Movies Books

This is a great tool for therapy with individuals, groups, families, or to expand your own thinking when watching videos. I have used this book with clients of all ages and in parenting classes. Almost all my clients gained insight and were able to view their own issues more rationally after watching the suggested films. The Setting The Scene and Scripting For Therapy sections are particularly useful if you do not have a chance to view the film prior to recommending it. I am anxiously awaiting the sequel.

great source for counselors to use with clients......was recommended by a facilator at a conference on personality disorders. i would advise therapists to make use of it for self and clients....

Although intended for therapists, this insightful book about using movies to illuminate our own experiences, motives, and choices is very worthwhile for families. The descriptions of movies like "Field of Dreams," "Breaking Away," and "Dead Poet's Society" provide us with thoughtful and perceptive ways to apply what we see to our own lives. The stories of the patients who were able to understand, identify, and change old patterns after seeing them reflected in the films are exceptionally well presented, and the suggestions for aproaches to using the films are sensitive and illuminating. Any parent will benefit from reading this book to gain a better way of thinking about what we show our children and how we can use what we do show them to improve family understanding and communication.

Filmmaker Pak provides not just the award-winning ROBOT STORIES screenplay, but four other tales which are all infused with considerations about technology. It's not only the futuristic settings which link these plots: it's an exploration of the problems between men and machines, the created and the natural worlds, which creates such a compelling dynamic in these motion pictures. Small black and white shots pepper the account, but it's the screenplays which are the heart of this fine title.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

I hadn't seen the Robot Stories movie, but a friend of mine did and raved about it. I'd read a few of Pak's comics for Marvel, so I picked up the book and was actually blown away by the amount of thought Pak has put into not just that movie but his career of writing in general. He gives insightful introductions to his many scripts, which run the gamut from sarcastic short spoofs about sex to the recreation of the life of a pioneering surgeon, and finally to the sci-fi feature from the title.

This was the first time I've actually read a screenplay, and it is different than reading a novel. But the book gives some helpful tips to make the adjustment easier. After I while I got used to the format to where I could really visualize the actors and actresses talking to each other.

Somehow I think that is one of the points of the book: to make films more accessible and to inspire people to create their own vision. Pak touches upon a lot of issues: from the craft of writing and the challenges of making an independent film to the media images of Asian Americans (David Henry Hwang's foreword is excellent in this regard). So it has something that can appeal to most everybody. But ultimately, I found the collection to be oddly inspiring to the artist hidden in me, and has made me want to see Pak's movies.

Cliff's Notes Review:
+ 4 Awesome, distinct stories
+ Novel central theme "human emotions and robots"
+ Represents the Asian American/Mixed-Race Community without beating you over the head with issues.
+ Charming and Provocative like an independant film/Professional and polished like a high-budget studio film.

My Take:
Robot Stories is awesome. Its is broken up into a series of 4 charming shorties, each related around a theme of "how humans develop emotions when dealing with robots". Each story has a distinct perspective on this central theme. For example, one story is about a couple who wants to adopt a child, but must babysit a "robo-baby" to prove their worth as parents, while another is about a mother trying to re-connect to her sick son through his collection of toy robots. I think the final point that I'd like about Robot Stories and Greg Pak as a director was that he was able to represent the Asian American/Mixed Race characters in normal situations. While this may feel like a minor point, its refreshing. Its nice once in a while to see an Asian American on the big screen who isn't a Lucy Lu Dragon lady, or a Connie Chung newscaster, but as a normal protagonist whom i can identify with.

"I recommend this book to film students and anyone else who is interested in the art of mixing film sound; it contains absorbing insights into the creative process from some of the best sound designers in the industry. By engaging film sound artists in a series of revealing dialogs, Pasquariello highlights some of the practical problems and ingenious solutions to making films sound good." Ioan Allen, senior vice president, Dolby Laboratories

