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Well illustrated book on history of silent movies
David Lean was one of a handful of movie-makers of international renown and, arguably, the most famous and successful of all British film directors. Emerging from a childhood of nearly Dickensian darkness, Lean found success as the director of the such classic films as The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, and Doctor Zhivago.Learn about the making of movies a s realized by a master, but also of the highly personal costs of genius. in color.
How It Happened Here tells the story of the making of a film and the subsequent reception that the film received and the controversy and alarm that it stirred up when it was first released. The film-makers were two teenagers (18 and 16) and they started out with no budget and a borrowed 16 mm camera. The project took 8 years to complete. Part of the book is a humorous and detailed account of how the boys overcame all the practical and financial hurdles of amateur film making and saw the project through to completion and national release. This in itself would qualify the book as a thoroughly entertaining read and a sound basis for a course in film making or media studies of any kind. But this was no ordinary film. Kevin and his co-director Andrew Mollo took as their theme the "what if?" idea of a conquered and occupied England, after a hypothetical defeat and invasion following the Dunkirk retreat.
Alive with the excitment of the old Hollywood, peppered with vivid cinematic and social recollections never before on record, illustrated with 300 rare photographs, this is a unique film history.
Not only does this volume feature, as the title suggests, many previously unpublished photos of the silent film star (these consisting of film stills, production shots, and personal photographs drawn from the collection of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences), it also contains extensive commentary on Pickford's career and each of her films. Not merely the most popular actress of her day, Pickford also exercised complete control over her films, making her a pioneer for women in positions of power in the film industry. For film historians and fans, this valuable volume contains a wealth of otherwise unavailable information about--as well as images of--her career. 9x12". Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
The first ever overview of women's contributions to the dawn of cinema looking at a variety of roles from writers and directors to film editors and critics. Why have women such as Alice Guy-Blache, the creator of narrative cinema, been written out of film history? Why have so many women working behind the scenes in film been rendered invisible and silent for so long? Silent Women, pioneers of cinema explores the incredible contribution of women at the dawn of cinema when, surprisingly, more women were employed across the board in the film industry than they are now. It also looks at how women helped to shape the content, style of acting and development of the movie business in their roles as...
From Kevin Brownlow, cinema historian and discoverer of lost films, here is the first full-scale exploration of a vital and now almost forgotten chapter of American moviemaking: the response of early producers of the decades before World War I. All the issues that torment America today were rampant in the silent-film era: crime, poverty, alcohol, drugs, racial and ethnic prejudice, epidemics, and the controversies over birth control, abortion, and the death penalty. And there were others that persist today but were then even more explosive: sexual mores, government and police corruption, prison conditions, immigration, and strife between capital and labor. Although many early moviemakers ign...
In the world of film collecting, the claim "find of the century" may sound an unpardonable exaggeration. But what discovery can equal it?1 Collectors had hailed the discovery of the occasional lost Keystone comedy in which Chaplin played, but nobody had the slightest idea that somewhere in England, somewhere in France, and somewhere in the United States lay three separate treasure troves of silent film which would, for the first time, reveal the working methods of the greatest single figure of the cinema. It was a treasure hunt involving innocence and guile, accident and coincidence. A treasure hunt which took us to Switzerland, France and the United States. The treasure, when it was uncovered, revealed information as precious as the film itself. From the material, we compiled a television series called Unknown Chaplin, three hour-long documentaries produced for Thames Television. Apart from the experience of making the series, we learned so much about Chaplin we could not squeeze into the commentary we decided to preserve it in the form of a book.
“Explains Pickford’s roles as not only a talented actress, but also as a philanthropist and industry leader who managed to end up her own producer.” —Time Out In the early days of cinema, when actors were unbilled and unmentioned in credits, audiences immediately noticed Mary Pickford. Moviegoers everywhere were riveted by her magnetic talent and appeal as she rose to become cinema’s first great star. In this engaging collection, co-published with the Library of Congress, an eminent group of film historians sheds new light on this icon’s incredible life and legacy. Pickford emerges from the pages in vivid detail, revealed as a gifted actress, a philanthropist, and a savvy industry leader who fought for creative control of her films and ultimately became her own producer. With extensive photos and illustrations, this book paints a fascinating portrait of a key figure in American cinematic history. Includes over 200 photos, illustrations, and stills from the collections of the Library of Congress and Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences