ridley's original, uncut screenplay, almost as notorious as its subject matter is a stylised meditation on maternal love, childhood, violence and homoeroticism and takes its place as one of the masterpieces of contemporary cinema.

The Tom Hanks Enigma: The Biography of the World's Most Intriguing Movie Star


David Gardner - 2000
    With an array of stunning performances in blockbusters as diverse as Big, The Da Vinci Code, Forrest Gump, Philadelphia, and Saving Private Ryan to his name, he has an outstanding reputation as one of the world's greatest leading men. Yet behind the many roles lies an intensely complex figure. This wonderful portrait of a dedicated family man and professional explores Tom Hanks' fractured childhood, the breakdown of his first marriage, his friendship with Princess Diana, his relationship with Bill Clinton, his moral and political stances, his family life, and the highs and lows of his stellar career.

Hitchcock


François Truffaut - 1966
    Here is a rare opportunity to eavesdrop on two cinematic masters from very different backgrounds as they cover each of Hitch's films in succession. Though this book was initially published in 1967 when Hitchcock was still active, Truffaut later prepared a revised edition that covered the final stages of his career. It's difficult to think of a more informative or entertaining introduction to Hitchcock's art, interests, and peculiar sense of humor. The book is a storehouse of insight and witticism, including the master's impressions of a classic like Rear Window ("I was feeling very creative at the time, the batteries were well charged"), his technical insight into Psycho's shower scene ("the knife never touched the body; it was all done in the [editing]"), and his ruminations on flops such as Under Capricorn ("If I were to make another picture in Australia today, I'd have a policeman hop into the pocket of a kangaroo and yell 'Follow that car!'"). This is one of the most delightful film books in print. --Raphael Shargel

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.

Barney Fife and Other Characters I Have Known


Don Knotts - 1999
    With candor he takes us behind the scenes on the set of Three's Company, and behind the sets of his hugely successful film comedies. And he shares bittersweet memories of The Mayberry Reunion, and affectionate recollections of his professional and personal relationships with such legends as Andy Griffith, Jack Benny, Red Skelton, Orson Welles, Lou Costello, and Arthur Godfrey.

Clint Eastwood - The Biography of Cinema's Greatest Ever Star


Douglas Thompson - 2005
    For over forty years he has dominated Hollywood and his success both in front of and behind the camera has assured his place in cinema history alongside such superstars as Marlon Brando, John Wayne and Robert De Niro..."Clint" reveals the man behind the myth. Bestselling author Douglas Thompson draws on exclusive interviews with the star, to provide the definitive portrait of Clint Eastwood. From his early days as a jobbing actor on $75 a week to his directorial triumph with "Million Dollar Baby", "Clint" reveals the personal highlights of one of the most celebrated careers in cinema history.

Blade Runners, Deer Hunters & Blowing the Bloody Doors Off: My Life in Cult Movies


Michael Deeley - 2008
    Producer Michael Deeley, an urbane Englishman in Hollywood, had to fight wars to get these movies made, from defending the legendary sex scene of Don't Look Now from a disapproving Warren Beatty to seizing control of Convoy from a cocaine-ridden Sam Peckinpah. This is a no-holds-barred look at the true stories behind some of the greatest cult movies ever made.

The Making of Star Trek


Stephen E. Whitfield - 1968
    Filled with quotations from cast members, memos to and from Gene Roddenberry, biographies of cast members, sketches, photographs, set descriptions, and even budgets and cast schedules, this volume is a fascinating, invaluable behind-the-scenes account of the development and production of the original Star Trek™ series."- source unknown"The book on how to write for TV! The complete story on how the U.S.S. Enterprise was designed, the original concept behind the show, backgrounds of the characters—the whole authentic history." - Ballantine

The Brothers Mankiewicz: Hope, Heartbreak, and Hollywood Classics (Hollywood Legends Series)


Sydney Stern - 2019
    (1897–1953) and Joseph L. Mankiewicz (1909–1993) wrote, produced, and directed over 150 pictures. With Orson Welles, Herman wrote the screenplay for Citizen Kane and shared the picture’s only Academy Award. Joe earned the second pair of his four Oscars for writing and directing All About Eve, which also won Best Picture. Despite triumphs as diverse as Monkey Business and Cleopatra, and Pride of the Yankees and Guys and Dolls, the witty, intellectual brothers spent their Hollywood years deeply discontented and yearning for what they did not have—a career in New York theater. Herman, formerly an Algonquin Round Table habitué, New York Times and New Yorker theater critic, and playwright-collaborator with George S. Kaufman, never reconciled himself to screenwriting. He gambled away his prodigious earnings, was fired from all the major studios, and drank himself to death at fifty-five. While Herman drifted downward, Joe rose to become a critical and financial success as a writer, producer, and director, though his constant philandering with prominent stars like Joan Crawford, Judy Garland, and Gene Tierney distressed his emotionally fragile wife who eventually committed suicide. He wrecked his own health using uppers and downers in order to direct Cleopatra by day and finish writing it at night, only to be very publicly fired by Darryl F. Zanuck, an experience from which he never fully recovered. For this first dual portrait of the Mankiewicz brothers, Sydney Ladensohn Stern draws on interviews, letters, diaries, and other documents still in private hands to provide a uniquely intimate behind-the-scenes chronicle of the lives, loves, work, and relationship between these complex men.

