Individual film directors Books

Book Synopsis''Over 20 films. Over 40 years. What collaboration in any medium has lasted so long, been so successful, so personal, so happy? Read this wonderfully entertaining book: a unique story of a unique life in the world of world cinema'' WES ANDERSON ''Jim is as eloquent and elegant with words as with the camera; here are almost a series of short stories of his life, vivid snapshots, told with an exacting eye. Every sentence is filled with his wry cadence, guided by his appreciation of things beautiful, amusing and unusual. We take the tour of his life which has as fascinating a cast and is set in locations as far flung and exotic as his films - except with way more sex. Read it and drink it in!'' HELENA BONHAM CARTER''Ivory is full of candour and randiness...[this] book will open the eyes, often very wide'' The Times---------------In Solid Ivory, a carefully crafted mosaic of memories, portraits, and reflecTrade ReviewOver 20 films. Over 40 years. What collaboration in any medium has lasted so long, been so successful, so personal, so happy? James Ivory met Ismail Merchant (in 1961) and Ruth Prawer Jhabvala (in 1962), and one of the earliest, most durable, most independent of independent film families came to life. The widest varieties of stories (neorealist memoirs, literary adaptations, avant garde experiments) and settings (England, France, Italy, India, the Americas North and South); the broadest collection of superb actors and artists (Vanessa Redgrave, Paul Newman, Anthony Hopkins, Shashi Kapoor, Maggie Smith, Subrata Mitra!). Read this wonderfully entertaining book: a unique story of a unique life in the world of world cinema. * Wes Anderson *I met Jim when I was 18 . He was an introvert to Ismail's extrovert. I always wondered what was going on in his head. Now I know, and I'm so glad he's shared it.Jim is as eloquent and elegant with words as with the camera; here are almost a series of short stories of his life, vivid snapshots, told with an exacting eye. Every sentence is filled with his wry cadence, guided by his appreciation of things beautiful, amusing and unusual. We take the tour of his life which has as fascinating a cast and is set in locations as far flung and exotic as his films - except with way more sex. And I thank God I'm not in it. Jim is now in his ninth decade and I believe his secret elixir is a delight in life - read it and drink it in! -- Helena Bonham Carter'James Ivory write[s] with perfect elegance...there's nothing starchy or uptight about these scenes from his fascinating life' * The Sunday Times *'Full of humour, warmth and crystal-clear reminiscences from his personal and professional life, Ivory's narrative is witty, informative, gossipy and at times eye-poppingly frank' * The Lady *'There's something rather brilliant about a man heading towards his hundredth birthday demanding more explicit sex. Ivory is full of candour and randiness...[this] book will open the eyes, often very wide' * Times *'Consistently entertaining' * Guardian *'A languid, enjoyably gossipy memoir from one half of Merchant Ivory that after a fascinating exploration of well-off, small-town American life in the Thirties and Forties, quickly gets eye-opening' * Evening Standard *Ivory writes beautifully and delicately, and emerges as a true cinematic rarity; the auteur who wants everyone to have a nice time while they make their best work * TLS *Over 20 films. Over 40 years. What collaboration in any medium has lasted so long, been so successful, so personal, so happy?...Read this wonderfully entertaining book: a unique story of a unique life in the world of world cinema. -- Wes AndersonJim is as eloquent and elegant with words as with the camera; here are almost a series of short stories of his life, vivid snapshots, told with an exacting eye. Every sentence is filled with his wry cadence, guided by his appreciation of things beautiful, amusing and unusual. We take the tour of his life which has as fascinating a cast and is set in locations as far flung and exotic as his films - except with way more sex...read it and drink it in! -- Helena Bonham CarterA memoir as eloquent and gracious as his films, Ivory's page-turner brims over with the boldness, candor, and modesty which only great minds can claim. Places, objects, bodies, people, and so many names, all have a place in his unassailably brilliant life. -- André Aciman - writer of CALL ME BY YOUR NAMEThe producer-director's memoirs are as stately and intimate as his indelible films, chronicling his childhood in Klamath Falls, Oregon during the Great Depression; his clandestine boyhood crushes; and the tribulations and triumphs of making movie magic. * Oprah Daily *

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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

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Book SynopsisMelodrama, biography, cold war thriller, drug memoir, essay in fragments, mystery – Fassbinder Thousands of Mirrors is cult critic Ian Penman’s long awaited first original book, a kaleidoscopic study of the late West German filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder (1945–1982). Written quickly under a self-imposed deadline in the spirit of Fassbinder himself, who would often get films made in a matter of weeks or months, Fassbinder Thousands of Mirrors presents the filmmaker as a pivotal figure in the late 1970s moment between late modernism and the advent of postmodernism and the digital revolution. Compelling, beautifully written and genuinely moving, echoing the fragmentary and reflective works of writers like Barthes and Cioran, this is a story that has everything: sex, drugs, art, the city, cinema and revolution.Trade Review‘[Fassbinder] Thousands of Mirrors is not a sorrowful kill-your-heroes recanting. It’s much more interesting than that – a freewheeling, hopscotching study of the Fassbinder allure and an investigation of Penman’s younger self…It’s a book about a film-maker but also, hauntingly, about the way our tastes and passions change over time.’ — Anthony Quinn, Observer‘Do Penman’s flurries of quickfire erudition add up to a dazzling kaleidoscope overall, or a labyrinth of aborted pathways? The answer is “both”. He’s boldly querying his subject’s genius from every vantage point – angry and young; older and (maybe) wiser.’ — Tim Robey, Telegraph‘Ian Penman is an ideal critic, one who invites you in, takes your coat, and hands you a drink as he sidles up to his topic. He has a modest mien, a feathery way with a sentence, a century’s worth of adroit cultural connections at the ready, and a great well of genuine passion, which quickly raises the temperature.’ — Lucy Sante, author of The Other Paris‘This is a wonderful book, and a surprisingly encouraging one too. Acute in its glancing survey of Fassbinder’s films, it also engages the early Seventies as a moment of ideological dishevelment that refuses to pass. If Penman lingers over those years in his own taut and revealing way, that is partly because they produced a kind of critical thought that, having not yet been squared up to fit the academic conveyor belt, could be rarified, speculative and experimental while also remaining closely engaged with political reality. Fassbinder is a great model for anyone puzzling over how we might remember as well as think and act in this chaotic time.’ — Patrick Wright, author of The Sea View Has Me Again‘Ian Penman – critic, essayist, mystical hack and charmer of sentences like they’re snakes – is the writer I have hardly gone a week without reading, reciting, summoning to mind. The writer without whom, etc.’ — Brian Dillon, author of Affinities‘Approached from all angles, Fassbinder is by turns a figure of intense corporeality, glistening with sweat, and an overblown mass of meaning.’ — Georgie Carr, Times Literary Supplement‘The book is many things, but above all it is a reckoning with the idea that art might enter the commodity world and awaken its inhabitants.... [T]he late 1970s/early 1980s, in which Penman was a shadowy but vital presence – post-punk, new pop, new romanticism – is remembered similarly as a moment where a sudden societal switch led to an efflorescence of radical popular culture. Writing his book in 2022, Penman was remembering Penman in 1982 remembering the just-dead Fassbinder marking one historical moment of transition by making reference to another that took place decades earlier. To read Penman doing this in what feels like another moment of passage into something unknown and frightening is rather eerie.’ — Owen Hatherley, London Review of Books‘This is a jittery, clammy book, sweat beading on every page… In its exuberant phrase making, obsessive listing, emotional explosions and crashes, bursting seams – the book has three appendices – and its linguistic pyrotechnics, it ultimately comes down on the side of willing delirium.’ — John Douglas Miller, Frieze‘[A] slender love letter.’ — Stuart Jeffries, Spectator‘[T]his is the efficient, gregarious guidebook that neophytes have been missing’ —Chris Molner, Los Angeles Review of Books ‘Drifting through personal back alleys and intellectual boulevards à la the wanderings of Walter Benjamin and Geoff Dyer. A maze of epigrams, aphorisms (“Aren’t all masks death masks?”), anecdotes, and numbered fragments. An exquisitely companionable guidebook-inventory of a vast, intimate mental space Penman dubs the Fassbundesrepublik…A Thousand Mirrors doesn’t try to solve the contradictions of its subject but lays them out like a suit and inhabits them.’ —Howard Hampton, Artforum‘Ian Penman’s Fassbinder Thousands Of Mirrors isn’t a biography of the epic and controversial master filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder – it’s much more. It’s chock-a-block with quotes and confessions, famous writers, artists, politics, history, social commentary and a bit of sex, drugs and rock’n’roll, among – of course – film talk. Like me, you’ll have to re-read this, not least because it’s a who’s who of post-WWII culture world.’ — Rhonda Lee Reali, Buzz Magazine‘And so, as if making a pact with his young review-churning self, Penman opted for a different strategy: to write quickly, finishing in a matter of months a critical portrait of Fassbinder in the style of Fassbinder — fast, made-to-deadline, bristling with ideas yet economical.The book rushes by in a flurry of numbered one-or-so-paragraph notes. The notes drift, venture lightly and suggestively down quick-flash exploratory tunnels, turn Fassbinder and his films over and peer at them from various heights.’ — William Harris, Jacobin‘Fassbinder Thousands of Mirrors, by the British critic Ian Penman, offers… an erotics—of cinema, of memory, of the gradual wreck of history. The sensuality of Penman’s book is inseparable from the music of his prose.’ — Jeremy Lybarger, The Baffler‘Ian Penman – legendary writer, critic and master of lucid, joyous prose – instead offers up a patchwork portrait of RWF, one assembled of 450 observations, reflections, bits of research and more. Through those fragments you get a proper sense of how one can really wallow in both Fassbinder’s massive body of work and his personal mythology – but Mirrors also reeks of adoration and joy, a delightful, emotive and appropriately flashy ode.’ — Ed Cunningham,Timeout Books of the Year 2023

