Individual film directors Books

Book SynopsisApplys a noir lens to films which defy easy generic categorization

Read more less

Book SynopsisONE OF THE SUNDAY TIMES'' 100 BEST SUMMER READS OF 2020''It''s hard to beat Susanna Moore''s Miss Aluminium'' Vogue''A sharp-edged summery treat'' Hadley Freeman''Unlike any Hollywood memoir you''ll have read'' MetroAt seventeen, Susanna Moore left her home in Hawai''i, with no money, no belongings and no prospects. But in Philadelphia, an unexpected gift of four trunks of beautiful clothes allowed her to assume the first of many disguises. Her journey takes her from New York to Los Angeles where she becomes a model and meets Joan Didion and Audrey Hepburn. She works as a script reader for Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson, and is given a screen test by Mike Nichols. But beneath Miss Aluminium''s glittering fairytale surface lies the story of a girl''s insatiable hunger to learn. Moore gives us a sardonic, often humorous portrait of Hollywood in the seventies and of a young womanTrade ReviewAn outstanding memoir... A novelist best known for her extraordinary 1995 erotic thriller In the Cut, Moore has now written an extraordinary memoir... The descriptive writing is a joy. * The Sunday Times *Poignant and hugely entertaining... As she tries on different identities, the book becomes less about childhood trauma than an examination of the masks women wear to meet social expectations, occasionally prompting them to forget who they are entirely... The book bursts with brilliantly gossipy titbits, recounted with wry understatement... From the outside, Moore's life seemed gilded with its merry-go-round of parties, lovers, designer clothes and dizzyingly famous friends. In Miss Aluminium, her tales of the Hollywood high life certainly provide giggles and glitz, though the darkness is never far from the surface. The real story is the ripple effect of grief, a woman's self-invention and the awful deeds of powerful men. -- Fiona Sturges * Guardian *Moore's account of her time as a model and bit-part actress in Hollywood is peppered with famous names, from Audrey Hepburn and Harrison Ford to Warren Beatty and Roman Polanski. But this riveting book isn't just about being on the fringes of celebrity: it's a compellingly dark tale of a young woman navigating her way through a sea full of sharks ... This is a totally gripping and tremendously entertaining memoir. * Daily Mail *A striking new memoir ... Through the #MeToo lens, Moore's measured, superficially judgment-free recounting of her time in the middle of All That can be read as a personal statement of empowerment: She came, she saw, she took notes, and she left to become a novelist and a miss-no-detail student of female autonomy. * New York Times *Miss Aluminium, is a triumphant, inspiring account of how to find your true self in the most unlikely of settings * RED magazine *As well as documenting Moore's heartbreaks, Miss Aluminium is also full of humorous tales about the famous... a poignant remembrance of a life lived in the shadow of family tragedy, as well as being a wry peak into celebrity narcissism. * Independent (App Edition) *Susanna Moore on working in Hollywood in the 1970s is literally my fantasy weekend read, and it does not disappoint. -- Hadley FreemanA sharp-edged summery treat -- Hadley FreemanDisarmingly candid... This is her first memoir and it's even better than her fiction... Moore deploys a disarming repertoire of sideswipes, gallows humour and raised eyebrows, whether writing about trivia or tragedy... There's a fascination here with toxic masculinity that makes you think of the dangerous, sexually potent detective in In the Cut. * The Times *Susanna Moore's memoir Miss Aluminium is the most blissful brilliant beautiful book. How it manages to be so glittery with old Hollywood gossip, and yet to be so utterly serious about a woman's struggle for self-determination, I don't know, but there it is. -- Rachel CookeNow seventy-four, and a well-regarded author, Moore is ready to expose her "shadow self" and the pain of her early life . . . One gets a sense that what is revealed has been chosen appraisingly, not out of coyness but, rather, out of something resembling an architect's appreciation of a structure's good bones. Moore's writing has the slightly mysterious sense of detachment that she adopted when building her persona, many years ago, though paradoxically this is what makes her revelations, when they come, more piercing. * The New Yorker *Moore's search for stability during a free-spirited decade is a whirlwind of celebrity encounters and a lyrical exploration of the lingering effects of a mother's death * Publishers Weekly *As readers of Moore's fiction know, she is a brilliant storyteller and sentence-maker . . . Miss Aluminum reminded me of everything I ever loved about her as a writer and now, as happens with certain memoirs, I feel like she is my friend? A very elegant, accomplished grande dame sort of friend, to be sure, one who might loan you a pair of blue velvet Pucci bell-bottoms or a copy of 'The Great War and Modern Memory' on your way out the door after tea. * The Washington Post *A tantalizing tale, told in a seductive and provocative voice. * Booklist *A captivating portrait of a woman in search of herself * Kirkus *It's a tale of shimmering, glamorous surfaces that conceal something darker and more painful... Miss Aluminium positions Moore as a chronicler of Sixties power and pleasure to rival her friend Didion, and, you sense, this model-actress-author has plenty more Hollywood stories to tell. We can only hope she chooses to share them. * Evening Standard *It's hard to beat Susanna Moore's Miss Aluminium * Vogue *There may not be an air bridge to the US just yet but you can still touch down on Tinseltown high life thanks to Susanna Moore's memoir, Miss Aluminium... her understated book is unlike any Hollywood memoir you'll have read * Metro *Wonderful ... Moore's sketches of famous friends cut to the quick - Nichols is tiringly brilliant; Beatty is restless and ravenous; Roman Polanski (this 20-something starlet was "too old to interest him") makes a contest of everything * Daily Telegraph *Moore's book captures what it was like to come of age in a glamorous world, but there was darkness beneath the surface. If the 70s was Hollywood's Golden Age, Miss Aluminium illustrates that there was much suffering and exploitation behind the scenes - and yet the young wannabe writer and actor from Hawaii clearly had plenty of fun along the way * Irish Independent *In this superb Hollywood memoir, novelist Susanna Moore tells the story of her early years... just as memorable is Moore's unflinching portrayal of the darkness beneath the glamour of Seventies Hollywood * Tatler *Miss Aluminium is a different order of achievement entirely, both in its scalding honesty and its sly, watchful humour. I haven't read a book like it in years. -- Anthony Quinn * Mail on Sunday *There's a kind of writing about LA that I am a sucker for. Gossipy, lyrical, with a surface of affectless simplicity but an undertow of melancholy that can be personal or institutional or, best of all, both entwined ... Joan Didion did it; Eve Babitz specialised in it... Miss Aluminium is that kind of book. I, of course, adore it. Miss Aluminium ends before Moore really becomes a writer, but with her poised for that part of her life to begin; its ravishing execution is testament to how fine a writer she became. * Spectator *There is a coolness in the way she describes traumatic events. Such understatement also lends itself to wicked humour... In another's hands, a Hollywood memoir would be pure titillation. What makes this stand out is its depiction of a specific place in time and the elegant restraint of its prose... an excellent book * Financial Times *A rollercoaster ride that will both move and entertain -- Alex Clark * Financial Times *Hollywood's darker side is exposed in this model-turned-writer's tales of her time among the stars * Sunday Times *The bare-bone facts of Susanna Moore's memoir read like a dark fairy tale... Heartbroken, directionless and adrift in a man's world... she embarks on a quest to find a voice and sense of selfhood, poignantly described by the older, wiser Susanna * Sunday Express *Moore's book captures what it was like to come of age in a glamorous world, but there was darkness beneath the glittering surface. If the 70s was Hollywood's Golden Age, Miss Aluminium illustrates that there was much suffering and exploitation behind the scenes * Irish Independent *