From May/June, 1997 issue of the Editors Guild (IATSE Local 776) Newsletter, Hollywood, California BOOK REVIEW: "SOUNDS OF MOVIES - Interviews with the Creators of Feature Sound Tracks" by Nicholas Pasquariello 240 pages, softcover - Port Bridge Books Reviewed by Dave Whittaker Nicholas Pasquariello has been writing about the technical side of filmmaking for a variety of periodicals for about twenty years, and he now has published a valuable book that collects together interviews with thirteen individuals who are all prominent in the world of film sound. The interviews span the last thirteen years, published originally in Mix magazine and others, and the interviews included here seem to have been chosen for their timelessness, a wise choice. While this book seems aimed largely at the academic film community, there's sufficient depth in the contents so as to be of value to "working professionals" in the film industry. The book is divided into two main sections about production and post-production. The production interviews are with prominent production mixers; the section on post is with re-recording mixers, sound editors, and "sound designers" who wear both hats. The balance is devoted to absorbing interviews on director/composer collaboration, the archival restorations of 'Othello' and 'Lawrence of Arabia', and the perils of translating and dubbing foreign-language versions abroad. In the production section the interviews are with Chris Newman on 'A Chorus Line' and 'Mosquito Coast', Drew Kunin on the rigors of getting usable sound on racing yachts for Carrol Ballard's 'Wind', Ivan Sharrock on 'The Last Emperor', Simon Kaye on 'Platoon', Tod Maitland on 'The Doors', and Nelson Stoll on the marriage of documentary and feature techniques and the politics of the job. It's an interesting and highly varied group of films, with an equally interesting and varied group of mixers talking. If you've never worked in production, or if you've ever complained about the production mixing on a show you're working on, these interviews can be most enlightening. You'll gain some appreciation for the difficult position these folks are in. Trying to reconcile the goal of good sound quality with the conflicting demands of preoccupied directors, camera and lighting needs, difficult locations, and budget realities, all the while "looking good in dailies", is clearly revealed to be a most elusive objective. In the post-production section are interviews with Mark Berger on re-recording 'Amadeus' and 'Mosquito Coast', Richard Beggs on sound design for 'Cotton Club' and 'Tucker', Leslie Shatz on sound design for 'Mishima', Mark Mangini on sound effects for 'Star Trek IV', and Mike Minkler on re-recording 'Explorers'. Like the production mixing section, the group of films here is quite varied and the personalities of the interviewees are often quite engaging. The post section devotes most of its length to the interviews with Bay Area professionals. As a Hollywood sound editor, I was taken aback by this at first, but then realized that this proves to be a bit of a virtue, because the multiple-hat wearing of Richard Beggs and Leslie Shatz allows the interviews to roam over the entire sound-post process, presenting a cohesive picture of what really goes on beyond the picture editing room. Perhaps this Bay Area weighting is a reflection of the tendency for many filmmakers who appreciate the value of collaboration to be attracted to the less-compartmentalized working methods there. It proves useful to read about the difficult location sound recording on 'Mosquito Coast', and then read later about the ramifications of those early decisions when Alan Splet and Mark Berger were trying to edit and mix the tracks. Where this book could be improved would be if there more of these linkages of interviews. Also, when techniques with a long history are discussed in the interviews (such as dance foley for 'Chorus Line') an internal author's reference about that history would be enlightening (as in: "Fred Astaire and others were doing this in 1934"). But these are minor quibbles, somewhat made up for by the presence of fascinating 'bonus' interviews with Vittorio Storaro and Dean Tavoularis on the cinematography and production design for 'Tucker'. There's precious little published material on the working and creative processes of film sound, and this book helps to fill the void. Check it out.

"I recommend this book to film students and anyone else who is interested in the art of mixing film sound; it contains absorbing insights into the creative process from some of the best sound designers in the industry. By engaging film sound artists in a series of revealing dialogs, Pasquariello highlights some of the practical problems and ingenious solutions to making films sound good." Ioen Allen Senior Vice President Dolby Laboratories

This is a beautiful little book. I enjoyed reading Ms. Rubin's text just as much as the photos. It reads more like a novel than a bio. including little known facts and personal interviews of his family and friends. She makes a point to illustrate the early influences of Steven's family and school life that later became themes for his movies. It is a very intimate look into Speilburg's personal and professional journey. Ms. Rubin has included many formerly unpublished photos. It all adds up to a wonderful read and certainly a lovely addition to your library, especially if you are a fan of Spielberg's work.

This is a pretty good decent sized book about both Spielberg's life growing up and his most successful movies such as Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, ET, Jurrasic Park and Saving Private Ryan to name a few. There are some great colour photographs from the movies along with a lot of information. If you like the films he has done or are interested in his life then this would have to be one of the best books out there on that subject.

Great book for the 9-14 age group or anyone older looking for a light read. Lots and lots of interesting pictures of Spieberg's childhood, early career and blockbuster movies and behind-the-scene production. Well written and a high quality book.

I borrowed this book two times from the library at school.
I read it last night. I just have it for one week.
It's a cool book.
Steven got a camera and he filmed tons of movies on it.
And it talks about all the movies he directed.
He then became a famous director after all that stuff
i just said.
So,now,please buy this book!

The book is astonishing as I would have love to meet him in person. I have been always fascinated with Spielbergs movies and he has shown me great courage and great technical skills in which he is my number one idol because the movies such as ET and CE32 taught me how to film when I was 6 yrs old. So I could only wish to see him someday.

