Best Filmmaking Books

“Available recommendation signals cluster around Social Sciences, WritingHistory, NonFiction, Philosophy, History lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for creative discipline, craft, or artistic motivation. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

“Available recommendation signals cluster around Writing, NonFiction, WritingNonFiction, Filmmaking lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for creative discipline, craft, or artistic motivation. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

From the #1 internationally bestselling author of the Cartel Trilogy (The Power of the Dog, The Cartel, and The Border), The Force, and Broken comes the first novel in an epic crime saga about the Irish and Italian crime syndicates in America during the 1980s and 1990s.?One of America?s greatest storytellers.? ? Stephen KingProvidence, RI, 1986. Tw...

“Available recommendation signals cluster around Cinema, NonFiction, Film, Art, Filmmaking lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for creative discipline, craft, or artistic motivation. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

This ultimate insider's guide reveals the secrets that none dare admit, told by a show biz veteran who's proven that you can sell your script if you can save the cat!...

Robert McKee's screenwriting workshops have earned him an international reputation for inspiring novices, refining works in progress and putting major screenwriting careers back on track. Quincy Jones, Diane Keaton, Gloria Steinem, Julia Roberts, John Cleese and David Bowie are just a few of his celebrity alumni. Writers, producers, development exe...

Explores the epic human drama behind the making of the five movies nominated for Best Picture in 1967Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, The Graduate, In the Heat of the Night, Doctor Doolittle, and Bonnie and Clydeand through them, the larger story of the cultural revolution that transformed Hollywood, and America, forever....

“Available recommendation signals cluster around Spirituality, NonFiction, Filmmaking, Writing lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for creative discipline, craft, or artistic motivation. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

The organization of letters on a blank sheet?or screen?is the most basic challenge facing anyone who practices design. What type of font to use How big How should those letters, words, and paragraphs be aligned, spaced, ordered, shaped, and otherwise manipulated In this groundbreaking new primer, leading design educator and historian Ellen Lupto...

“Available recommendation signals cluster around Writing, NonFiction, Film, Art, Filmmaking lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for creative discipline, craft, or artistic motivation. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

Any booklength interview with Alfred Hitchcock is valuable, but considering that this volume's interlocutor is François Truffaut, the conversation is remarkable indeed. Here is a rare opportunity to eavesdrop on two cinematic masters from very different backgrounds as they cover each of Hitch's films in succession. Though this book was initially p...

From one of America's most acclaimed directors comes a book that is both a professional memoir and a definitive guide to the art, craft, and business of the motion picture. Drawing on 40 years of experience on movies ranging from Long Day's Journey Into Night to The Verdict, Lumet explains the painstaking labor that results in two hours of screen m...

In Rebel Without a Crew, famed independent screenwriter and director Robert Rodriguez (Sin City, Sin City 2, Once Upon a Time in Mexico, Spy Kids) discloses all the unique strategies and original techniques he used to make his remarkable debut film, El Mariachi, on a shoestring budget. This is both one man's remarkable story and an essential guide ...

The awardwinning, bestselling author of Station Eleven and The Glass Hotel returns with a novel of art, time, love, and plague that takes the reader from Vancouver Island in 1912 to a dark colony on the moon three hundred years later, unfurling a story of humanity across centuries and space.Edwin St. Andrew is eighteen years old when he crosses t...

A short and entertaining book on the modern art of writing well by New York Times bestselling author Steven PinkerWhy is so much writing so bad, and how can we make it better Is the English language being corrupted by texting and social media Do the kids today even care about good writing Why should any of us careIn The Sense of Style, the best...

Here is the story of Jerry Weintraub: the selfmade, Brooklynborn, Bronxraised impresario, Hollywood producer, legendary deal maker, and friend of politicians and stars. No matter where nature has placed himthe club rooms of Brooklyn, the Mafia dives of New York's Lower East Side, the wilds of Alaska, or the hills of Hollywoodhe has found a w...