Read more less

Book Synopsis Woody Allen''s Manhattan Murder Mystery has been described as a kind of Rear Window for retirees. As this quote suggests, an analysis of Alfred Hitchcock''s methodical use of comedy in his films is past due. One of Turner Classic Movies'' on-screen scholars for their summer 2017 online Hitchcock class, the author grew tired of misleading throwaway references to the director''s comic relief. This book examines what should be obvious: Hitchcock systematically incorporated assorted types of comedy--black humor, parody, farce/screwball comedy and romantic comedy--in his films to entertain his audience with comic thrillers.Trade Review“Gehring remains supreme in film comedy scholarship” - Choice

Read more less

Book SynopsisFrederick Aldama’s The Cinema of Robert Rodriguez (2014) was the first full-scale study of one of the most prolific and significant Latino directors making films today. In this companion volume, Aldama enlists a corps of experts to analyze a majority of Rodriguez’s feature films, from his first break-out success El Mariachi in 1992 to Machete in 2010. The essays explore the formal and thematic features present in his films from the perspectives of industry (context, convention, and distribution), the film blueprint (auditory and visual ingredients), and consumption (ideal and real audiences). The authors illuminate the manifold ways in which Rodriguez’s films operate internally (plot, character, and event) and externally (audience perception, thought, and feeling).The volume is divided into three parts: “Matters of Mind and Media” includes essays that use psychoanalytic and cognitive psychology to shed light on how Rodriguez&Table of ContentsRodriguez's Cinema of Possibilities: An Introduction (Frederick Luis Aldama)Matters of Mind and MediaOne. From El Mariachi till Spy Kids? A Cognitive Approach (Sue J. Kim)Two. You've Come a Long Way, Booger Breath: Juni Cortez Grows Up in the Spy Kids Films (Phillip Serrato)Narrative Theory, Cognitive Science, and Sin City: A Case StudyThree. Painterly Cinema: Three Minutes of Sin City (Patrick Colm Hogan)Four. Sin City, Style, and the Status of Noir (Emily R. Anderson)Five. Sin City, Hybrid Media, and a Cognitive Narratology of Multimodality (Erin E. Eighan)Aesthetic and Ontological Border Crossings and BorderlandsSix. Intertextploitation and Post-Post-Latinidad in Planet Terror (Christopher González)Seven. Planet Terror Redux: Miscegenation and Family Apocalypse (Enrique García)Eight. The Border Crossed Us: Machete and the Latino Threat Narrative (Zachary Ingle)Nine. The Development of Social Minds in the "Mexico Trilogy" (James J. Donahue)It's a WrapTen. Tarantino & Rodriguez: A Paradigm (Ilan Stavans)Eleven. Five Amigos Crisscross Borders on a Road Trip with Rodriguez (Frederick Luis Aldama, Samuel Saldívar, Christopher González, Sue J. Kim, and Camilla Fojas)Afterword. Postproduction in Robert Rodriguez's "Post-Post-Latinidad" (Alvaro Rodriguez)Works CitedNotes on ContributorsIndex

Read more less

Book SynopsisLuminous presence: Derek Jarman's life-writing is the first book to analyse the prolific writing of queer icon Derek Jarman. Although he is well known for his avant-garde filmmaking, his garden, and his AIDS activism, he is also the author of over a dozen books, many of which are autobiographical. Much of Jarman's exploration of post-war queer identity and imaginative response to HIV/AIDS can be found in his books, such as the lyrical AIDS diaries Modern Nature and Smiling in Slow Motion. This book fully explores, for the first time, the remarkable range and depth of Jarman’s writing. Spanning his career, Alexandra Parsons argues that Jarman’s self-reflexive response to the HIV/AIDS crisis was critical in changing the cultural terms of queer representation from the 1980s onwards. Luminous presence is of great interest to students, scholars and readers of queer histories in literature, art and film.Table of ContentsIntroduction1 'The porter into forgotten landscapes': A finger in the fishes mouth2 Dancing Ledge: 'An autobiography at forty'3 Derek Jarman’s Caravaggio: 'Reading between the lines of history'4 Becoming Pasolini: Derek Jarman in Ostia5 Kicking the Pricks: 'Forward into an uncertain future...'6 Self-Projection in film: The Last of England and The Garden7 Modern Nature: Haunting, flowers and personal mythologies8 Queer Edward II: 'Are you a closet bigot?'9 At Your Own Risk: A Saint's Testament10 Smiling in Slow Motion: Testimony and elegy11 'A kind of bliss': Blue and Chroma12 Derek Jarman’s Garden: A therapy and a pharmacopoeiaConclusion: 'The past is the mirror'BibliographyFilmographyIndex