Smoking in Bed: Conversations with Bruce Robinson


Alistair Owen - 2000
    Talking candidly about his entire career; his acting, writing and directing, and the many tussles he has faced with Hollywood moguls, this is Bruce Robinson as you've never seen or heard him before.'The most purely likeable book about cinema I have ever read. Robinson talks about his profession in a way that is astonishingly clear-headed, funny and wise' David Hare, Guardian, Books of the Year

On Kubrick


James Naremore - 2007
    This book argues that in several respects Kubrick was one of the cinema's last modernists.

Stanley Kubrick, Director: A Visual Analysis


Alexander Walker - 1971
    The result is a frame-by-frame examination of the inimitable style that infuses every Kubrick movie, from the pitch-perfect hilarity of Lolita to the icy supremacy of 2001: A Space Odyssey to the baroque horror of The Shining. The book's beautiful design and dynamic arrangement of photographic stills offer a frame-by-frame understanding of how Kubrick constructed a film. What emerges is a deeply human study of one remarkable artist's nature and obsessions, and how these changed and shifted in his four decades as a filmmaker.

Chain Saw Confidential: How We Made the World's Most Notorious Horror Movie


Gunnar Hansen - 2013
    To critics, it was either "a degrading, senseless misuse of film and time" or "an intelligent, absorbing and deeply disturbing horror film." However it was an immediate hit with audiences. Banned and celebrated, showcased at the Cannes film festival and included in the New York MoMA's collection, it has now come to be recognized widely as one of the greatest horror movies of all time.A six-foot-four poet fresh out of grad school with limited acting experience, Gunnar Hansen played the masked, chain-saw-wielding Leatherface. His terrifying portrayal and the inventive work of the cast and crew would give the film the authentic power of nightmare, even while the gritty, grueling, and often dangerous independent production would test everyone involved, and lay the foundations for myths surrounding the film that endure even today.Critically-acclaimed author Hansen here tells the real story of the making of the film, its release, and reception, offering unknown behind-the-scenes details, a harrowingly entertaining account of the adventures of low-budget filmmaking, illuminating insights on the film's enduring and influential place in the horror genre and our culture, and a thoughtful meditation on why we love to be scared in the first place.

Monty Python Live!


Graham Chapman - 2009
    . . . . . well, actually, God knows what you are holding in your hand, you are after all adults, and what you hold in your own right hand is entirely up to you . . . . . . you may, after all, have this in your left hand and something else in your right hand and you will probably have held far worse things in both your hands than this . . . and hey! . . . No! . . . Stop that! Miss Johansson, I said, "Please hold my calls . . ." Honestly. Hollywood! Anyway, what you are about to read--or have read to you--is a new book that is the first active collaboration of the Monty Python chaps for many, many years. In fact, the first book written and produced by the Pythons, themselves, since 1979. No, they are not all dead. Okay, some of them have been a bit quiet recently, and one or two have DNR notes by their bedsides, but the point is five of them are still technically alive and that, if not exactly cause for rejoicing, may well be cause for a new book. And this is it! So hold whatever you like in your right hand while you read this book. Because laughter is jolly good for you. Even if it can make you blind. --The Pythons

Big Bosoms and Square Jaws: The Biography of Russ Meyer, King of the Sex Film


Jimmy McDonough - 2005
    Teas in 1959. The modest little film pushed all preexisting limits of on-screen nudity, and with its success, the floodgates of what was permitted to be shown on film were thrust open, never to be closed again. Russ Meyer ignited a true revolution in filmmaking, breaking all sex, nudity, and violence taboos. In a career that spanned more than forty years, Meyer created a body of work that has influenced a legion of filmmakers, fashionistas, comic book artists, rock bands, and even the occasional feminist. Bringing his anecdote- and action-packed biographical style to another renegade of popular culture, New York Times bestselling author of Shakey Jimmy McDonough offers a wild, warts-and-all portrait of Russ Meyer, the director, writer, producer, and commando moviemaking force behind the sexploitation classics Vixen, Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! and many others. Big Bosoms and Square Jaws blows the lid off the story of Russ Meyer, from the beginning to his recent tragic demise, creating in the process a vivid portrait of a past America.