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Book SynopsisThe enigmatic and elusive filmmaker Stanley Kubrick has not been treated to a full-length biography in over twenty years. Stanley Kubrick: An Odyssey fills that gap. It is based on access to the latest research, especially into his archive at the University of the Arts, London, and other papers as well as new interviews with family members and those who worked with him. It offers comprehensive and in-depth coverage of Kubrick's personal, private, public, and working life. We discuss not only the making of his films, but also about those he wanted but failed to make like Burning Secret, Napoleon, Aryan Papers, and A.I. We discover what he was doing when he was not making films. This biography will puncture a few myths about this allegedly reclusive filmmaker, who created some of the most important works of art of the twentieth century

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Book SynopsisUnofficial and unauthorised.'When people ask me if I went to film school I tell them, 'No, I went to films''. From the set of 1993’s Pulp Fiction, to a bar room meeting with Robert Rodriguez and an inspirational lunch with Leonardo di Caprio, this unique graphic novel takes us across a series of Hollywood-inspired vignettes covering the movie-obsessed life and career of one of modern cinema’s greatest filmmakers – Quentin Tarantino. Join the conversation as Tarantino talks John Travolta into starring in Pulp Fiction, find out about the inspiration for his earliest screenplays and learn about Tarantino’s obsessive childhood growing up in California. For those who already know what they call a Quarter Pounder with Cheese in Paris – as well as those looking for an insight into Tarantino’s influences, inspirations and the development of his signature

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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.

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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.

