Television Books

Devotees of Fred Allen's radio show will enjoy this book, but others will not relate to the characters depicted. One complaint: In this reprint (evidently scanned from an original printing), the first page of each chapter was overscanned, so that the text is cut off at the margins.

"Treadmill To Oblivion" is the definitive book of Fred Allen's wit, humor, and charm. It traces his adventures in radio from 1932 to 1949. Within, we get samples of rountines, brilliantly funny jabs (Bewtween he and Jack Benny) and insight into the comic, concentrated mind of Fred Allen; one of America's greatests comedians. Also, there are sevral humorous observations, asides, and quips that reveal Allen's biting ever-throbbing wit. A MUST-READ for any lover of wit, wisdom, and humor. A good companion to this book is the honestly warm "Much Ado About Me", Fred Allen's subsequent book, telling the tale of his life before radio. Regardless, READ THIS BOOK!!!!!

"Treadmill To Oblivion" is the definitive book of Fred Allen's wit, humor, and charm. It traces his adventures in radio from 1932 to 1949. Within, we get samples of rountines, brilliantly funny jabs (Bewtween he and Jack Benny) and insight into the comic, concentrated mind of Fred Allen; one of America's greatests comedians. Also, there are sevral humorous observations, asides, and quips that reveal Allen's biting ever-throbbing wit. A MUST-READ for any lover of wit, wisdom, and humor. A good companion to this book is the honestly warm "Much Ado About Me", Fred Allen's subsequent book, telling the tale of his life before radio. Regardless, READ THIS BOOK!!!!!

Have owned & loaned both.In Treadmill To OblivionFred tells of his greedyagent booking him into themuddiest place in AustraliaHis early bookings & dealings with this agentare an Allen gem. All About Me was mostly hisradio scripts. Finished byhis daughter. Excellent forwriters of comedy. Successto all that follow in hissteps.

i rarely write reviews unless i'm ticked off.

i own a used copy of the original hardcover, back in the days before amazon.com, when it was a real accomplishment to find a rare used book. fred allen has been a favorite of mine since i was 12 years old and discovered old time radio. in fact, it's in hommage to f.a. that i have always typed in all lower case, as he did in his letters (see the other great book in the allen trio, "fred allen's letters". "much ado about me" is also wonderful, but unfortunately not quite finished when allen passed away.)

so my criticism is painful. . . i was so excited to see this book reprinted that i actually posted an announcement to the old time radio internet digest, encouraging folks to check it out. i ordered a copy myself, even though i own the original, just to throw a teeny bit of financial support at such a surprising endeavor. it seems quite unlikely to me that enough folks have even heard of fred allen these days to make this reprint a financial success (which would then, hopefully, spur more of this material to surface).

as i paged through the book i've read 100 times already, i could tell that the reprint was made from the original plates. the ink bleeds badly on many pages, and one page (which i can't seem to find now) was even printed slanted. the front cover is acceptable, even if as minimalist as one could make it given that it features a hirshfeld drawing. the back cover looks just awful, a plain white page with a bar code at the bottom and a small paragraph describing the book.

it's just simply a very cheap affair, despite the quality of the writing itself.

one other note: be aware that at least 50% of the book consists of script excerpts. when the book was published in 1953, no one had even conceived of the idea that one day people would be listening to these shows on reel to reel tapes, then lps, then cassettes, then mp3s. so to give the reader a sampling of the flavor of the show with these excerpts made sense.

now, however, anyone with enough interest in f.a. to buy this book most likely has had access to the shows one way or another. having a large collection myself, i was disappointed that i had heard many of the shows excerpted already.

but this is a minor reservation on a truly delightful, honest, witty, and funny account of allen's days in radio.

I am neither a science-fiction enthusiast nor a Christian. However, I am a long-time devotee of The Twilight Zone, and found myself intrigued by the concept of this book. As an impressionable youth at the time of the Twilight Zone's initial run, I always felt that the Twilight Zone was not "just a TV show," but rather presented a fairly coherent, if covert, value system that underlay and unified the various episodes, while offering a subtly didactic message. The authors of this book have analyzed the show from this standpoint and come up with a remarkable way of understanding this value system, expressed in a highly readable way. The style of the book is neither pompously academic nor heavy-handedly sectarian. But it is engaging and thought-provoking. I recommend it to all fans of TV science fiction, and not just Christians.