Read more less

Book SynopsisModern European cinema and love examines nine European directors whose films contain stories about romantic love and marriage. The directors are Jean Renoir, Ingmar Bergman, Alain Resnais, Michelangelo Antonioni, Agnès Varda, François Truffaut, Federico Fellini, Jean-Luc Godard and Éric Rohmer. The book approaches questions of love and marriage from a philosophical perspective, applying the ideas of authors such as Stanley Cavell, Leo Bersani, Luce Irigaray and Alain Badiou, while also tracing key concepts from Freudian psychoanalysis. Each of the filmmakers engages deeply with notions of modern love and marriage, often in positive ways, but also in ways that question the institutions of love, marriage and the ‘couple’.Trade Review‘In this thoughtful and persuasive book, Richard Rushton focuses on how European cinema from the 1960s onwards has grappled with the problem of other minds by representing the thoroughly modern marriage. Rushton draws on Stanley Cavell’s work on comedies of remarriage to show how the heterosexual couple in crisis is a dominant feature of European cinema too. He thus offers a new perspective on debates about the relationship between European and Hollywood cinema, in a framework that emphasises how both filmmaking cultures work through the impact of changing gender relations and the new subjectivities they forge.’Fiona Handyside, Associate Professor in Film Studies, University of Exeter‘In a refreshingly clear-sighted reconsideration of some cornerstone films of European art cinema, Richard Rushton demonstrates arresting connections with the classical Hollywood romantic comedy. Reading the cycles side by side, by way of philosophical theories of love, marriage and subjectivity, he opens up new perspectives on both as well as on that most enduringly ubiquitous axis of social organisation and human meaning, the romantic relationship itself. Remaining admirably accessible throughout, this is a book for lovers of cinema and lovers tout court alike.’Mary Harrod , Associate Professor of Film Studies, University of Warwick'Rushton’s brilliant move is to take such difficult matters as love, romance and coupling as seriously as European New Wave cinema did. In doing so, he not only provides rich new readings of well-loved films but also shakes loose the supposed ideological coherence of those New Waves.'Kyle Stevens, Associate Professor of English, Appalachian State University -- .Table of ContentsIntroduction: acknowledgment and connectedness1 Remarriage in Hollywood and Europe2 The falsity of social worlds: The Rules of the Game3 Ingmar Bergman’s Smiles of a Summer Night: acknowledgment and deception4 Ingmar Bergman: comedies and tragedies5 Alain Resnais and the communication of love6 Michelangelo Antonioni: learning how to love7 Agnès Varda: the construction and destruction of the couple8 François Truffaut and the impossible couple9 Federico Fellini: love and forgiveness10 Jean-Luc Godard: in praise of two11 Éric Rohmer: the ordinary miracle of loveIndex

Read more less

Book SynopsisDavid Simon's American city examines the work of showrunner David Simon, creator of acclaimed television serials The Wire, Treme and The Deuce. Situating these television serials in their real world context of twenty-first-century America, the book explores how Simon's work responds to dominant discourses about the state of the American city. -- .

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn inspirational trove of film posters and ephemera, photographs, artwork and more from the collection of Spike Lee For nearly four decades, Spike Lee has made movies that demand our attention. His extensive filmography reflects an unflinching critique of race relations in the United States, from the Student Academy Award®–winning short Joe's Bed-Stuy Barbershop: We Cut Heads and the ever-relevant Do the Right Thing to the more recent Oscar®-winning BlacKkKlansman and Da 5 Bloods. A lifelong cinephile and film scholar, Lee draws inspiration from other artists working across a range of eras, genres and global cinemas. He has also devoted much of his career to teaching the next generation of filmmakers. Spike Lee: Director’s Inspiration presents Lee’s personal collection of original film posters and objects, photographs, artworks and more—many of these inscribed to Lee personally by filmmakers, stars, athletes, activists, musicians and others who have inspired his work in specific ways. Straight from the walls of Lee’s 40 Acres and a Mule production studio in Brooklyn, his faculty office at NYU and his Martha’s Vineyard home, these objects offer a glimpse into what shapes Lee’s signature filmmaking approach. Spike Lee: Director’s Inspiration also includes a conversation between Lee and Shaka King (Judas and the Black Messiah) and brief texts by some of the many artists Lee himself has inspired. Spike Lee (born 1957) is a director, writer, actor, producer, author and artistic director of the graduate film program at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, where he has taught since 1993.Trade ReviewA polished and affecting celebration of the young Brooklyn student filmmaker who has gone on to become a legend of American cinema. -- David Terrien * ArtReview *

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe city, with its manifold distractions and violence, its invitation to intoxication and dream, had long served to represent the experience of modernity in works of art at the time John Schlesinger made his acclaimed urban documentary ‘Terminus’ in 1961. To be a reader of the city was to be a reader of modern life, and Schlesinger was a discriminating, at times relentless, reader of the city throughout his career, especially in his three greatest films, ‘Midnight Cowboy’, ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ and ‘The Day of the Locust’, set in New York, London and Los Angeles, respectively. His character-driven stories, evocation of the significance of the everyday, and insistence on ambiguities of situation and motive – all qualities he was known for – point to literary influences that reach back to the nineteenth century and earlier. ‘The Films of John Schlesinger’ is not only the first book to fully acknowledge those influences, but also the first book to explicate the power of his art to capture the modern, urban experiences of becoming an adult in an atmosphere that relentlessly promotes fantasies of success and wealth; of coming to terms with one’s national identity in the context of international politics; and of attempting to transform the past, both personal and cultural, into a viable present. Trade Review“This remarkable book situates major films like Billy Liar, Midnight Cowboy and Sunday Bloody Sunday within a life’s work in cinema and other media. There are brilliant analyses of particular shots and moments, and we get a very persuasive picture of Schlesinger’s continuing concern with the interaction of character and setting, and with questions of moral survival.” —Michael G. Wood, Professor Emeritus of English and Comparative Literature, Princeton University, USATable of ContentsIntroduction; Part I: Coming of Age; 1. Leading Up to ‘Midnight Cowboy’; 2. Schlesinger’s ‘Bildungsfilm’: ‘Midnight Cowboy’ and the Problem of Youth; 3. Human Emergence in a Commercial Age: ‘Madame Sousatzka’; Part II: Identity and Nation; 4. ‘An Uncomfortable Truth’: ‘The Day of the Locust’; 5. ‘Honky Tonk Freeway’ and the Risks of Embarrassing the United States; 6. An Eye for an I: Identity and Nation in Films of the Reagan-Thatcher Years (‘Yanks’, ‘An Englishman Abroad’, ‘The Falcon and the Snowman’, ‘A Question of Attribution’); Part III: The Use of the Past; 7. History Hollywood-style: ‘Far from the Madding Crowd’; 8. The Resonance of Art: ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’; Epilogue: Refusal to Mourn: ‘Cold Comfort Farm’; Works Cited; Index.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis unique collection focuses on the work of legendary Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman. Written in the wake of the centenary of Bergman’s birth in 2018, the volume aims to combine new approaches to Bergman’s films and writings with more traditional analyses. Established themes such as Bergman’s interest in philosophy and psychology are addressed, but also less familiar topics, notably his relationship with Hollywood and his elaborate use of film music and autobiographical writing that characterised his later work. There are new analyses of aspects of Bergman’s most famous films, including Smiles of a Summer Night and Fanny and Alexander, but also insightful readings of lesser-known works, such as Saraband and Sawdust and Tinsel.An electronic version of this book is available under a creative commons licence: manchesteropenhive.com/view/9789198557718/9789198557718.xmlTable of ContentsIngmar Bergman at 100: an introduction – Erik Hedling1 Ingmar Bergman on the international scene – Peter Cowie2 Bergman transnational: Munich–Rome–Los Angeles, or ‘the last temptation of Ingmar Bergman’ – Thomas Elsaesser3 Bergman and the business: notes on the director’s ‘worth in the market’ – Olof Hedling4 Bergman, writing, and photographs: the auteur as an ekphrastic ghost – Maaret Koskinen5 The playfulness of Ingmar Bergman: screenwriting from notebooks to screenplays – Anna Sofia Rossholm6 Cinema as a detour: Ingmar Bergman, writer – Jan Holmberg7 Laughing through tears: the soundscape of Ingmar Bergman’s Smiles of a Summer Night – Alexis Luko 8 Sound, act, presence: classical music in the films of Ingmar Bergman—a lecture recital – Anyssa Neumann9 Film-musical moments in Ingmar Bergman’s films – Ann-Kristin Wallengren10 Where does music come from? Musical meaning and musical discourse in Ingmar Bergman’s films – Per F. Broman11 Bergman, Janov, and Autumn Sonata – Paisley Livingston12 Persona’s penis – Daniel Humphrey13 Battlefield family: Ingmar Bergman, Henrik Ibsen, and television – Michael Tapper14 Bergman/Birdman/Vogler: an ecocritical examination of the birds of Bergman – Linda Haverty Rugg15 Visionaries and charlatans: Ingmar Bergman’s filmmaking – Laura Hubner16 Imagined without dialogue: Sawdust and Tinsel and Dreams – Dan Williams17 The ghost in the machine: Saraband – Lars Gustaf Andersson18 Return to the bourgeoisie: Fanny and Alexander in Swedish politics – Erik HedlingIndex