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Book SynopsisDiscover the secrets of Christopher Nolan's Tenet with this exclusive behind-the-scenes look at 2020's most anticipated film. In 2020, director Christopher Nolan returns with Tenet, an action epic evolving from the world of international espionage. This deluxe book takes fans through the full creative journey that brought Tenet to the screen, from the genesis of Nolan's uniquely imaginative script through to the cutting edge techniques used to realise the film's innovative action sequences. Featuring exclusive interviews with the director and his crew, including producer Emma Thomas and production designer Nathan Crowley, The Making of Tenet is a can't-miss companion to Nolan's thrilling new masterpiece.

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Book SynopsisTrade Review“It’s gossipy and funny and sometimes wistful and sad, but it’s page-turning. . . . For a film lover like me, Alright, Alright, Alright is an endless feast of facts and revelations. I’m gonna guess that for the casual filmgoer (and even someone who’s never seen Dazed and Confused) it will be fascinating just for the thrill of reading older people looking back with joy, bewilderment and sometimes anger at a time when they were not only young, but when their youth blazed.” — Patton Oswalt, New York Times Book Review “The story of Dazed and Confused has been told before, but never with the depth, breadth, or remarkable reproduction of the film’s conversational rhythms found in Melissa Maerz’s new oral history. . . . Like Linklater’s depiction of the last day of school circa 1976, Maerz’s book envelops readers in time and place. But while the movie’s more of a snapshot, Alright, Alright, Alright is a panorama, enriched by deep background…. It’s a class reunion that doesn’t suck, attended by almost all of the living principals.” — AV Club “[Maerz] does a lot more than just weave the oral history behind a famous movie. She makes it feel like the story of a generation….. This book does for the Nineties what the movie did for the Seventies: a lovingly detailed portrait of an era, celebratory but inevitably elegiac, full of tiny comic moments that seem to sum up the decade’s craziest hopes and dreams…. Like the movie, the book is pure pleasure because makes you feel like you’re hanging out with these friends—it’s a joy to jump and join them on a slow ride.” — Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone “A charming oral history of everyone’s favorite stoner film. . . . Essential for fans of the film but also for anyone with ambitions to work in film on either side of the camera.” — Kirkus, starred review “Fun reading, enhanced by veteran entertainment journalist Maerz’s expert chapter introductions and many, well-organized conversations with everyone from Linklater to the stars to the film crew. But Alright, Alright, Alright is also an interesting peek into the many relationships that must be navigated in the making of a film, and a surprising foray into the nature of memory and nostalgia. A must for fans of the movie and readers interested in the moviemaking experience.” — Booklist, starred review “Thorough, funny, and bittersweet.” — Texas Monthly “Touches on the volatility of young artists, the hormones of youthful performers, the conflicts between corporate and artistic stakeholders, the ways our entertainment is presented to us and how we consume it. The book, like the film, is a story about time. ... One of the joys in Alright, Alright, Alright is the perspective Maerz attains with the time that has passed since the making of “Dazed,” as well as its release, its lukewarm reception and its long-tail embrace. Her book becomes less specifically tied to the film and more about how time affects all of us after adolescence.” — Houston Chronicle “An at times humorous chronicle of how a small film became a touchstone of 1990s cinema, with introspective analysis of directing techniques, casting, and performance. . . . Linklater devotees, those who love Dazed and Confused, and anyone interested in 1990s indie film will appreciate Maerz’s detailed tribute.” — Library Journal “An intricate oral history… any cinephile would be happy to check out.” — Publishers Weekly