In an exploration of the contemporary vernacular of television, Kim Paffenroth and Thomas Bertonneau have articulated the ways that modern scientific investigation can enhance one's Christian faith. For too many years, too many preachers and theologians have kept either an uneasy distance between science and religion, or have felt compelled to elevate one, while denigrating the other. These authors have used six television shows, Doctor Who, Star Trek, The Prisoner, The Twilight Zone, The X-Files and Babylon 5, to examine the ways such television shows acknowledge a God who is intimately engaged with humans. Each of these television shows offered its viewers iconic archetypal heroes and villains, ones who are not that different from the great figures of the biblical text. Over time these productions grappled with human choices when presented with ethical dilemmas. They looked into the multidimensional faces of evil in the human realm. Viewers were thrust into the midst of such grand storytelling, right along with the characters in the television production. These authors have looked at the power of one aspect of the popular culture, linked it to theology in informed ways, and offered conclusions that are hopeful. Rather than reject television as "trash," Bertonneau and Paffenroth offer readers a fascinating analytical consideration of an inextricable part of our everyday lives.

[Rev. Sandra M. Rushing: Author of the upcoming book The Judas Legacy]

I found my read of "The Truth is Out There" by Bertonneau and Paffenroth enjoyable and satisfying. I'm not a scholar but I had no trouble moving through the chapters and I gained not only a new perspective on some of my favorite entertainment but I discovered a few fascinating facts that has me looking at it again.

The historical review of the classic "science vs religion" argument in the opening chapter was revelatory for me. I think anyone who isn't already familiar with the work of Rene Girard (whose theory of literary analysis is integral to the authors' thesis) will find the words, "Well I'll be darned!" escaping from their lips, paragraph by paragraph.

There is much more surprise to this book than just the unexpected subtitle, "Christian Faith and the Classics of TV Science Fiction". (I think the publishers should have dropped "Christian" as this rich insight into things religious is a mutli-faith one.)

I learned something about myself as well from Bertonneau and Paffenroth... there is good reason why so many simple but haunting images from the Twilight Zone and The Prisoner have lingered in my imagination for decades.

Read this book.

I have to disagree with the Publisher's Weekly review at the top of the page. Overall, the book isn't "stuffy" at all; it's easy to engage with and, yes, entertaining. You simply need to think it's cool that the more you know the Book of Revelation, the more you understand the X-Files.

In this genre (academics writing about TV shows) you can find some very good books and some very bad ones. The bad ones are all the same: academics who are bored with what they do -- theories of the self deconstructed blah blah -- try to juice it up by discovering it in the midst of a sitcom. The result is unpersuasive, condescending, and boring.

*The Truth is Out There* is one of the good ones. I'd rank it among the few (for example, Paul Cantor's *Gilligan Unbound*) that see how the best entertainment always has something serious at stake. You can try to make entertainment that takes *nothing* seriously, but that's a really serious development too. (See Thomas Hibbs, *Shows About Nothing*, another great example of what can be done with the genre.) As anyone who is really into these science fiction shows will tell you, they are most fun when you take them most seriously. That's what *TTIOT* does.

Just how Christian these shows are is a hard question, and the Christian readings advanced in the book will be controversial. All the better. I'd love to see the authors engage in phaser warfare with Cantor, who also deals with Star Trek and the X-Files but reads them very differently.

This is very much a book that I wish I had written. I have been a fan of science fiction for as long as I can remember (I can't quite remember the original Star Trek in first run, but it was in recent re-run when I first acquired sentience and memory...).

One of the hallmarks of successful science fiction (as opposed to the significant volume of bad science fiction that comes out each year) is that it doesn't rely exclusively on futuristic ideas of where science and technology will go, but rather delves deeply into the meaning of life and other significant issues of existence, relationship and cosmological understanding that people find important regardless of the time and technological period in which they live. A case in point is Star Trek - issues arise in most episodes of most of the series that deal not just with life and death, but what is important in life? By playing off against in-human or un-human characters like the Vulcans or the Klingons (or even more exotic, albeit often poorly constructed, creatures), the important aspects of human nature can be brought forward in ingenious ways.

Authors Thomas Bertonneau and Kim Paffenroth begin the text by discussing the relationships of science, religion and storytelling. There is a long history of this triad, which have rarely all been pulling together in the same direction, but not always opposed to each other, either. Bertonneau and Paffenroth trace the origins of science fiction back to ancient Greece, whose writings at the time combined elements of philosophy, religion and science in ways that often did not recognise a distinction between the fields the way modern academia and popular imagination does. Of course, these all contain ideas that lead into each other and the human condition. 'In giving us a cosmic perspective on ourselves, science and science fiction restore us to a proper humility - a meekness before the awe of creation appropriate to our station.'