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisLinda Badley offers an in-depth examination of Lars von Trierâs Antichrist (2009), Melancholia (2011), Nymphomaniac (2013â14), and The House That Jack Built (2018) and the contexts that produced them. She draws on numerous interviews with the director and his collaborators as well as inside access to archival materials.Trade ReviewLinda Badley’s book is indispensable not only for those drawn, in spite of ourselves, to von Trier’s films, but also to all experiencing our contemporary moment in the register of despair and anxiety. Informed by personal conversations with von Trier, deeply ensconced in the filmmaking process and all its collaborators, and attentive to von Trier’s deliberate bad taste as well as his play with bending genre, Badley’s provocative readings of each film locate them in the director’s psyche while also showing that they offer a deft diagnosis of misogyny, climate disaster, capitalism, and hypocrisy run amok. -- Lori Marso, coeditor of Politics, Theory, and Film: Critical Encounters with Lars von TrierLars von Trier Beyond Depression is the first comprehensive account of the recent work of Lars von Trier, offering a lively and compelling critical evaluation of his cycle of ‘post-depression’ films that began with Melancholia (2009). A definitive resource on this period of von Trier’s output, its engagement with primary source material, interviews, and its incisive close readings will be indispensable to anyone interested in the filmmaker and his place within contemporary cinema. -- Tina Kendall, Anglia Ruskin UniversityWe should be grateful to Linda Badley for leading us into the darkness of Lars von Trier's cinematic world and illuminating it. Lars von Trier Beyond Depression draws on Badley's extraordinary knowledge of Trier and his cinema to study Antichrist, Melancholia, Nymphomaniac, and The House that Jack Built. Badley uses interviews of Trier and his collaborators, close analysis, genre studies, film-philosophy, ecocriticism, discussions of extreme cinema, and postcritical and postcinematic discussion to unfurl the strata of Trier's films. The book is a tour de force. Any reader interested in Trier or auteur cinema and its afterlife should read it. -- Andrew Nestingen, author of The Cinema of Aki KaurismakiBased on careful archival research and on highly productive insights from countless practitioner interviews, Lars von Trier Beyond Depression offers a compelling account of Antichrist, Melancholia, Nymphomaniac, and The House That Jack Built. Focusing on the intentions, self-understandings, and personal experiences of von Trier and such theoretical lenses as dark ecology and psychoanalysis/therapy, Linda Badley evokes the contours of an ethical project in the Danish director’s contributions to trauma cinema and extreme cinema. -- Mette Hjort, chair professor of humanities and dean of arts, Hong Kong Baptist UniversityLars von Trier Beyond Depression presents new, insightful readings into the director’s latest films, including valuable reflections on the creative processes and sources of inspiration in von Trier’s work based on extensive archival material, notes, statements, and drafts. These are supplemented with new interviews regarding key questions, which generates a fascinating explorative text on the cultural influences and impacts issuing from one of our finest film directors today. With her impressive and meticulous contribution, Linda Badley not only succeeds in giving new perspectives on von Trier’s films, she also manages to substantiate in depth how Danish and European culture and ways of thinking differ from American. Anyone interested in Lars von Trier’s oeuvre should start with reading this book infused with genuine ideas and perspectives. -- Bodil Marie Stavning Thomsen, author of Lars von Trier's Renewal of Film 1984-2014: Signal, Pixel, DiagramAs one of the foremost scholars on Lars von Trier’s entire oeuvre, Linda Badley’s new in-depth study provides a fresh perspective, integrating extensive archival research, contemporary cultural references, and interviews with the director and his longtime collaborators. In examining some of the Danish auteur’s most criticized—perhaps even despised—films, Lars von Trier: Beyond Depression uncovers multiple new approaches to understanding the processes that shaped their intensity and singularity. -- Anna Westerstahl Stenport, coeditor of Nordic Film Cultures and Cinemas of ElsewhereTable of ContentsPrefaceAcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. Nature as Satan’s Church: Antichrist’s Dark Ecology2. Melancholia: Wagner, Superkitsch, and Dark Ecology3. Nymphomaniac: Digressionism, Collaboration, Hypotexts, Paratexts4. The House That Jack Built: Murder as Art/Art as MurderCodaAppendixNotesFilmographyBibliographyIndex

Read more less

Book SynopsisHitchcock Annual, volume 23, includes essays on Hitchcock’s use of silence in his films, civilians at war in his World War II trilogy, melodrama and the Christian imagination in Under Capricorn, filming thought and feeling in Strangers on a Train, and remaking the romance in The Man Who Knew Too Much.