According to David Mamet, a film director must, above all things, think visually. Most of this instructive and funny book is written in dialogue form and based on film classes Mamet taught at Columbia University. He encourages his students to tell their stories not with words, but through the juxtaposition of uninflected images. The best films, Mam...

An exhilarating, splendidly illustrated, entirely new look at the history of baseball: told through the stories of the vibrant and everchanging ballparks where the game was and is staged, by the Pulitzer Prizewinning architectural critic.From the earliest corrals of the mid1800s (Union Grounds in Brooklyn was a "saloon in the open air"), to the ...

Internationallyrenowned directing coach Weston demonstrates what constitutes a good performance, what actors want from a director, what directors do wrong, script analysis and preparation, how actors work, and shares insights into the director/actor relationship....

An invaluable analysis of the director's art and craft, from one of the most revered of all film school directors. Alexander 'Sandy' Mackendrick directed classic Ealing comedies plus a Hollywood masterpiece, Sweet Smell of Success. But after retiring from filmmaking in 1969, he then spent nearly 25 years teaching his craft at the California Instit...

Critically acclaimed filmmaker Reiss delivers the ultimate guide to film distribution and marketing for the digital era. With the collapse of the traditional independent film distribution model, filmmakers need this information for their films to be acquired and released nationally....

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Here is an account of a filmmaker who looks straight into the eye of the Hollywood blockbuster storm and dares not to blink.In "A Killer Life," Christine Vachon follows up her independent producing handbook, "Shooting to Kill," with a behindthescenes memoir of the battle between creativity and commerce and a renegade's rise to being one of the...

Complete with behindthescenes diary entries from the set of Vachon's bestknown fillms, Shooting to Kill offers all the satisfaction of an intimate memoir from the frontlines of independent filmmakins, from one of its most successful agent provocateurs and survivors. Hailed by the New York Times as the "godmother to the politically committed f...

"A first rate book and a joy to read...It's doubtful that a complete understanding of the director's artistry can be obtained without reading this book...Also indispensable for budding directors are the addenda, in which Kurosawa lays out his beliefs on the primacy of a good script, on scriptwriting as an essential tool for directors, on directing ...

This classic best selling book has been updated to include new budgets for digital video feature films, a no budget feature, and the allimportant digital video transfer to 35mm for theatrical release....

The first book that takes the words and experiences of a diverse group of celebrated women film directors and puts their voices front and center. This unique volume of interviews presents over 40 feature and documentary directors from around the world including Debra Granik (Winter?s Bone), Courtney Hunt (Frozen River), Callie Khouri (Mad Money), S...

When it comes to producing, no one speaks with more authority than Lloyd Kaufman, founder of the longestrunning independent film studio, Troma Entertainment. He reveals the best ways to seek out investors, scout locations, hire crew and cast talent, navigate legalities, and stay within your budget. Featuring tips from some of the finest producers ...

"A broad and deep look at how electronic media are changing storytelling . . . . Completely fascinating." ?Booklist, starred reviewNot long ago we were spectators, passive consumers of mass media. Now, on YouTube and blogs and Facebook and Twitter, we are media. No longer content in our traditional role as couch potatoes, we approach television sho...

The authoritative guide to producing, directing, shooting, editing, and distributing your video or film Widely acknowledged as the ?bible? of video and film production, and used in courses around the world, The Filmmaker?s Handbook is now updated with the latest advances in HD and new digital formats. For students and teachers, professionals and no...

The Technique of Film and Video Editing provides a detailed, precise look at the artistic and aesthetic principles and practices of editing for both picture and sound. Because editing is about more than learning a specific software program, this book focuses on the fundamentals of editing as art. Analysis of photographs from dozens of classic and c...