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Book Synopsis'A story of courage, heart, of coming back for more, of love and struggle and the power of both' Joseph O'ConnorA No.1 bestseller, It's Not Yet Dark is an unforgettable book about relationships and family, about what connects and separates us as people and, ultimately, about what it means to be alive.Trade ReviewIf you are hungry for truth and beauty, read this book * Roisin Ingle, The Irish Times *Sparsely and beautifully written...the human spirit and will to live shines out of these pages...By the time you reach the end of this book, with tears of admiration, sadness and frustration in your eyes, the question is no longer why would you want to live...but how could you not * Irish Independent *An unforgettable read about what it means to be alive * Woman's Way magazine *[It's Not Yet Dark is] a demonstration of a will to live that is breathtaking...There's a rhythm of immediacy that feels like a still-beating heart whose strength is beyond admirable. It is a work of a documentary poetry...an extraordinary read * The Herald *Part memoir, part stark document of the way [Simon] and his family have dealt with motor neuron disease, and part fierce celebration of being alive, It's Not Yet Dark is powerful, gripping and compelling * The Irish Times *The word 'inspirational' is over-used, but if ever a book deserved this epithet, this is it * Sunday Independent *[A] gripping, affecting, sometimes funny read by a natural-born storyteller with something to say about the weight and the value of a life...If you need a story of courage, of heart, of coming back for more, of love and struggle and the power of both, It's Not Yet Dark could be the elusive thing you're after * Joseph O'Connor *Beautifully written...utterly life-affirming * Alan Rickman *Crystal clear, radiating all the things that we aspire toward. A beautiful love story * Colin Farrell *

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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.

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Book SynopsisInspired by the fabled journals in which acclaimed filmmaker Guillermo del Toro records his innermost thoughts and unleashes his vivid imagination, Insight Editions has created a replica sketchbook aimed at the director's legion of fans. Similar in design to del Toro's leather-bound volumes, this sketchbook features an inspirational message from the director along with selected examples of his incredible art.

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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

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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

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Book SynopsisThe golden age of German cinema began at the end of the First World War and ended shortly after the coming of sound. This book demonstrates the connection between German Romanticism and the cinema through Expressionist writings.Trade Review"A sumptuous meal for those interested in the dark and brooding days of German cinema." * Cinema Journal *"Arguably one of the best books on cinema yet written." * Times Literary Supplement *Table of ContentsForeword to the English language edition 1 The Predisposition towards Expressionism 2 The Beginnings of the Expressionist Film The Cabinet of Dr Caligari; Genuine; Von Morgens bis Mitternachts; Torgus; Raskolnikow 3 The Spell of Light: the Influence of Max Reinhardt The Student of Prague (1913); Max Reinhardt; The Go/em (1920); Die Chronik Pon Grieshuus; Vanina; Carl Boese on the special effects for The Go/em 4 Lubitsch and the Costume Film !vfadame Dubarry; Sumurun; Anna Boleyn; Danton; Othello; Pola Negri 5 The Stylized Fantastic Der Miide Tod 6 The Symphonies of Horror Nosferatu; the demoniac bourgeois; the sway of the Doppelgiinger 7 'Decorative· Expressionism Waxworks; the concept of space; the obsession with corridors and staircases; Paul Leni on set designing 8 The World of Shadows and Mirrors Warning Shadows; the Expressionist actor 9 Studio Architecture and Landscape Die Nibelungen; geometric grouping 10 The Expressionist Debut of a 'Realistic' Director Der Schatz 11 Kammerspielfilm and Stimmung Hintertreppe; Scherben; Sylvester; Paul Czinner; Elisabeth Bergner; Stimmung 12 Murnau and the Kammerspielfilm The Last Laugh; the mobile camera 13 The Handling of Crowds Metropolis; the influence of the Expressionist choruses and Piscator 14 The Fritz Lang Thriller Die Spinnen; Dr Mabuse der Spieler; Spione; Die Frau im Mond 15 Tragedies of the Street Die Strasse; The joyless Street; Asta Nielsen; Dirnentragiidie; the Absolute film; Asphalt 16 The Evolution of the Costume Film Tartuffe 17 The Eye of the Camera in E.A. Dupont Das Alte Gesetz; Variety 18 The Climax of the Chiaroscuro Faust 19 Pabst and the Miracle of Louise Brooks Pandora's Box; Diary of a Lost Girl; Censorship and Pabst's realism 20 The Decline of the German Film The coming of sound; Die Dreigroschenoper; M; Das Testament des Dr Mabuse; Miidchen in Uniform; the Ufa style; Leni Riefenstahl; the post-Nazi era Appendix: The Dreigroschenoper Lawsuit Principal Works Mentioned in the Text Selective Filmography, 1913-33 Index Sources of Illustrations