Read more less

Book SynopsisWinner of the 2020 Peter C. Rollins Book AwardLonglisted for the 2020 Moving Image Book Award by the Kraszna-Krausz FoundationNamed a 2019 Richard Wall Memorial Award Finalist by the Theatre Library Association Herman J. (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

Read more less

Book SynopsisI do not follow ideas, I stumble into stories or into people; and I know that this is so big, I have to make a film. Very often, films come like uninvited guests, like burglars in the middle of the night. They are in your kitchen; something is stirring, you wake up at 3 a.m. and all of a sudden they come wildly swinging at you.When I write a screenplay, I write it as if I have the whole film in front of my eyes. Then it is very easy for me, and I can write very, very fast. It is almost like copying. But of course sometimes I push myself; I read myself into a frenzy of poetry, reading Chinese poets of the eighth and ninth century, reading old Icelandic poetry, reading some of the finest German poets like Hölderlin. All of this has absolutely nothing to do with the idea of my film, but I work myself up into this kind of frenzy of high-caliber language and concepts and beauty.And then sometimes I push myself by playing music, for example, a piano concerto by Beethoven, and I play it and write furiously. But none of this is an answer to the question of how you focus on a single idea for a film. And then, during shooting, you have to depart from it sometimes, while keeping it alive in its essence. —Werner Herzog, on filmmakingWerner Herzog doesn’t write traditional screenplays. He writes fever dreams brimming with madness, greed, humor, and dark isolation that can shift dramatically during production—and have materialized into extraordinary masterpieces unlike anything in film today. Harnessing his vision and transcendent reality, these four pieces of long-form prose earmark a renowned filmmaker at the dawn of his career.Trade Review"A compulsively readable, probing collection. It’s equal parts challenging and satisfying, infuriating and enlightening."—Publishers Weekly"Herzog seems to peer nonstop into the abyss combining vainglory, cruelty, and madness. Those are the coordinates at which Herzog geolocates humanity."—BookForum"Scenarios contains more than merely dialogue in cold type. Herzog’s screenplays read like novellas—the characters are fully thought-out and the settings are vividly described, albeit in long, medium and close shots."—Shepherd Express"Herzog doesn’t write traditional scripts. Instead, Herzog writes scenarios which are like a hybrid of film, fiction, and prose poetry."—Film International

Read more less

Book SynopsisAbraham Polonsky (1910-1999), screenwriter and filmmaker of the mid-twentieth-century Left, recognized his writerly mission to reveal the aspirations of his characters in a material society structured to undermine their hopes. In the process, he ennobled their struggle. His auspicious beginning in Hollywood reached a zenith with his Oscar-nominated screenplay for Robert Rossen's boxing noir, Body and Soul (1947), and his inaugural film as writer and director, Force of Evil (1948), before he was blacklisted during the McCarthy witch hunt. Polonsky envisioned cinema as a modern artist. His aesthetic appreciation for each technical component of the screen aroused him to create voiceovers of urban cadences--poetic monologues spoken by the city's everyman, embodied by the actor who played his heroes best, John Garfield. His use of David Raksin's score in Force of Evil, against the backdrop of the grandeur of New York City's landscape and the conflict between the brothers Joe and Leo Morse, elevated film noir into classical family tragedy. Like Garfield, Polonsky faced persecution and an aborted career during the blacklist. But unlike Garfield, Polonsky survived to resume his career in Hollywood during the ferment of the late sixties. Then his vision of a changing society found allegorical expression in Tell Them Willie Boy Is Here, his impressive anti-Western showing the destruction of the Paiute rebel outsider, Willie Boy, and cementing Polonsky as a moral voice in cinema.

Read more less

Book SynopsisKnown as Hollywood's 'Boy Wonder', Irving Thalberg created classics such as "Ben-Hur", "Tarzan the Ape Man", "Grand Hotel", "Freaks", "Mutiny on the Bounty", and "The Good Earth", but died tragically at thirty-seven. This work uses production files, financial records, and correspondence to confirm the genius of Thalberg's methods.Trade Review"Vieira has accomplished something quite extraordinary... This is the definitive volume about a towering figure in the history of Hollywood." -- Leonard Maltin Leonard Maltin's Movie Crazy "Vieira has written the definitive biography of Thalberg." STARRED REVIEW -- Teri Shiel Library Journal "The third biography of Thalberg, and far and away the most thoroughly researched, comprehensive, and penetrating ... as close to definitive as any biography of Irving Thalberg is likely to get." -- Joseph Epstein The Weekly Standard "Vieira writes with great verve and enthusiasm, and he has a flair for narrative movement that suits these exponents of the new storytelling ... well written and extensively researched." -- David Thomson New Republic "If you want to know about Hollywood's Golden Age, then you must know about Thalberg. And if you want to know about Thalberg, then you must read this book." -- Anthony McKenna Screening The Past "Among the many virtues of Mark Vieira's biography is the use he makes of the story conferences preserved in the MGM archives." The Economist "Vieira's work is both exhaustively researched and beautifully presented, rich in detail yet compulsively readable. If you want to know about Hollywood's Golden Age, then you must know about Thalberg. And if you want to know about Thalberg, then you must read this book." -- Anthony McKenna Screening The Past "This is a worthy, well-documented account of [Thalberg's] life." -- R. D. Sears Choice "A well-researched and readable biography." -- David Yezzi Wall Street Journal "This is a sympathetic, diligent, and intelligent account of a wondrous era in Hollywood." Jewish Book World "Vieira has put the enigmatic producer back in the spotlight with his biography ... a thorough and readable book." -- Matthew Rovner Forward "Vieira's excellent biography reveals a master player...[and] sheds much needed light upon significant, influential life." Magill's Literary Annual / Salem Press "The jury has been out for 70 years on the MGM studio chief, even though F Scott Fitzgerald immortalised him as the "last tycoon". Was Thalberg art's gift to Hollywood, with his well-bred epics (Romeo and Juliet, Marie Antoinette)? Or was he a mogul playing to the middlebrow? Read this impressively researched study and decide." -- Nigel Andrews Financial Times "An engaging new biography ... an unusually animated and revealing tour of Hollywood in the 1920s and '30s." -- Noah Isenberg Bookforum "An important book on a pivotal figure in Hollywood history... Vieira's biography is an invaluable resource." -- Camille McCutcheon, University of South Carolina Upstate Jrnl Of American Culture "Vieira takes students of movie history deep into the bowels of MGM." -- Robert Fulford The National Post "A fast-paced and well-researched new biography of Thalberg." -- Kent Jones Film CommentTable of ContentsPreface Part One The Merger 1 The Boy Wonder 2 A Funny Little Man 3 Three Shaky Little Stars Part Two The Perfection of Silence 4 A Studio Style 5 Wicked Stepchildren 6 A Business of Personalities 7 Top of the Heap 8 “More Stars Than There Are in Heaven” Part Three The Talkies 9 The Golden Silents 10 All-Talking, All-Singing, All Profitable 11 The Production Code Part Four “His Brain Is the Camera” 12 Visiting Royalty 13 New Morals for Old 14 The Right to Be Wrong 15 Hollywood Icarus Part Five The Thalberg Unit 16 The New Setup 17 Honor with Credit 18 “To Hell with Art!” Part Six The Crown Prince of Hollywood 19 “Napoleon Thalberg” 20 A Feverish Energy 21 A Labor of Love 22 The Gods Are Jealous Part Seven The Legacy 23 Unfinished Projects 24 Marie Antoinette Epilogue Appendix: The M-G-M Films of Irving Thalberg Notes Select Bibliography Acknowledgments Index Illustrations