DOWN AND DIRTY PICTURES chronicles the rise of independent filmmakers and of the twin engines the Sundance Film Festival and Miramax Films that have powered them. Peter Biskind profiles the people who took the independent movement from obscurity to the Oscars, most notably Sundance founder Robert Redford and Harvey Weinstein, who with his brother, ...

“Available recommendation signals cluster around NonFiction, Film, Art, Filmmaking lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for creative discipline, craft, or artistic motivation. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

The writings of Greek philosopher ARISTOTLE (384BC 322BC) student of Plato, teacher of Alexander the Great are among the most influential on Western thought, and indeed upon Western civilization itself. From theology and logic to politics and even biology, there is no area of human knowledge that has not been touched by his thinking. Poetics one of...

To anyone who wants to make a doc but doesn t have a lot of time, money, or experience, Anthony Artis says: "It s time to get down and dirty!" a filmmaking mentality that teaches you how to be creative with your resources and do more with less. Written by a guerrilla filmmaker for guerrilla filmmakers, this all new edition of a bestselling classic ...

If It's Purple, Someone's Gonna Die is a mustread book for all film students, film professionals, and others interested in filmmaking. This enlightening book guides filmmakers toward making the right color selections for their films, and helps movie buffs understand why they feel the way they do while watching movies that incorporate certain color...

Many critics agree that Joel and Ethan Coen are one of the most visionary and idiosyncratic filmmaking teams of the last three decades. Combining thoughtful eccentricity, wry humor, irony, and often brutal violence, the Coen brothers have crafted a style of filmmaking that pays tribute to classic American movie genres yet maintains a distinctly pos...

"Never go to a meeting without a strategy." "Ride the horse in the direction it's going." These are just two of the gems unearthed from the trenches of Hollywood by Lynda Obst, one of the most successful producers in the movie business today. In Hello, He Lied, Obst offers real, practical advice to wouldbe professionals in any field: "Thou sha...

Right now, you're wondering, "Gee, what kind of information is in this cute yet stylish guide" Sure, there are a bunch of other books that will take you through the filmmaking process, and if your name is Beaver Cleaver, you might be interested in them.But you should know that filmmaking is a war, and this book will lead you through it like no oth...

So metaphorical: the Palme d'Or and Golden Globe Awardwinning, Oscarnominated film as a graphic novel drawn by Director Bong Joon Ho himself....

Less than a decade since they began working in the movies, Mark and Michael Polish have established themselves as critically acclaimed, awardwinning independent filmmakers. Their innovative approach to art direction, use of digital photography, and ability to attract stellar talent to their modestly budgeted films sprang from necessity; now these ...

“Available recommendation signals cluster around NonFiction, Film, Fiction, Art, Filmmaking lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for creative discipline, craft, or artistic motivation. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

An invaluable set of careerlength interviews with the German genius hailed by François Truffaut as "the most important film director alive"Most of what we've heard about Werner Herzog is untrue. The sheer number of false rumors and downright lies disseminated about the man and his films is truly astonishing. Yet Herzog's body of work is one of the...

An alternate cover edition can be found here.Andrey Tarkovsky, the genius of modern Russian cinemahailed by Ingmar Bergman as "the most important director of our time"died an exile in Paris in December 1986. In Sculpting in Time, he has left his artistic testament, a remarkable revelation of both his life and work. Since Ivan's Childhood won th...

Now consultant Morrie Warshawski has created a new, completely revised and updated version that gives filmakers the full story on how to get grants and donations from individuals, foundations, government agencies, and corporations in the 21st century....

Gain the essential skills of a professional grip to become the jack and master of all trades on a movie or television show set. Discover vital insider tips ranging from how to operate cuttingedge rigging and lighting equipment to performing difficult camera mounts on aircraft, boats, cars, and trains.In The Grip Book, Fifth Edition, seasoned Holly...

A highly visual exploration of the best shots, moves, and setups in the industry. This books reveals the secrets behind each shot?s success, so it can be adapted to the director?s individual scenes....