One might wonder at the absence of films here - after all, the Joseph Campbell/Star Wars mythology would seem a natural tie-in for the subject. However, the authors liken the television shows to epic poetry - the serial aspect shows (generally speaking) the same sets of characters in recurring dilemmas, much the way epic poetry did. Most films do not have that aspect (although the Star Wars series approaches epic proportions). Also, television gives a kind of accessibility that films (until recently) did not have - an 'in-home' quality that is analogous in ways to Jesus' parables, which are much more home-spun in nature when compared to philosophical treatises of Greek and Roman writers of his same time.

Bertonneau and Paffenroth highlight six particular series: Dr. Who (the original British version), Star Trek (the original generation), The Prisoner, The Twilight Zone (Rod Serling's time), The X Files, and Babylon 5. The authors do not expect readers to be familiar with each of the shows (although the more obsessive science fiction fans - short for fanatic, of which I am one - will likely know them all), but expect because of the pervasive influence these shows have had on popular culture that every reader will be familiar with some aspects of some of the shows. However, these shows are in many ways counter-cultural, which the basic Christian message also tended and tends to be. 'Science fiction's determination to take a lofty view distinguishes it from other popular genres, which tend to be preoccupied with various forms of adolescent resentment.' Even so-called adult dramas tend to be replays of basic relationship patterns established early - the kind of discussion of the nature of good and evil or the nature of truth rarely comes up in these shows as it might in science fiction.

These are far from perfect shows, to be sure, and are not a replacement for the gospel. Ever mindful of the biblical injunctions against idolatry, authors Bertonneau and Paffenroth show how these science fiction shows take that issue as an important one - meanwhile, other shows are becoming idols (indeed, there is even a popular show right now with the very word in its title, but like idols of the ancient world, very little in terms of ultimate truth comes forward from them). Again Star Trek can be held up as an example here: 'it repeatedly examines the nature of good and evil, human nature, progress, reason and emotion, and most of all, virtue. Star Trek became and remains so popular because it does not just entertain but inquires into questions of ultimate meaning and purpose with thoughtfulness, ambiguity, and insight.' These shows tell stories that have a moral - and as often as not, these morals correspond to values the gospel message also tries to impart.

There are books out there bearing the title 'The Gospel according to the Simpsons,' 'The Gospel according to Disney,' and even 'The Gospel according to Sherlock Holmes,' but this book, 'The Truth is Out There,' doesn't have to put up as much struggle with its base subject to fit the underlying substance of theology and philosophy as the previous texts. The truth is out there, and in here, and can be found.

Pilate's question - what is truth? - is a question worth asking. Science fiction is one of the few popular forums in which this discussion continues.

I'm a single mom with three kids. I work two jobs and take care of an invalid mother. As a result, my kids see a little too much TV for my comfort. With my busy schedule, I needed some way that I could let the kids watch TV without having to be there to monitor every moment, and a way that wouldn't require much of my time. This is it. I spend less than 5 minutes with it each day challenging my kids with a TV project, and I'm set to go do what I want. My hats off to the author for finding a way to use TV to actually bring us all together.

This book is great! My kids love it. I find the activities for older teenagers (15 and up) a little impractical for my kids, but they actually enjoy helping the younger ones since the projects are creative and involve TV. So either way, my kids are actually doing things together and learning! Thank you! Finally my TV is harnessed.

I found TV Time to be very practical. At first I thought it might be another book that assumes I have a craft store in my house, but no. Not much is necessary beyond cardboard, paper, crayons, pencils, books, and the usual stuff you find in every house with a child in it.

I was skeptical when I ordered the book, but it really does work. I only have to spend two minutes a day with the book to find a new idea and that quickly my kids are automatically using it in a creative and educational way. When I see all the pictures they color and projects they make now while watching TV, I don't feel guilty letting them watch anymore. One less reason to feel guilty about being an overworked Mom.

Journalist and mom Debra Koontz Traverso shares the same concerns that other parents have about the wasteland that in general characterizes TV for children. But she's not willing to throw the baby out with the proverbial bathwater, preferring instead to use TV for the educational and mind-expanding experience it can be. So, she's written TV Time to help parents learn how to get kids actively involved in managing TV choices and making the most of them.

With 95 percent of the households in this country sporting at least one television set, the medium obviously has an impact on a child's life. Although much has been written about the evils of children watching television, little concrete guidance has been provided for parents in palatable form .. until now, Traverso remedies this situation in her book by providing unique and fun ideas on how to transform the television into an educational tool by incorporating the fun of watching the tube with the stimulation involved in learning.

And here's the best part: the book is divided by age groups, activities and subjects, so it makes an easy reference that can grow with a child as his/her TV selections change through the years. Most of the activities take less than a minute to read and apply, a welcome blessing to busy working moms who otherwise would feel angst about allowing their children to watch TV.

The author suggests lots of easy-to-play games, dialogues, mindteasers and memory quizzes to help turn sitting in front of the TV into an active rather than passive experience. Traverso also suggests unusual and subtle ways parents can stimulate their children's thinking to critique content as they watch television, and she also helps them understand the subtle messages presented on the screen.

Most educators would agree, it's a book that should be referred to each time the TV is turned on.

This Book is great!!! The workouts are designed to be completed during the commercials of your favorite television show. A 1 hour show has 4 commercial breaks of about 4 minutes each. Accordingly, each exercise block takes about 4 minutes to complete. For example, during the first commercial break you may do a few stretches; the second, do a few pushups or water bottle curls, the third some squats, and the fourth, some ab exercises.
Often workout books are so overwhelming (and written for people already moderately fit). The workouts Stew presents are quite reasonable for any couch potato; and for everyone who complains they don't have time, NO MORE EXCUSES! Stew shows a creative flair here and this book proves once and for all that you don't need a lot of time to get some choice exercising done. Imagine workouts around tv commercials! A real nice feature of this book lacking in so many health fitness books is that there are pictures of Stew doing the exercises, so you don't run the risk of injury or bad form.
It's really quite ingenious and requires no equipment--just a chair to do some dips and a water bottle or light weights.
If you're dissatisfied with your physical fitness level, don't have the money or time for a gym, and are ready to get serious about things, get this book. It's the best money you could spend on Amazon!

This is a great book for the completely sedentary. I orignally bought this book for my sister-in-law who has three small children and never has time to exercise. I have since given the copy to my younger sister also who I couldn't persuade to do anything else.

The workouts are designed to be completed during the commercials of your favorite television show. A 1 hour show has 4 commercial breaks of about 4 minutes each. Accordingly, each exercise block takes about 4 minutes to complete. For example, during the first commercial break you may do a few stretches; the second, do a few pushups or water bottle curls, the third some squats, and the fourth, some ab exercises.
It's really quite ingenious and requires no equipment--just a chair to do some dips and a water bottle or light weights.

If you are already in shape, of course this book isn't for you, but I bought it for my family that isn't in shape. "What can I do," they say, "with no time or energy?" Now you can introduce to them Stew Smith. Even better, offer them his online PT club. www.stewsmith.com

Alright, the title intrigued me at the bookstore. Often workout books are so overwhelming (and written for people already moderately fit). The workouts Stew presents are quite reasonable for any couch potato; and for everyone who complains they don't have time, NO MORE EXCUSES! Stew shows a creative flair here and this book proves once and for all that you don't need a lot of time to get some choice exercising done. Imagine workouts around tv commercials! A real nice feature of this book lacking in so many health fitness books is that there are pictures of Stew doing the exercises, so you don't run the risk of injury or bad form. Stew might be a former Navy SEAL, but he looks like a regular guy. Getting healthy doesn't have to be intimidating. Anybody can do these exercises. Do yourself and your body a favor, get the book even if you are an athlete. You will be surprised at the ideas inside. The small anecdotes - the one I liked most was the note Stew's wife wrote about trying to lose weight after the birth of their daughter- add a nice dimension to the book. The book was written by Stew for his parents (respected couch potatoes). You almost want to hug this guy. Seriously, the pictures, the sense of humor (the idea of this book alone), and the creativity Stew offers is why I ranked this with a 5 star rating.

A year ago I was in a size 18 dress. Today, as I write this review, I am wearing a pair of size 1 jeans, and it's entirely because of Stew and his dedication to helping people become as healthy and strong as they can be. I have, at this point, bought and given away over a dozen copies of this excellent book. It was a great starting point for me in my quest for physical fitness. I went from there to joining his Online PT Club and he was beside me, and, at times, behind me, when I needed to be pushed over the hump -- every step of the way. If you're dissatisfied with your physical fitness level, don't have the money or time for a gym, and are ready to get serious about things, get this book. It's the best money you could spend on Amazon!

Alright, the title intrigued me at the bookstore. Often workout books are so overwhelming (and written for people already moderately fit). The workouts Stew presents are quite reasonable for any couch potato; and for everyone who complains they don't have time, NO MORE EXCUSES! Stew shows a creative flair here and this book proves once and for all that you don't need a lot of time to get some choice exercising done. Imagine workouts around tv commercials! A real nice feature of this book lacking in so many health fitness books is that there are pictures of Stew doing the exercises, so you don't run the risk of injury or bad form. Stew might be a former Navy SEAL, but he looks like a regular guy. Getting healthy doesn't have to be intimidating. Anybody can do these exercises. Do yourself and your body a favor, get the book even if you are an athlete. You will be surprised at the ideas inside. The small anecdotes - the one I liked most was the note Stew's wife wrote about trying to lose weight after the birth of their daughter- add a nice dimension to the book. The book was written by Stew for his parents (respected couch potatoes). You almost want to hug this guy. Seriously, the pictures, the sense of humor (the idea of this book alone), and the creativity Stew offers is why I ranked this with a 5 star rating.