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn this original and indispensable book, Christine Madrid French reveals Hitchcock’s relation to the built world was informed by an intense engagement with location and architectural form - in an era marked by modernism’s advance - fueled by some of the most creative midcentury designers in film.Trade Review"The subject is fascinating. This book will surely appeal to a wide audience. Christine Madrid French’s enthusiasm is contagious, informative, and eye-opening." - Sidney Gottlieb, editor of Hitchcock on Hitchcock

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis volume celebrates one of the best known and most loved Italian directors in the world, one of the great masters of tension and horror: Dario Argento. Over the years his cinema has established itself - among cinephiles but not only - for its visionary power, for the search for an aesthetic dimension which is reached through excess. And this excess is not so much what materialises in the virtuosity of the staging of murder and death, as in treating such a brutal and disturbing material in such a way that it becomes something abstract, almost a baroque stylisation. The volume, full of critical essays that investigate the poetics and imagination of Dario Argento, retraces the director’s complete filmography. It also welcomes the testimonies of collaborators and the statements of great directors and actors who shared his long career. Biographies complete the volume. With texts by: Mick Garris, Domenico De Gaetano, Marcello Garofalo, Stefano Della Casa, Piera Detassis, Roberto Pugliese, Alan Jones, Domenico Monetti; testimonianze di: Stefania Casini, Franco Bellomo, Luigi Cozzi, Claudio Simonetti, Sergio Stivaletti, Luciano Tovoli, Antonello Geleng, Pupi Oggiano; fotogrammi tematici: Grazia Paganelli, Matteo Pollone, and Fabio Pezzetti Tonion. Text in English and Italian.

Read more less

Book SynopsisExplore the beginning of Steven Spielberg’s remarkable career with this definitive retrospective that covers Duel, The Sugarland Express, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, 1941, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial. In the first ten years of his career, Steven Spielberg directed some of the most influential and beloved films in cinema history. Movies such as Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial introduced audiences to the modern blockbuster and cemented Spielberg as a monumental figure in pop culture. Through exclusive imagery and unparalleled insight from Spielberg’s longtime documentarian, Laurent Bouzereau, this deluxe volume explores how a young filmmaker reinvented American cinema within just ten years. Featuring a fresh perspective on films including Duel, The Sugarland Express, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, 1941, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, this book is an essential exploration of an iconic filmmaker’s early career. ALL-NEW INSIGHTS: Featuring exclusive imagery and unparalleled insight from Spielberg’s longtime documentarian, Laurent Bouzereau. EXPLORE SPIELBERG’S EARLY CAREER: Covering the years 1971 to 1982, this deluxe volume explores how a young filmmaker reinvented American cinema within just a decade. LEARN THE HISTORY OF LANDMARK FILMS: This book dives deep into groundbreaking Spielberg films including Duel, The Sugarland Express, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, 1941, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial. COMPLETE YOUR COLLECTION: This book stands alongside hit titles including Jurassic Park: The Ultimate Visual History and Close Encounters of the Third Kind: The Ultimate Visual History.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisWelcome to Jurassic Park! Discover the cinematic evolution of the Jurassic Park trilogy, with this deluxe book celebrating the saga’s massive impact on pop culture.Director Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park unleashed an island of awe-inspiring dinosaurs, captivating audiences worldwide. Grossing over $900 million worldwide, the film ushered in a whole new age of digital visual effects and would go on to enthrall generations of moviegoers. The most comprehensive book about the Jurassic Park trilogy to date, Jurassic Park: The Ultimate Visual History begins with an in-depth account of the making of Spielberg’s original film, including rare and never-before-seen imagery and exclusive interviews with key creatives. Readers will then unearth the full history of the trilogy, from The Lost World: Jurassic Park to Jurassic Park III, through unprecedented access to the creative process behind the films. Fans will also find a fascinating look at the wider world of the saga, including video games, toys, comics, and more, exploring the lasting legacy of the movies and their influence on pop culture. Jurassic Park: The Ultimate Visual History will be the last word on the most epic saga in movie history—the definitive behind-the-scenes book that fans have been waiting for.