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Book Synopsis''Joseph Mcbride''s book has the sweep, passion, complexity and tragic grandeur of a great John Ford film - it should be compulsory reading.'' Martin ScorseseJohn Ford''s many classic movies - among them Stagecoach, The Grapes of Wrath, The Quiet Man, The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance - earned him worldwide praise and renown. Now Joseph McBride presents us with the definitive account of the man''s myriad complexities and contradictions, tracing Ford''s life from his modest beginnings as ''Bull'' Feeney, the nearsighted football-playing son of Irish immigrants in Maine, to his recognition, after a long, controversial, and much-decorated career, as America''s national myth-maker. This deeply insightful and impeccably documented narrative is the epic tribute that Ford''s stature merits.

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Book SynopsisDuring the 1920s and '30s, Mexico attracted an international roster of artists and intellectuals - including Orson Welles, Katherine Anne Porter, and Leon Trotsky. This book covers the years that the renowned Soviet director Sergei Eisenstein spent in the country to work on his controversial film Que Viva Mexico!

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Book SynopsisNOW A NETFLIX ORIGINAL SERIES, featuring interviews with Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola and Guillermo del ToroBefore the Second World War the Hollywood box office was booming, but the business was accused of being too foreign, too Jewish, too 'un-American'. Then the war changed everything. With Pearl Harbor came the opportunity for Hollywood to prove its critics wrong.America's most legendary directors played a huge role in the war effort: John Ford, William Wyler, John Huston, Frank Capra, and George Stevens. Between them they shaped the public perception of almost every major moment of the war. With characteristic insight and expert knowledge Harris tells the untold story of how Hollywood changed World War II, and how World War II changed Hollywood.Trade ReviewThe bombs fall on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 and Hollywood rolls up its sleeves and swaps the diplomatic velvet glove for the patriotic steel fist . . . A story well worth telling * * Observer * *A captivating history . . . makes you want to revisit many of the films * * Daily Telegraph * *Mark Harris conducts a fastidious investigation into the five top filmmakers who put their careers on hold to help the war effort . . . Fascinating * * Total Film * *Harris deftly threads the story of each man into the wider canvases of Hollywood and the war * * Scotland on Sunday * *Gripping . . . reveals how an elite squad of Hollywood's greatest directors recorded the bravest - and bloodiest - actions of World War II * * Mail on Sunday * *Tough-minded, information-packed and irresistibly readable * * New York Times * *Can't-put-it-down history of the World War II propaganda film * * San Francisco Chronicle * *Harris has a huge story to tell, and he does so brilliantly . . . an inspirational, if cautionary, tale of the triumph of the individual over the collective, of personal vision over groupthink, and ultimately of art over propaganda * * Wall Street Journal * *Harris is a lively commentator, and a master weaver of multifarious threads * * Empire * *Impeccably researched and irresistibly entertaining * * Belfast Telegraph * *Full of colourful anecdotes about the golden age of Hollywood as well as unflinching descriptions of what the directors faced on the frontline, the 500-plus pages just fly by. This would make a great movie... * * Aberdeen Evening Express * *This is as epic an undertaking as those historical Hollywood sagas of the '30s and '40s, including anecdotes from this golden age of film * * Good Book Guide * *I enjoyed the honesty of this book. It opened my eyes * * The Truth About Lies * *A startling account of how five exemplary film-makers (John Ford, George Stevens, John Huston, William Wyler, Frank Capra) enlisted in every branch of the US forces, only to return, deeply moved and changed, to approach cinema in new ways * * Financial Times * *

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Book SynopsisFrederick Wiseman has made films that together form a monumental chronicle of late twentieth-century institutional and cultural life. This title provides a comprehensive overview of Wiseman's work (including projects for theatre and opera), featuring original essays by a variety of writers, critics, filmmakers and actors, and by Wiseman himself.