Tried to covered a broad concept and has done it well. He is more a video expert than an IP expert but given the breadth of the concept he is trying to cover, I must say, he has done a great job. I would have given him 5 starts if he had not use the term "signal" in the IP and RTP discussions.

This is one of the most in-depth and comprehensive books I have ever seen covering IPTV, security, streaming, conferencing, compression and network transport. If you are professionally involved in video, this book serves as the perfect first stop reference that will give you a quick understanding of what the technologies are for and how they interrelate. Information is very well organized and easy to find.

Excellent book for technical professionals looking to go deeper into video. All the relevant protocols and technologies are surveyed, and enough detail is provided to give an understanding of their relevance. Highly recommended - this will point you to the areas to explore in more depth if you need to go further.

This book provides an excellent basis for anyone working in the field of video transport over IP networks. The author is a highly-respected expert in this field and speaks with authority on the subject, yet has written a volume that is very readable and useful as a reference. I can highly recommend this work as an up-to-date review of the topic.

As a video engineer for over 30 years, I am constantly amazed by what passes for reference work in the field of television, communications and computers. Most of the technical books answer a few questions at best and are very good at putting one to sleep, very quickly!

Not so with Mr. Simpson's book. "Video Over IP, a Practical Guide..."is,indeed, just that. With the convergence of entertainment communications and computers, the plethora of acronyms in this field is worse than it's ever been. Video over IP cuts through the clutter and provides concise, easy to understand answers. Mixed in are real life application descriptions, and practical examples that describe the technology clearly and in a way that can be understood by engineers and managers alike. An example is Mr. Simpson's analogy comparing MAC addresses and IP addresses, where the MAC address is similar to an automobile's VIN number and the IP address, which may vary over the life of a piece of hardware, is analogous to the registration or plate number. Brilliant! Couple this with the review and checklist update at the end of each chapter, and what we have is an excellent reference work that is both easy to read and up to date. A must have for anyone in the video, telecom or entertainment fields.

I liked this book a lot. I am not a video engineer - however, I need high performance hardware and I need to understand how to connect it all. I needed to understand what it takes to put together a networked high performance system of relational databases (emphases on high performance and databases) - SAN's, NAS's, RAID's, etc. This book describes it at the correct level.

I was looking for a general overview of SAN's, NAS, DAS, and other high throughput fast storage and networking descriptions. This book has it without overwhelming you with 8B/10B encoding and modulation nonsense.

As a systems integrator in the broadcast and professional video industry, we face issues associated with the converging IT and professional AV media environments on almost daily basis. To date, we have had to build our own knowledge base to address these matters and have found no one source that appropriately deals with these merging industries - well this book addresses these issues head on.

Personally, I found this book really "hit the spot" as it relates to the broadcast and media industry as it stands today (as well as in the near future). I found this book to be up to date and topics discussed exceedingly relevant. Although this book tackles a broad array of topics, from media network deployment and management to video system fundamentals and architectures, the information covered was well presented and logically organized which made it a very comfortable read.

This book is a must for anyone (IT managers, as well as network and video engineers alike) who have an interest in producing, managing, and distributing video media.

This book is of interest to any technical professional working with video. In the past, we could view the world of IT as of increasing value but not central to a video system. No longer. This book comprehensively lays out the myriad of technologies and issues to be considered as we incorporate the power and economy of IT servers and networking ever more broadly into our broadcast and production facilities.

Last year at a Hollywood Post Alliance meeting a senior technical production executive said to an audience of technical professionals, "If you don't have a strong foundation in video, networking and IT....you will not work in our business any longer."

What he was really saying is, go out and get Kovalick's book and read it. And then read it again.

As a professional who serves the pro-video and broadcast market, I've been eagerly awaiting my copy of Video Systems in an IT Environment. I just received my order a few weeks ago from Amazon.com and I've now had a chance to absorb several chapters -- with more to come.

First impressions: Wow! Substantial. Meaty. First of its kind. When you receive this book in the mail, the first thing you notice upon opening the package is the sheer weight and tasteful abstract art on the front cover. This is a hefty 600-page volume packed with hundreds of detailed illustrations and lots of examples. When it comes to understanding principles of modern networked media for video and audio, this Focal Press work deserves a prominent place in any serious video or IT engineer's reference library.