Read more less

Book SynopsisTrade ReviewAn imaginatively written self-reflexive academic's journey through the films of Kitano Takeshi. -- Isolde Standish, School of Oriental and African Studies A bold and provocative attempt at pinning down this most mercurial and misunderstood of Japanese directors. -- Jasper Sharp, Midnight Eye The depth of engagement with the films and the director within The Cinema of Takeshi Kitano ensures a complex reading of Kitano's cinema... An excellent book for anyone interested in Japanese culture, screen media and theory. More than this, The Cinema of Takeshi Kitano... is (like Kitano's cinema) an evocative and powerful contribution to film culture. -- Wendy Haslem, The University of Melbourne Senses of CinemaTable of ContentsAcknowledgements Introduction: Becoming Lost in Tokyo 1. Time, Space and Whatever 2. Flowering Blood 3. Intense Alterity 4. Starring Kitanos 5. This is the Sea Conclusion: Standing Outside Office Kitano Postscript: I Welcome the Pain of it Already Filmography Bibliography Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisTrade ReviewColin Burnett's The Invention of Robert Bresson is a breathtaking act of scholarship. The portrait of Bresson that emerges here, in biographical, cultural and aesthetic terms, is the most complete one that we have to date and will likely ever see. Burnett is as concerned to trace Bresson's relation to figures like Max Ernst as he is to show us just how deep Bresson's involvement was with Coco Chanel and the world of advertising. This is not the Bresson most of us have imagined. But even beyond the book's contribution to Bresson scholarship and French film studies, which is already considerable, Burnett offers us a new way of thinking about what he calls "a cultural marketplace," a mode of inquiry that will invigorate single author studies by way of the painstaking detail Burnett's model gives to the aesthetic and industrial forces at work at the various stages in an auteur's development, which inform, but do not determine in any simple way, the kind of decisions that a filmmaker is forced to make. For those of us who believe in the importance of single author studies, this book comes as a massive breath of fresh air. For those of you who believe auteurism has run its course, I dare you to read The Invention of Robert Bresson. It will not be easy, I predict, to maintain your resistance. -- Brian PriceColin Burnett keeps historical questions front and center as he explains Bresson's creative role within the lively cultural marketplace of post-WWII French cinema. The Invention of Robert Bresson goes beyond the confines of the usual auteur study, revealing the many innovative ways that Bresson promoted his personal style, while also participating fully in the artistic and critical context of his era. Burnett re-energizes our interest in this rewarding auteur and his place within a rich, unprecedented cinéphilia. -- Richard NeupertAn essential book for those interested in cinema authorship, French film and visual culture, and the iconoclastic Robert Bresson. Burnett's bold intervention takes Bresson down off his marble plinth and makes him a flesh-and-blood practitioner once again, in fierce conversation with the artistic and industrial situations that nourished his work. Burnett's real achievement is to make us look at Bresson—and postwar French cinema in all its troubled creative ferment—profoundly anew again. -- Tim PalmerFrench director Robert Bresson is celebrated among cinephiles for his distinctively spare films, and with this volume Burnett contributes considerably to the scholarship on this auteur. . . . Essential. * Choice *Burnett offers us an important contribution to work on Bresson, which signicantly expands and complements existing, more tex trather-than-context-bound studies. * French Studies *Table of ContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroductionPart One: Alternative Institutions1. Under the Aegis of Surrealism: How a Publicity Artist Became the Manager of an Independent Film Company2. The Rise of the Accursed: When Bresson was Co-President of an Avant-Garde Ciné-ClubPart Two: Vanguard Forms3. Purifying Cinema: The Provocations of Faithful Adaptation and First-Person Storytelling in "Ignace de Loyola" (1948) and Journal d'un curé de campagne (1951)4. Theorizing the Image: Bresson's Challenge to the Realists—Sparse Set Design, Acting and Photography from Les anges du péché (1943) to Une femme douce (1969)5. Vernacularizing Rhythm: Bresson and the Shift Toward Dionysian Temporalities—Plot Structure and Editing from Journal d'un curé de campagne (1951) to L'argent (1983)AfterwordSelected BibliographyIndex

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis is the first collection of original critical essays devoted to exploring the misunderstood, neglected and frequently caricatured role played by the film producer. The editors'' introduction provides a conceptual and methodological overview, arguing that the producer''s complex and multifaceted role is crucial to a film''s success or failure. The collection is divided into three sections where detailed individual essays explore a broad range of contrasting producers working in different historical, geographical, generic and industrial contexts. Rather than suggest there is a single type of producer, the collection analyses the rich variety of roles producers play, providing fascinating and informative insights into how the film industry actually works. This groundbreaking collection challenges several of the conventional orthodoxies of film studies, providing a new approach that will become required reading for scholars and students.Trade ReviewThis will prove an invaluable book, both to students and to those wishing to learn more about the film and media industries. Its spread is broad, making comparisons between different countries, practices and genres, and yet its intellectual focus is precise and well-conceived. The work of the producer has received scant attention in the past, and this important book rectifies that, and in a thorough, sophisticated and approachable way. Not to be missed. * Sue Harper, Emeritus Professor of Film History, University of Portsmouth, UK *A pioneering and timely volume emphasizing historical and transnational perspectives, Beyond the Bottom Line brings the myths and realities of the producer’s many roles into clear focus. Offering well developed case studies and conceptual clarification, the contributors deepen and extend the ongoing conversation about practitioner’s agency in thoughtful and productive ways. * Mette Hjort, Chair Professor of Visual Studies, Lingnan University, Hong Kong *This long-overdue scholarly collection represents an important step forward in the study of the role of the movie producer. Beyond the Bottom Line is a welcome addition to the burgeoning literature of production and industry studies. Its broad range of critical case studies will be a valuable resource to researchers and students alike. * Julian Hoxter, Screenwriting Coordinator, San Francisco State University, USA, and editor of Screenwriting *Table of ContentsTable of Contents List of Illustrations Notes on Contributors Acknowledgements 1. Introduction – Andrew Spicer, A.T. McKenna and Christopher Meir Part I – Theoretical and Historical Contexts 2. Joe Kember, University of Exeter, UK, “A Judge of Anything and Everything”: Charles Urban and the Role of the “Producer-Collaborator” in Early British Film 3. Audun Engelstad and Jo Sondre Moseng, Lillehammer University College, Norway, Mapping a Typology of the Film Producer – Or, Six Producers in Search of an Author 4. Andrew Spicer, University of the West of England, UK, The Independent Producer and the State: Simon Relph, Government Policy and the British Film Industry, 1980-2005 5. Paul Long, Birmingham City University, UK and Simon Spink, UK, Producing the Self: The Film Producer’s Labor and Professional Identity in the UK Creative Economy 6. Pauline Small, Queen Mary, University of London, UK, Producer and Director? Or, “Authorship” in 1950s Italian Cinema 7. Mark David Ryan, Ben Goldsmith, and Stuart Cunningham, Queensland University of Technology, Australia, and Deb Verhoeven, Deakin University, Australia, The Australian Screen Producer in Transition Part II – Media and Genre Contexts 8. Donna Kornhaber, University of Texas at Austin, USA, The Producer in Animation: Creativity and Commerce from Bray Studios to Pixar 9. Brett Mills and Sarah Ralph, University of East Anglia, UK, “Trying to Ride a Naughty Horse”: British Television Comedy Producers 10. Sonia Friel, Norwich University of the Arts, UK, Keith Griffiths’ Poetics of Production 11. James Lyons, University of Exeter, UK, The American Independent Producer and the Film Value Chain Part III – National and Transnational Contexts 12. Constanza Burucúa, Western University, Canada, Lita Stantic: Auteur Producer/Producer of Auteurs 13. A.T. McKenna, University of Nottingham, China, Beyond National Humiliation: Han Sanping and China’s Post-Olympics Historical Event Blockbusters 14. Gertjan Willems, Ghent University, Belgium, The Producer in Belgian Cinema(s): The Case of Jean (and Jan) Van Raemdonck 15. Christopher Meir, University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad and Tobago, Post-Imperial Co-Producers: Emile Sherman, Iain Canning and Contemporary Anglo-Australian Cinema