Thank you

The book is astonishing as I would have love to meet him in person. I have been always fascinated with Spielbergs movies and he has shown me great courage and great technical skills in which he is my number one idol because the movies such as ET and CE32 taught me how to film when I was 6 yrs old. So I could only wish to see him someday.

Thank you

This book provides an extensive review of the technicolor procsss and its development over the history of its use.

The author correctly points out the weaknesses of the Eastmancolor process and gives support to the superiority of dye transfer processed films. Mr. Haines has an excellent eye for color, and he lists a complete history of films using three strip technicolor and dye transfer matrices. He is not afraid to attack the studios and Kodak's short sightedness in dumping the process. As a result, film negatives are fading fast, and many films are losing their original look. He does list one chinese company that still uses the process, and I hope that they are still in business. Sadly films will never look as good again. END

This is a very complex book with a lot of technical information, some of which I didn't understand. However, I did get the overall gist of the writer's arguement which is the Technicolor process was vastly superior to the Eastmancolor process that replaced it. I've seen some 16mm film collector prints in Technicolor which were gorgeous. One of them was "The Adventures of Robin Hood" which was beautiful. Rich and vibrant...it took my breath away. I also saw 16mm Technicolor prints of "North by Northwest" and "Singin' in the Rain" which were spectacular. Boy do I love Technicolor. You can actually buy these prints on ebay if you have a lot of money.

I can't believe Hollywood abandoned this process. It's hard to compare old Technicolor movies with current Eastmancolor films like "Minority Report" which is drained of color and looks terrible. Are current directors color blind? I guess most people have never seen a Technicolor print and don't know what they're missing...

This book is better than Fred Basten's "Glorious Technicolor" in that it details all the different processes that used dye transfer printing including Cinerama, Technirama, 3-D, VistaVision and CinemaScope. Basten's book only covers the 3 strip camera and pretty much ignores the fifties and sixties. This book lists every film that was printed in Technicolor and lists them in each category or process. My only complaint is that unlike the Basten book, there are no color pictures. There are a lot of technical diagrams though.

In Haines second book, "The Moviegoing Experience 1968-2001", he made the technical aspects of his subject a bit easier to understand but this book is still an excellent reference source.

Haines is also a film director and made a very interesting 'film noir' movie called "Unsavory Characters" which I saw on DVD. The color portions of that movie resembled a Technicolor film from the era so he seems to understand the aethetics of cinematography. I also saw his "Alien Space Avenger" on videotape. According to The Perfect Vision magazine, it was printed at the Technicolor lab in China!

I read that Technicolor dye transfer printing was revived a couple of years ago and used on "Rear Window" and "Apocalype Redux" but few people in Hollywood cared and it was shut down again. Shame on them!

There's no question that the author is the greatest champion of Technicolor and has made an impact on film history by chronicling the story. He's one of the most interesting writers and directors out there and I hope someone discovers him soon!

I purchased the book for my son's language arts class. It seems to be a great resource for information.

This vocabulary series is the best one that I have found to illustrate how the word is most often used. The vocabulary list is also well thought out; the words are actually in frequent use. You can't go wrong buying this series.

In the vocab book you can find many new words that you need in your life, so be smart and kind enough to study this book.

This is the eighth book of Movie Posters that I have purchased from Bruce Hershenson and each time I remark on the extremely high quality of the reproductions. This is obviously a job done from the heart but the visual aspects of the book strikes something in the sub-conscious and suddenly you are back in some cinema watching that movie again. More than just a coffee-table book but a reference source and one to take to work and get a discussion going as an alternative to football. A great read and highly recommended.

Bruce has done it again. In one book he has included the best and most graphically appealing posters from the greatest WAR movies of all times. Not only does he have the U.S. posters but many times he has selected the foreign poster that has better graphics. When you view this book you will be "transported" back to the films that you loved. I had forgotten about many of the great WWII films that I saw as a kid until seeing Bruce's book. How will he top this??

This is arguably the finest entry in the Bruce Hershenson published series of film genre graphics books. Though all of his volumes are impeccable in style and presentation, this book approaches film advertising illustration not only as art, but as world history. Instead of compiling war film posters in order of their release year, they are here presented chronologically by the time of the actual war itself, adding profound depths of sociological and psychological perspective to the long sad history of hell on Earth. I write this review not for all the film buffs out there or poster collectors or illustrators, but to historians, to all teachers and students of the human journey. Here, from flag waving to burning, are the images of war as hope, promise, necessity, waste and despair. More than the films themselves with all their shooting and shouting, these posters silently command and provoke our senses all the way to the last shreds of wonder.

I started buying products in Amazon this year and i'm very satisfied with your service. It's easier and cheaper than our products here in Portugal. I'll be back soon on amazon!