Although this book is oriented towards the professional media or broadcast systems engineer (as opposed to a video consumer building a home media network), the author does a nice job of weaving together the essentials of networked media from "A to Z" including a handy glossary of terms for those of us who can't keep our acronyms straight. I've known the author, Al Kovalick, who's a well regarded figure in the broadcast community. His breadth of knowledge is evident throughout each chapter, yet he writes in a witty, practical style that's both educational and fun to read (including some pretty subtle humor that will make an engineer chuckle). Without sacrificing depth, this book takes a complex technical subject and brings it down to earth, making it suitable even for less technical (but motivated) readers. I like the "It's a Wrap" section found at the end of each chapter that summarizes the salient points of each chapter.

Bottom line, this book is for you if you're seeking a solid overview of key engineering considerations when designing or recommending networked video architectures, including networking fundamentals, virus and firewall protection, video servers, NSPOF (no single point of failure) storage design including RAID and RAIN methods, as well as other innovative architectures. Several real-world case studies complement the teaching benefits including specific examples by leading-edge media companies and broadcasters.

Chapter Highlights:
Networked Media in an IT Environment
The Fundamentals of Professional Networked Media
Storage System Basics
Storage Access Methods
Software Technology for AV Systems
Reliability and Scalability Methods
Networking Basics for AV
Media Systems Integration
Security for Networked AV Systems
Systems Management and Monitoring
The Transition to IT: Issues and Case Studies
A Review of AV Basics

As an avid horror fan, I must say Vincent Price is the long-standing king of horror. When I think of horror movies, he immediately comes to mind. Finally, a book that specializes in the work of a true master who truly loved his work. Having recently purchased this, I look forward to mulling through its contents and watching the many films of "The Master of the Macabre." Long live Vincent Price!!!

True fans of Vincent Price don't really care whether or not we're watching something badly made like SCREAM AND SCREAM AGAIN or some auteur-approved masterpiece like TOMB OF LIGEIA. As long as Vincent Price is in it, hamming it up and acting all others right off the screen we are in hog heaven. It's a strange, fervid fraternity and way back when someone started calling us The Price Club and the name just stuck.

Denis Meikle has given us a book that clears up some of the myths surrounding Price's career, but he seems determined to create a new one, based somewhat on Victoria's great book. His thesis is that the McCarthy hearings and the "graylist" of which Price was the victim made him scared that he would never work again, so that afterwards, from the mid 1950s on, he consented to appear in any piece of schlock if the "price was right." Again and again he evinces this theory to explain, for example, why VP appeared as "Egghead" on TV's BATMAN. Price himself often stated that he wanted money to but more modern art with, but Meikle discounts this simple explanation.

I am the proud owner of a signed copy of Price's awesome book THE ART IN MY LIFE and I think that he indeed loved art and that he wasn't just "running scared" from the HUAC police.

But everyone deserves a forum for their views and Meikle makes a good case for his.

Vincent Price came into horror films by way of the studio system. His body of work is amazing, and he showed a fine sense of comedic timing in His Kind of Woman, with Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell, playing an OTT hammy actor. Later this tough for droll comedy would show in two gems - The Raven and The Comedy of Terrors. However, he really gathered attention in 1952 with House of Wax. After that wonderful performance, it was non stop fun all the way.

Many of his films were for William Castle or Roger Corman, and often considered Drive-In fodder - such as The Fly, The Bat, House on Haunted Hill. It was the series of Poe movies that firmly linked the word horror to Price - and I think it was a term he enjoyed completely. At the time the Corman-Price-Poe series of movies - The Pit and The Pendulum (with Scream Queen Barbara Steele), House of Usher, Tomb of Ligeia, Masque of the Red Death, Haunted Palace (which was really Lovecraft not Poe, but what the hey...) were often dismissed. But looking back, you will see finely crafted horror films that are still a pleasure to what now, with many of Price's wonderful performances.

Even later, he continued to seek out this same spotlight with the campy Theatre of Blood and the Dr. Phibes duo of films or the more serious Cry of the Banshee and Conqueror Worm (one of his most underrated performances).

He scared us with a gentle boo, mesmerising with that voice, thrilled us with the wondrous menacing laugh, enchanted us with his devilish twinkle in his eye...he entertained us cooking fish in his dishwasher on Johnny Carson.

His legacy lives and this is wonderful tribute to the master! Loaded with pictures, it is a must for Price fans.

When I was a kid way, way back in the late sixties to the early
seventies I never failed to catch a great Price film on the late night Creature Features. This book is hard to put down.
Dennis Meikle does'nt white wash the Master of Menace, nor present him in any unfavorable light. All of Price's successes
and failings are told here in a very respectful manner. As a
matter of fact there were some parts of Price's life I did'nt want to know. This is the story of a great actor the likes of whom we will never ever see again. Well illustrated. A really
excellent book.