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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

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Book SynopsisNow a major motion picture, The Disaster Artist, starring James Franco, Alison Brie, Zoey Deutch, Lizzy Caplan, Zac Efron, Bryan Cranston, Dave Franco, Kristen Bell, Seth Rogen, Sharon Stone, and Judd Apatow.In 2003, an independent film called The Room - starring and written, produced, and directed by a mysteriously wealthy social misfit named Tommy Wiseau - made its disastrous debut in Los Angeles. Described by one reviewer as ''like getting stabbed in the head'', the $6 million film earned a grand total of $1,800 at the box office and closed after two weeks. Over a decade later, The Room is an international cult phenomenon, whose legions of fans attend screenings featuring costumes, audience rituals, merchandising and thousands of plastic spoons. In The Disaster Artist, Greg Sestero, Tommy''s costar, recounts the film''s bizarre journey to infamy, explaining how the movie''s many nonsensical scenes and bits of dialogue came to be Trade ReviewFinally, a hilarious, delusional, and weirdly inspirational explanation for the most deliciously awful movie ever madeA great portrayal of hopefuls coming to Los Angeles to pursue their ambitions, and an even greater examination of what it means to be a creative person with a dream and trying to make it come true....In so many ways. Tommy c'est moiThe Disaster Artist is not only the terrifically engaging tale of a bad Hollywood movie, it's one of the most honest books about friendship I've read in years - Los Angeles TimesA book about a cinematic comedy of errors . . . sharply detailed . . . funny - New York TimesPossibly the most important piece of literature ever printed - The Huffington PostI laughed so hard reading The Disaster Artist that I cried - Rolling Stone

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Book Synopsis'The life-affirming expression of an artist engaged in living to the full' The Times Smiling in Slow Motion is Derek Jarman's last journal, stretching from May 1991 until a fortnight before his death in February 1994. Jarman writes with his trademark humour and candour about friends and enemies, as he races through his final years of film-making, gardening and radical political protest. Written from Jarman's Charing Cross Road flat, his famed garden at Dungeness, and finally from his bed in St Bartholomew's Hospital, Jarman meditates on his own deteriorating health and the loss of his contemporaries. Yet Smiling in Slow Motion is not simply a chronicle of illness and regret: it is, at its heart, one of endeavour, determination and pride.WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY NEIL BARTLETTTrade ReviewGossipy, candid, funny, and, as Jarman’s illness takes hold, powerfully moving * Choice Magazine *Present on every page is the creative sparkle and compellingly generous spirit of a man who was in every way an uncompromising individual * The Times *In these diaries... the artist and film director emerges as a down-to-earth visionary... this perceptive and enjoyable work is something of a miracle * Independent *For all his anger, Jarman never seems brutalised. He retains his humanity and his good humour. His is a wonderfully garrulous, mercurial, polymathic daemon * Literary Review *Jarman [is] the sort of troublemaking visionary who one day may be compared with Blake -- John Gill * Time Out *

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Book SynopsisFrom their first film in 1963, Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet distinguished themselves as two of Europe's most inventive, generous, and uncompromising filmmakers. From Machorka-Muff (1963) through These Encounters of Theirs (2006), and in the subsequent solo work of Jean-Marie Straub, they developed groundbreaking and unique approaches to film adaptation, performance, sound recording, cinematography, and translation in films made across Germany, Italy, and France – including such modern classics as The Chronicle of Anna Magdalena Bach (1967), Moses and Aaron (1974), Class Relations (1983), and Sicilia! (1999). On the occasion of the first complete North American retrospective of their films in more than two decades, this volume traces the history of Straub's and Huillet's work, placing their films in the specific cultural, linguistic, and critical contexts in which they were produced and providing an account of their distribution and reception in the English-speaking world.Trade ReviewFat and full of ideas and information. -- David Bordwell * Observations on Film Art *[A] showcase of the film making practice as a true labor of love. -- Film QuarterlyFendt's volume is an immensely useful tool for framing and enhancing the duo's notoriously austere, 'difficult' films...A comprehensive and superbly detailed filmography concludes the book, solidifying its status as a newly crucial resource for devout Straubians and casual auditors alike. -- Cinema Scope