Lázaro Silva

São Mateus, Terceira Island
Azores, Portugal

i am writing this for the benefit of non US readers especially those from my country india which makes 900 films every year.i am in the process of writing a book on screenplay in my native language Telugu and i have been devouring every book that's available.I was thrilled to read about the 'belatedness' Bordwell describes as i share the same dilemma.his summing up of the film writing & film making arts is very usefully informative and inspiring,too.Tollywood( Telugu film industry) churns out around 200 films every year,but nobody here treats screenwriting as something one could learn, and excell if one had the creative talent.I am glad Mr.Bordwell applauds the value of screenwriting books in helping keep the narrative standards from falling.wish guys from my film industry read this book.

David Bordwell is one of the most widely read film scholars around, and not without reason: he writes with ease and ellegance, his insights are often deep and almost always relevant, his starting points are usually essential for better understanding cinematic art. Is he always right?
Of course not, he is not a religious profet or Jacques Lacan (Oops!).

However he usually describes the area of his study quite well, cites references and data he would like you to check in order to see whether he is right and, well, does serious scholarly work. Not a small achievent in a fastly globalizing (and fastly "mcdonaldsizing") academic community of cultural gurus who know everything about everything... Therefore, when you disagree with him (as I sometimes do), you usually know what your are disagreeing about and why.

This book is another Bordwell's insightful contribution to the study of American and global cinema (styles in cinema are basically more international/global than in literature; probably less than in classical music or jazz), explaining how contemporary cinema develops from older stylistical patterns. From the era of silent movies or Slavko Vorkapic's experiments for Frank Capra to modern-era (greatly digitalized) blockbusters, Hollywood's manners and procedures of telling a story can be compared with quite a fruitfull result.
Ofcourse, simple description of stylistic trend or procedure does not directly serve as a proof of aesthetic value, but the subject of this book is, basically, style, not aesthetic value or anything else that can be connected to (and is intertwined on many levels with) style.
This book is equally useful for scholars, teachers and (thanks to his nice style and clear argumentation) students of cinema and all other educated art lovers.

Like the author's other works, this is a highly meticulous and empirical study of the way contemporary Hollywood films function. Paying close attention to selected films by intensive frame analysis, Bordwell calls into question many contemporary "sibboleths" concerning the status of "post-Hollywood" which he reveals as having more connections with its classical counterpart than most critics believe. His attention to fine detail and references to "American Cinematographer" and screenwriting manuals reveal that he has really done his homework. He challenges his contemporaries to do likewise before they engage in problematic "post" judgements whether they be on the realm of postmodernism, post-colonialism, and post- anything which may become academic equivalents of those formerly fashionable platform shoes or flared trousers that often date episodes of the 1970s British cop series THE SWEENEY.

The references to contemporary Hong Kong cinema and analysis of films such as Johnny To's A HERO NEVER DIES are also valuable components of this book. Like DRAGNET's Sergeant Joe Friday, Bordwell insists that we supply facts based on viewing the evidence ourselves. We should not ignore important empirical aspects before we begin to make meanings that may eventually prove to be non-substantial. Those who choose to avoid the well-researched findings of this book should be issued with speeding tickets and forced to attend a scholarly version of "community service" or "boot camp" involving the detailed viewings of as many films as possible, reading interviews with film directors, and studying important journals such as AMERICAN CINEMATOGRAPHER. This is equally important for those newly converted "film experts" in English Departments of postmodernist persuasion who recently discover Laura Mulvey's 1975 essay on "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" and regard it as a "gospel" truth which remains unaltered today! These feelings are more akin to non-linguistic theological studies and not the highly textual, linguistic based explorations of biblical and near eastern studies that relay on studies in pre-semitic studies, Canaanite, Aramaic, and Arabic studies to reveal key empirical structures influencing "holy writ."

This is another indispensable work by an important scholar that every serious professor and student should learn from even if it only involves better interpretation and a more professional "making of meaning."

This is one of the best LOTR datebooks I've seen. It has many photo quality pictures, which have pictures not seen before in the movie. Each day has either a picture, quote or trivia from the fellowship of the ring. It has enough space to write homework, meetings or just day-to-day stuff. At the beginning it also has some nice inteview exerpts from the leading characters from the FOTR. Any true fan of LOTR could not do without

This is one of the best LOTR datebooks I've seen. It has many photo quality pictures, which have pictures not seen before in the movie. Each day has either a picture, quote or trivia from the fellowship of the ring. It has enough space to write homework, meetings or just day-to-day stuff. At the beginning it also has some nice inteview exerpts from the leading characters from the FOTR. Any true fan of LOTR could not do without