I just finished reading this excellent book on Vincent Price. It concentrates just on his work in the horror film genre which is primarly what he is remembered for. Denis Meikle follows Vincent's career chronologically film by film, giving details of the production as well as what was going on in Price's life at the time. While this is not an exhaustive work on this wonderful actor, it makes a great companion piece to his daughter's book "Vincent Price: A Daughter's Biography" which covers his personal life and Lucy Chase Williams' excellent "The Complete Films of Vincent Price" which covers all his film output. All together, these tell the story of one of the last true renaissance men. Recommended.

Film is all about the image, and Bruce Block gives you a visual toolkit. With this book, you can construct images that help to tell your story, set the mood, and control how the image affects the audience. He helps you build your film shot by shot. His techniques, illustrated with new art and images from films, will make any film stronger and all filmmakers more confident and creative. Many of Hollywood's leading directors have benefited from his expertise. Now the rest of us can, too. I highly recommend this book.

Because of plenty of pics the read is very easy and took me something like 2 days (on occasional reading). The book itself deals both with composition and movement, and some very interesting points about flat and deep space. I recommend it not only to cinematographers but also interested in composition. This is a good explanation of all types of perspectives and many other things. Easy to read but quite solid in quality of info.

There are plenty of books out there about how to write a great screenplay. But film is a VISUAL medium, and books about telling stories VISUALLY are few and far between. Not only does Bruce Block have a superior instinct for visual composition, but he's able to explain the often complex relationships between subjects, light, color and motion in ways that are easily accessible. If you're interested in writing or directing movies, THE VISUAL STORY will help you immeasureably along your career path. And if you just like to see movies, this book will give you insights into cinematic storytelling elements you've always FELT, but probably never before recognized. This is an essential book for anyone who loves to make or enjoy motion pictures.

I teach a class called "Story" at Los Angeles Film School and this book is on my Recommend Reading List for all students but I especially tout it to cinematography, production design and directing majors. There are many books that talk about the basics (shot size, 180 degree rule, etc.) but if you want to go beyond that to find out what kinds of choices the great filmmakers make and why, this is the book with the answers.

One thing young filmmakers and students often fail to understand about the auteurs and master directors is that they base their shots on what serves the story, not the fact that the shot "looks cool." I love the fact that author Bruce Block talks so much about the need for the visuals to follow and reflect the ups and downs of the underlying story structure. I also love the fact that that he takes film theory and shows the filmmaker how to apply it. Ordinarily, film theory and film practice are two separate worlds.

I never thought I'd find a film book I liked better than the first edition of "The Visual Story," but now I have: It's the 2nd edition, which has a bigger, easier-to-read format, many more color illustrations and more, updated examples. The students who've taken my advice and read this book are blown away by it. I believe it should be mandatory reading for anyone who is in the film business or who hopes to be.

I am a visual person. I'm currently taking a film class and had to purchase The Visual Story for class. Let me first say that I am an aspiring filmmaker. I have an incredible library of handpicked books catering to any and all aspects of the filmmaking experience and this is by FAR among the very top of my selections! It is really terrific at not only explaining concepts very concisely, but it also is full of real visual examples. Terrific book. Buy it! You'll be glad you did.

Unfortunatly this book received a very bad italian translation. In French the book is no more published. So the english original version is very precious.

Antonio Vivaldi's life is hardly well documented: certainly not as well as Mozart's or Beethoven's. Even Bach's biographical details, scarcely thorough, are significantly greater than the "Red Priest's". Vivaldi's music and reputation nearly disappeared following his death, along with a substantial number of his manuscripts and the day-to-day details of his sui generis career. His resurrection as a composer and the dogged efforts of musicologists have provided at least the rough outlines of a biography. H. C. Robbins Landon, whom some consider Joseph Haydn's alter ego, has written an excellent biography of Vivaldi, managing to provide the details of his life in only 170 pages (including illustrations). Hardly a voluminous tome, there just isn't much day-to-day knowledge available, and what is known must often be teased out of official documents that are still coming to light.