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Book SynopsisA richly illustrated journey through the extraordinary cinematic worlds of beloved filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki A New York Magazine 2021 holiday gift guide pick For over four decades, Hayao Miyazaki has been enchanting audiences of all ages. His animated films, often featuring children navigating unfamiliar and challenging worlds, offer timeless explorations of youth and what it means to grow up. Celebrated and admired around the globe for his artistic vision, craftsmanship and deeply humanistic values, Miyazaki has influenced generations of artists. The universal appeal of his evocative natural settings and complex characters, many among them strong girls and young women, cuts across cultural boundaries. This book is published on the occasion of the 2021 inaugural exhibition at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles, in collaboration with Studio Ghibli in Tokyo. It accompanies the first ever retrospective dedicated to the legendary filmmaker in North America and introduces hundreds of original production materials, including artworks never before seen outside of Studio Ghibli’s archives. Concept sketches, character designs, storyboards, layouts, backgrounds and production cels from his early career through all 11 of his feature films, including My Neighbor Totoro (1988), Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989), Princess Mononoke (1997), Spirited Away (2001) and Howl’s Moving Castle (2004), offer insight into Miyazaki’s creative process and masterful animation techniques.Trade ReviewAlmost too beautiful to be true. -- Jyni Ong * It's Nice That *the book is artistic biography, aesthetic treatise, creative process explication, and celebration of the filmmaker’s work. -- W. Scott Olsen * Frames *"much more than a collection of film stills and includes layout drawings, storyboards, production design drawings, key animation sets, maps, backgrounds, and even translations of notes etched into the drawings. The work speaks for itself, and Miyazaki’s brilliant imagination is on full display; it’s a peek behind the curtain that many will savor" -- Matthew Sorrento * Film International *Will satisfy all your Ghibli needs... Fans can piece together Miyazaki’s aesthetic process from all 11 of his feature films. -- Shawn Ghassemitari * Hypebeast *A considerable work itself: a treasure for fans of the animator and Studio Ghibli, and a wonderful history, art, and reference piece for students of film and animation. * Anime News Network *Published in partnership with Studio Ghibli, “Hayao Miyazaki” will be available starting Sept. 7 and is set to include hundreds of original production materials, including artworks never seen outside of Studio Ghibli’s archives -- Pat Saperstein * Variety *

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Book SynopsisA poetic meditation on life and death, by one of the most renowned and respected film-makers and intellectuals of our time. In November 1974, when Werner Herzog was told that his mentor Lotte Eisner, the film-maker and critic, was dying in Paris, he set off to walk there from Munich, ‘in full faith, believing that she would stay alive if I came on foot’. Along the way he recorded what he saw, how he felt, and what he experienced, from the physical discomfort of the journey to moments of rapture. It is a remarkable narrative – part pilgrimage, part meditation, and a confrontation between a great German Romantic imagination and the contemporary world. This edition of the book is being published for the first time as a classic piece of proto-psychogeography, to coincide with the fortieth anniversary of the legendary director’s walk.Trade Review'Surely the strangest, strongest walking book I know, it tells the story of a winter pilgrimage, made in desperation and in hope. At once a diary, a blizzard of weather and memories, and the record of a ritual: only Herzog could have written this weird, slender classic.' Robert Macfarlane * Robert Macfarlane *Herzog's pilgrimage is a fugue and an absurdist comedy as rich as anything in his cinema'. Iain Sinclair * Iain Sinclair *

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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

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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.

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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.

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