Movies Books

This is a great book written by one of my favorite authors. The story takes you on a ride through all the ups and downs of the Hollywood dream. The characters are really interesting, and I felt very connected to them.

If you have ever see the HBO series Entourage, it's like that times ten. Everyone who has been involved in the making of movies, or wants to be, should read this book.

This is a great text! I homeschool and have been pleased with it! It's challenging but not overwhelming. Our curriculum uses this as their text, but my 4 year old isn't enrolled in K. I felt he was ready for it and it's going very well.

Wow, how did this guy manage to find so many rare interviews with Kate Hepburn and her family and friends? What a well researched, beautifully recorded audio-biography of one of Hollywood's brightest stars and an inspiration to people everywhere. Hats off to Random House Audio for this highly original work!

This is really a fascinating and well written book. Oriard looks at every angle in deconstructing how and why football became America's Game by 1960. Great illustrations accompany very readable text. It's a social history as much as a football history, but it speaks volumes about the sporting heritage of America and how race, class, and ethnicity are reflected in the game - and indeed how the game has forced us to confront some of the less savory facets of American society, particularly race. Highly recommended for anyone interested in the history of football and American popular culture.

This book is a must for Lana Turner fans and even for people like me who like her but have many others who are bigger favorites. This is a lavishly illustrated paperback that critiques Turner's career up to 1976. Basinger is clearly a fan of Turner's and is never really harsh on any of Turner's performances or even films (with a couple of exceptions from late in her career like THE BIG CUBE); Lana was obviously pleased as she referred to Basinger's comments once or twice in her 1982 autobiography!! It's nice to read something so upbeat on a lady who had often had such turmoil in her life.

If you do unit studies or just like to enrich your homeschool program with videos, you have to have this book by Beth Holland! This is another resource I discovered a homeschool convention and immediately purchased.

Learning with the Movies includes a listing of cinema movies and made-for-TV movies. The beauty of this guide is that all the movies are organized chronologically beginning with Bible Times and Ancient Egypt through 1900's. If you are doing a study on Rome, simple look through the section on Ancient Rome! For instance, in the Rome section, she has included Ben-Hur, Demetrius and the Gladiator, fall of the Roman Empire, Julius Caesar, Jupiter's Darling, Quo Vadis?, The Robe, Sign of the Pagan (about Attila the Hun), and Spartacus. There is also some blank space for you to list additional movies as you find them.

Finally, she has also included movies related to the Music/Arts (example: The Agony and the Ecstasy which is about Michelangelo), Biographies (example: Abe Lincoln in Illinois), Sports (example: Brian's Song), Science/Nature (example: Apollo 13), Horses (example: Miracle of the White Stallions), Medicine (example: The Girl in White), Literature (example: A Christmas Carol), Holidays (example: Miracle on 34th Street), and Family Films (just plain fun

Each movie listing includes its production date, Beth's star rating, and the parental guidance rating (PG, G, etc). An alphabetical listing is in the back of the book.

Golman captures the visions, dynamics and momentum of the people involved in filmaking- from the director to the teamsters. The sheer beauty of the images and the technical ability of the photographer are exquisite. The publisher should REPRINT THE BOOK!!!!!

"Living Pictures" by Deac Rossell is one of the best recent books to cover the period in the history of the moving image that is usually called "the prehistory of cinema". It is international in scope; contains a wealth of information; the influences of the parallel social, scientific and cultural developments are clearly set out; and is well written as well as relatively brief which makes it useful to both film students and movie enthusiasts.

The book is a very careful and meticulous contribution to a very complex subject. The study of 19th century moving image faces major difficulties because of the commonly held preconceptions and misconceptions about both the moving image and the historical period. As Rossell points out early in his book we often "[...] project backward in time the later characteristics of 'the movies' drawn from an era well after the period of invention and exploration."