What Robbins Landon reveals about Vivaldi, especially in his few surviving letters to the nobility or the inevitable dedications to his various noble patrons, is painful. Cringing obsequiousness, fawning servility, even an occasional whining sycophancy when things go wrong and Vivaldi pleads to a patron for assistance, are all prominently displayed. This was coin of the realm for the era: the artist as flotsam in a hierarchical world. It is painful to witness, nevertheless. What is also revealed is a certain wolfishness on Vivaldi's part. His strange and lengthy menage with the attractive and moderately talented Giraud sisters, slightly unusual for a Priest. His peculiar working habits and relationships with other artists. His somewhat craven demeanor throughout his compositional career, finally inducing him to abandon Italy for Vienna at the end. This portrait of Vivaldi seems more enigmatic and his biography more of a palimpsest than the usual life story. Given the data, Robbins Landon does a superb job of at least revealing Vivaldi's milieu, picturing beautiful Venice during that era and outlining the splendid music this peculiar man created. For it is ultimately the music, and only the music, that contains the blood and heart and sinew of this marvelous composer.

Mike Birman

If you love baroque music and are a fan of Vivaldi you will enjoy this book! H.C. Robbins Landon has really shown alot of research in this book and gives you details about Vivaldi's work and place in society. When I read the book I was amazed at the documents and letters written by Vivaldi. The illustrations provided in this text gave me a clearer insight as to how things were like in 18th century Italy.
Also when I was read this book I now have more respect for Vivaldi's work. The amount of work he did when he was alive was amazing.(Basically, he was a workaholic!). I am glad that his works have not been neglected and are now preserved.

Bravo Landon for showing us that there is more to Vivaldi than just the 4 seasons!

There are not many biographies about Vivaldi because, unfortunately, only a scetch of his life is known. This biography is probably the best contemporary book on him. It is not only a good synopsis of his life but it also has very good insights on his life and music. Landon's insights are especially good when he comments on specific works of Vivaldi. Vivaldi is rightly known as a master concerto composor. However, his voluminous output also included other genre, notably many beautiful operas and sacred works. Landon does a fine job in his book of commenting on these works also and proposing that, epsecially the sacred works, need to be better appreciated and popularized. As a Vivaldi buff (and there are very few of us) I highly recommend this book.

A superbly written and thoroughly researched book. I found the language superb.

Probably the only work available that pairs a film scholar/interviewer with the masters of the screen. Obviously a must for any film enthusiast.

VOICES FROM THE SET is a MUST READ for all film historians, film students and cinephiles. Macklin gains amazing insight into the working lives of such screen legends as The Duke, Altman, Beatty and Peckinpah, all captured in rare form. This is an excellent read.

When teaching film and television in Los Angeles, I had the luxury of having top industry professionals visit my classes. This is simply not possible at universities distant from the major centers of production. However, with Tony Macklin's unique and special tome, I can have many of the all-time greats "visit" my class anywhere. VOICES FROM THE SET will be required reading for all future "Masters of American Cinema" courses I teach-- anywhere...ever.

Voices From the Set is Tony Macklin's collection of interviews from the magazine he edited, the Film Heritage series. Exploring an underappreciated era in film, the early to mid 1970s, Macklin gathered interviews with directors, actors, producers, writers, even film critics who blazened a trail for independent cinema between the twilight years of the studio system and the birth of the blockbuster. The book is meant to be savored one interview at a time, and should give you a great list of films to rent if you're not familiar with them. In his introduction, Macklin calls this particular group of interviews "precious cameos that gain more value as time passes." His discussions include several maverick filmmakers still influential today, such as Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman, Sam Peckinpah and Warren Beatty. Voices also captures the essence of legendary directors and actors Alfred Hitchcock, Howard Hawks, Charlton Heston and Macklin's favorite, John Wayne. Macklin artfully probes below the surface and discusses the artists' feelings and visions, not just dry facts and dates. In the Scorsese interview, Macklin asks him for his opinion on "the new Hollywood" during the early to mid '70s. Scorsese talks at length about this group of influential filmmakers graduating from universities, himself numbering amoung them. He succinctly sums up the era and the reason for reading this book: "They [the old Hollywood] took it as a job...we come in from a whole different level...The old day is dying out, and there is a new Hollywood..."

Tony Macklin's collection of interviews, Voices from the Set, provides us remarkable reflections by some of Hollywood's greats--reflections of a Hollywood balanced at the crossroads of its artistic Golden Age and the modern-day blockbuster. Macklin's interviews with such influential film greats as Hitchcock, Altman, Scorsese, Heston, Hawks, Peckinpah, Wayne, and Beatty give us a fresh look at many of old Hollywood's most powerful, while providing us a peek at some of new Hollywood's up-and-comers.

Macklin, in skillfully eliciting responses that are compelling, honest, and human, allows us to witness a side of Hollywood that is rarely seen. Voices from the Set's subjects are willing to talk to Macklin, and Macklin is willing to give us the full transcripts of his interviews. No sound bite answers here. Macklin asks the tough, thought-provoking questions and we are rewarded with direct, insightful answers.

Both fans and students of film will not be disappointed in this book. Virtually every interview in Voices will sing to you.