His legendary course on auditioning has launched hundreds of successful careers. Now in this book he tells the all-important HOW for all aspiring actors, from the beginning student of acting to the proven talent trying out for that chance-in-a-million role!

    As in the authors' bestselling "Film Art", concepts and events are illustrated with actual frame enlargements, giving students more realistic points of reference than competing books that use publicity stills.

    Night Shyamalan—the most successful filmmaker of his generation—as he creates a new movie masterpiece In 1999, filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan exploded onto the cinema scene with his supernatural thriller The Sixth Sense, which garnered major acclaim and raked in massive box office numbers around the globe. Since then, his phenomenal commercial and critical success has continued as his films—including Unbreakable, Signs, and The Village—have grossed over $1.5 billion and reinvented the thriller genre. But throughout his rise to prominence, Shyamalan has remained separate from the Hollywood system, living and working solely in his hometown area of Philadelphia, and keeping his ideas, filmmaking techniques, and business practices tightly-kept secrets. In The Man Who Heard Voices, journalist Michael Bamberger takes readers inside Shyamalan’s world for the first time, getting total access to the man who has been called “the modern-day Hitchcock” as he prepares, creates, and test-screens his next film, Lady in the Water, which stars Paul Giamatti (star of Sideways) as a building superintendent and Bryce Howard (star of The Village) as a mysterious sea nymph. Bamberger’s intimate perspective and insightful narrative prose will bring to life Shyamalan’s creative process—from his multiple drafts and revisions of the screenplay to his on-location work with his cinematographer and crew and his relationships with the actors under his direction. The book also follows the high- stakes business decisions behind the scenes, including his agonizing decision to move from Disney to Warner Bros. for this film, his involvement in the studio’s massive marketing campaign, and the evaluation of the crucial initial test-screening of the film.

    Now nearly fifty years after that re-edition, the book continues to occupy an important place in the literature of film. Arnheim’s method, provocative in this age of technological wizardry, was to focus on the way art in film was derived from that medium’s early limitations: no sound, no color, no three-dimensional depth.

    This engaging guide walks readers through the essential elements of every good screenplay, from character development, to creating a story, to writing compelling dialogue, to adopting a screenplay from a different source. It also includes all the specific formatting details that go into writing a visual screenplay from scripting character introductions, to writing the camera into the script, to creating a cinematic collage. In addition, Screenwriting For Dummies covers the important task of selling a screenplay, including tips for getting a spec script into the proper marketing format, protecting intellectual property rights, and securing an agent.

    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.

    Now including updates on the latest trends in the industry, writers-producers Kenneth Atchity and Chi-Li Wong tell readers everything they need to know to create an effective and saleable treatment, one that incorporates such key elements as conflict, likeable characters, plot twists, a climax, and visual drama.Using dozens of the latest examples from actual productions, Writing Treatments That Sell distinguishes between scripts designed for feature films, episodic television, and made-for-TV movies, and shows step-by-step how to prepare a selling treatment for each. Also included is essential information on copyrighting and acquiring rights along with a comprehensive glossary of industry terms. This book is essential for anyone hoping to get a foot in the door of the exciting scriptwriting business.

    This official publication contains 500 exclusive images, from the earliest pencil sketches and conceptual drawings to magnificent full-color paintings that shaped the look of the film. All the principal locations, costumes, armor and creatures are covered in stunning detail, including concepts, storyboards and images that did not make it into the final film.As well as a wealth of sketches, paintings and digital images, The Art of The Fellowship of the Ring contains photographs showing how the creative process was realized and a number of stills from the film. Contributors include Alan Lee and John Howe, the two artists who inspired Peter Jackson's vision of Middle-earth and who worked with him to bring his trilogy to the big screen. They and a dozen other designers who created all of these diverse elements explain how they contributed to the development of the film, giving a fascinating insight into how Middle-earth was brought to life.With text compiled from exclusive interviews with director Peter Jackson, special effects supervisor Richard Taylor, designers Grant Major, Ngila Dickson, Paul Lasaine and others, this unique book celebrates the pivotal contribution made by a handful of people which help turn the first Lord of the Rings movie into an award-winning global success.

    This is a book about the business of managing your screenwriting career, from advice on choosing an agent to tips on juggling three deal-making breakfasts a day. Prescriptive and useful, Breakfast with Sharks is a real guide to navigating the murky waters of the Hollywood system.Unlike most of the screenwriting books available, here’s one that tells you what to do after you’ve finished your surefire-hit screenplay. Written from the perspective of Michael Lent, an in-the-trenches working screenwriter in Hollywood, this is a real-world look into the script-to-screen business as it is practiced today.Breakfast with Sharks is filled with useful advice on everything from the ins and outs of moving to Los Angeles to understanding terms like “spec,” “option,” and “assignment.” Here you’ll learn what to expect from agents and managers and who does what in the studio hierarchy. And most important, Breakfast with Sharks will help you nail your pitch so the studio exec can’t say no.Rounded out with a Q&A section and resource lists of script competitions, film festivals, trade associations, industry publications, and more, Breakfast with Sharks is chock-full of “take this and use it right now” information for screenwriters at any stage of their careers.

    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.

    Nor is it a matter of just putting that good idea down on paper. In scriptwriting, it's not just the writing but also the rewriting that counts. Making a Good Script Great focuses on the rewriting process and offers specific methods to help you craft tighter, stronger, and more workable scripts.While retaining all the valuable insights that have made the first edition one of the all-time most popular screenwriting books, this expanded, second edition adds new chapters that take you through the complete screenwriting process, from the first draft through the shooting draft.If you're writing your first script, this book will help develop your skills for telling a compelling and dramatic story. If you're a veteran screenwriter, this book will articulate the skills you know intuitively And if you're currently stuck on a rewrite, this book will help you analyze and solve the problems and get your script back “on track.”

    In a clear, step-by-step fashion, this book is a fun, eye-opening, ?brain-expanding, and often irreverent guide to writing stories that sell. Covering everything from Heroes to Villains, from Theme to Plot Points, from cooking up good ideas to a business plan for smart writers, this book forever eliminates that horrible feeling every writer goes through — staring at the blank page and wondering “what comes next?”

    If Stanley Kubrick had made only" 2001: A Space Odyssey" or "Dr. Strangelove," his cinematic legacy would have been assured. But from his first feature film, "Fear and Desire," to the posthumously released "Eyes Wide Shut," Kubrick created an accomplished body of work unique in its scope, diversity, and artistry, and by turns both lauded and controversial.In this newly revised and definitive edition of his now classic study, film critic Michel Ciment provides an insightful examination of Kubrick's thirteen films--including such favorites as "Lolita, A Clockwork Orange," and "Full Metal Jacket-"-alongside an assemblage of more than four hundred photographs that form a complementary photo essay. Rounding out this unique work are a short biography of Kubrick; interviews with the director, as well as cast and crew members, including Malcolm McDowell, Shelley Duvall, and Jack Nicholson; and a detailed filmography and bibliography. Meshed with masterful integrity, the book's text and illustrations pay homage to one of the most visionary, original, and demanding filmmakers of our time.

    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.

    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.