The book does an excellent job in presenting the attitudes that the innovators themselves held about the moving image and its projected variety that became cinema; the ideas they had about what it was they were working on; what uses they imagined it could have; how they could exploit it; Most early moving image histories imply that the researchers had a pretty good idea of what they were doing and that they were trying consciously to invent cinema. Well it seems that no one actually had any clear idea of what cinema was to become. At best they wanted to cash-in on the attraction that technological miracles had at the turn of the century. All moving image machines before cinema had enjoyed such a more or less brief period of popularity until their novelty faded. It appears that nobody thought that projected moving image would have a different fate.

Another debate that Deac Rossell presents very well is the long-standing issue about who is the so-called inventor of the "cinema". This quarrel has lasted since late 19th century and here is thoroughly debunked as a pointless effort to usurp an invention that doesn't belong to any one specific individual. The research presented in the book (bringing together material from publications, patent applications and newspaper articles in several languages) makes amply clear that cinema came about through the efforts of a huge number of people in several countries. A lot of the writings since 1895 on these matters was allied with one or other of the warring factions and constantly and often intentionally misrepresented facts and have thrown a thick fog over the real development of the moving image technology and arts.

Rossell has worked hard to dispel all the fog. The references to original applications from patent offices from all the major countries in moving image development are important in establishing who did what and when. This international aspect of his work is of immense value. Especially his facility with German sources has opened to the non-German speaker invaluable access to otherwise inaccessible material. It should be noted however that the back page notes that describe the book as the "first book in English in nearly half a century to tell the story of the international development of the first films" is not correct. Perhaps it is the first such book by a USA scholar but not the first in English. This ignores books by at least two British writers: David Robinson and Michael Chanan; and the publications by film festivals devoted to early moving image and silent cinema.

Deac Rossell's ability to move beyond the conception of "cinema" as we think of it today and present clearly and succinctly the characteristics of the wide variety of different cinemas, or moving image practices, that came about in the 19th Century is also very significant. These different cinemas present possibilities and routes not followed up or marginalized after the classic Hollywood model acquired the position of dominance it still enjoys. It is enlightening to consider the different ways moving images were used and viewed, and the different ideas their development envisioned in the period before 1895.

On the minus side is the small number and very poor quality of the illustrations. This aspect is important, as several of the devices described can only be understood if demonstrated with drawings and photographs. Another negative aspect is the curious absence of any mention, in a very small number of cases, of some key figures like von Uchatius, the person who possibly manufactured the first machine to successfully project motion pictures - even though they were drawings.

"Living Pictures" was one of the names used in the 19th century to describe the new phenomenon of moving images before "cinema" or "motion pictures" became established. Deac Rossell aptly chooses it as the title of his book as recently these early moving images have come back to life again. Through the efforts of a small number of dedicated scholars and aficionados, like Deac Rossell, the early history of moving image has managed to gain more attention. Through publications, museums, festivals and more recently web sites moving images made before cinema have come back to life to haunt us and to pose very pertinent questions about "what is cinema", what is its relation to a more general category like moving image (or the living pictures). These questions are becoming acute, as "cinema" and "film" will be affected profoundly and inevitably by the rapid technological development of digital imaging and the Internet.

This colorfully illustrated book (for which there was a documentary)has gorgeous icons (like Jean Harlow and Greta Garbo)in the silver screen with a brief commentary on most. Some pictures were magnificent like Theda Bara and an actual pretty one of Joanne Woodward-others it's for shame!the pictures of Mary Pickford are heinous as well as colored picture of Ingrid Bergman-
But it's notable that the book has a section dedicated to Arletty, a love goddess most definitely!
I'm supposing this book was written a long time ago, but if they publish a sequel like love gods (without the likes of Clark Gable, Victor Mature or Spencer Tracy) I will rush to the bookstand.

The magazine compilations are full of wonderful photos and articles. And, not only for diehard MacDonald/Eddy fans, but for all the world to appreciate these two wonderful singers who have brought such joy and pleasure to a world that needs their contribution. A great purchase!