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisMalcolm Turvey examines Jacques Tati’s unique comedic style and evaluates its significance for the history of film and modernism. Richly illustrated with images from the director’s films, Play Time offers an illuminating and original understanding of Tati’s work.Trade ReviewTurvey provides a sharply observant account of the scope and function of the more ‘cognitively challenging’ of these comic devices in Tati’s major films. -- David Trotter * London Review of Books *Turvey’s study of Tati’s context traces a fascinating continuity between the clown tradition, Charlie Chaplin’s construction of comic personas and the role of the 'living object' in Dada, Surrealism, Cubism and other interwar artistic movements. * Times Literary Supplement *Play Time is a subtle, intelligent—and wonderfully funny—book. It has much to offer both Tati novices and his connoisseurs. -- Pardis Dabashi * Modernism/modernity *The book is a delicious treat, and serious film students will appreciate it as a penetrating primer on the cinematic comic artisdt at work. * Choice *Play Time: Jacques Tati and Comedic Modernism must be warmly recommended reading for all lovers of Tati, particularly since it is written by one of them, which shows. And my recommendation gets only warmer for all those who, like myself, are interested in understanding comedy and its mechanisms. -- Gianni Barchiesi * Alphaville Journal *Malcolm Turvey’s exhilarating study of Jacques Tati is a precise, loving appreciation of the unique style and worldview of a great filmmaker. It’s also a history of avant-garde humor and a deep analysis of techniques of slapstick and satire. Turvey, one of our finest scholars of modernity in the arts, shows in detail how Tati’s comedy turned modernist experimentation into popular entertainment. -- David Bordwell, author of Reinventing Hollywood: How 1940s Filmmakers Changed Movie StorytellingMalcolm Turvey’s Play Time is the best extended critical study of Tati I’ve encountered: persuasively argued, scrupulously observed, and beautifully illustrated. The writing is clear and graceful, and the research is impressive, especially regarding the relation of slapstick films to avant-garde movements of the early twentieth century and Tati’s critiques of modern architecture. Most critical books about Tati have been short on close analysis, but this one beats them all. -- Jonathan Rosenbaum, author of Cinematic Encounters: Interviews and DialoguesFew films deserve a book-length study as much as those of Jacques Tati. Malcolm Turvey has done them justice. His explanation of their context in the slapstick and modernist traditions is fascinating. Turvey takes Tati’s work seriously, not by spoiling the fun but by respecting its extraordinary complexity. His title comes from Tati’s masterpiece. No matter how many times you have seen Play Time—and it is a film made for many viewings—Turvey will reveal something new and make you want to see it yet again. -- Kristin Thompson, Honorary Fellow in the Department of Communication Arts, University of Wisconsin-MadisonThis book is an excellent, detailed study of the films of Jacques Tati that establishes how Tati’s work draws upon classical “comedian comedy” while also connecting with the interwar European avant-garde. Moreover, the author insightfully discusses Tati’s love/hate relationship with modernity as well as his passion for creating a participatory style in which the spectator works to find humor in his films and also in the real world. -- Lucy Fischer, Distinguished Professor Emerita, University of PittsburghMalcolm Turvey’s Play Time is a completely joyful and entirely refreshing account of the films of Jacques Tati. It is also one of the finest, most nuanced accounts of comedic form that we have, a work that no one who studies comedy, or simply enjoys it, should be without. In tending so carefully to the structure of Tati’s gags—a seemingly infinite amount of them—Turvey does something that is as extraordinary as it is subtle. With Tati, he shows us how intelligence and popularity, structure and participation, aesthetic excellence and ordinary life, cannot be easily or gainfully opposed. -- Brian Price, University of TorontoTable of ContentsPreface and AcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. Comedic Modernism2. Comedy of Everyday Life3. The Beholder’s Share4. Satirizing ModernityAfterword: Parade, Tati, and Participatory CultureNotesBibliographyIndex

Read more less

Book SynopsisProviding a clear, systematic account of the evolution of Bellour's thought on the nature of cinematic representation, the impact of digital technology and the response of the spectator, this is an essential guide to the work of a major contemporary thinker.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe book offers a radical rethinking of Michelangelo Antonioni's work. It argues against prevalent understandings of it in terms of both cinematic purity and indebtedness to painting.

Read more less

Book SynopsisGo behind the scenes of DreamWorks Animation's smart,hilarious comedy The Boss Baby. This beautifully illustratedbook includes a wide range of colorful development art,storyboards and character sketches, as well as in-depthinterviews with director Tom McGrath, writer MichaelMcCullers, producer Ramsey Naito, plus key members ofthe storyboard, visual development, visual effects, CGanimation, modeling and layout departments.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn unusually brilliant generation of film-makers emerged from British television drama in the 1960-70s - none more formidable than Alan Clarke. Yet Clarke enjoyed only a vague renown among the public, even though some of his most incendiary productions - Scum, The Firm, Made in Britain - attracted great controversy. But he was greatly admired by his fellow professionals: ''He became the best of all of us'', Stephen Frears observed after Clarke''s untimely death in 1990.In his work Clarke explored working-class lives and left-wing themes with unflinching directness and humour. He forged alliances with gifted writers and producers, and his facility for encouraging stunning performaces (from Gary Oldman, Tim Roth, Ray Winstone) made him a hero amongst actors. As a man, Clarke''s wit, vigour and generosity were legendary. Yet he retained a privacy which made him enigmatic and imbued his work with much of its austere radiance. This volume is a tribute to Clar

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis work features 16 uncensored interviews with filmmakers who have struggled to realise their visions in a constantly shifting political landscape.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisIsaac Julien is one of Britain''s foremost artist film-makers, as equally acclaimed for his fluent and arresting single-screen works as his vibrant and inventive gallery installations. Moving deftly between filmworld and artworld, Julien remains one of the most original voices on the contemporary scene. This minigraph edition, published at the time of his nomination for the 2001 Turner Prize, features essays by Kobena Mercer and Chris Darke. Minigraphs is a series of publications developed by Film and Video Umbrella devoted to contemporary artists working with film and video. Fully illustrated, and with specially commissioned essays and an extensive lists of works, this series provides an attractive and indispensable introduction to some of Britain's most exciting contemporary artists.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less