In what amounts to Campbell?s only spiritual autobiography, this beautifully crafted collection of conversations, interviews, and outtakes from the The Hero?s Journey documentary reveals and illuminates Campbell?s personal and intellectual journey. Warm and relaxed, Campbell is first seen sipping Glenlivet and encouraging his mentee, Cousineau. The...

The Hollywood Standard describes in clear, vivid prose and hundreds of examples how to format every element of a screenplay or television script. A reference for everyone who writes for the screen, from the novice to the veteran, this is the dictionary of script format, with instructions for formatting everything from the simplest master scene head...

“Available recommendation signals cluster around NonFiction, Filmmaking lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for big-picture nonfiction and accessible learning. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

ObiWan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker must stem the tide of the raging Clone Wars and forge a new bond as Jedi Knights.The Clone Wars have begun. Battle lines are being drawn throughout the galaxy. With every world that joins the Separatists, the peace guarded by the Jedi Order is slipping through their fingers. After an explosion devastates Cato Nei...

This is the eBook version of the printed book.The colorist working in film and video is the individual responsible for breathing life into characters, bringing a mood into a scene, and making the final product polished and professionallooking. This craft is an art form that often takes years to perfect and many trialanderror attempts at getting ...

Building on the success of the bestselling "Master Shots," this volume goes much deeper, revealing the great directors' secrets for making the most of the visual during the usual static dialogue scene. Includes more than 200 diagrams illustrating camera positions....

Comprehensive. Detailed. Practical. Set Lighting Technician's Handbook, Fourth Edition , is a friendly, handson manual covering the daytoday practices, equipment, and tricks of the trade essential to anyone doing motion picture lighting, including the lamp operator, rigging crew, gaffer, best boy, or director of photography. This handbook offers...

The Conversations is a treasure, essential for any lover or student of film, and a rare, intimate glimpse into the worlds of two accomplished artists who share a great passion for film and storytelling, and whose knowledge and love of the crafts of writing and film shine through.It was on the set of the movie adaptation of his Booker Prizewinning ...

Chabouté's enchanting story of a park bench was first published to critical acclaim in France in 2012. Faber now brings his work to the English-speaking world for the first time.Through Chabouté's elegant graphic style, we watch people pass, stop, meet, return, wait and play out the strange and funny choreography of life. Fans of The Fox and the St...

Peter Bogdanovich, director, screenwriter, actor and critic, interviews sixteen legendary directors of the first hundred years of film from Allan Dwan and Raoul Walsh to Leo McCarey, Alfred Hitchcock and Sidney Lumet. The conversations brought together in this book give us a history of the movies. They are the stories of pioneers who came to the ...

“Available recommendation signals cluster around NonFiction, Filmmaking lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for big-picture nonfiction and accessible learning. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

The casting director for Chicago, Pippin, Becket, Gypsy, The Graduate, the Sound of Music and Jesus Christ Superstar tells you how you can find your dream role! Absolutely everything an actor needs to know to get the part is here: What to do that moment before, how to use humour; create mystery; how to develop a distinct style; and how to evaluate ...

The world of cinematography has changed more in the last few years than it has since it has in 1929, when sound recording was introduced. New Technology,, new tools and new methods have revolutionized the art and craft of telling stories visually. While some aspects of visual language, lighting and color are eternal, shooting methods, workflow and c...

There are many books on the technical aspects of film and video editing: e.g., how to use software packages like Final Cut Pro and Avid. Much rarer are books on how an editor thinks and makes decisions. Faced with hundreds of hours of raw footage, a film editor must craft the pieces into a coherent whole. Rhythm is a fundamental tool of the film ed...

“Available recommendation signals cluster around NonFiction, Film, Art, Filmmaking lists, suggesting this book may fit readers looking for creative discipline, craft, or artistic motivation. Treat this as discovery context, not a quality guarantee.”

Newly revised and updated, Film Lighting is an indispensible sourcebook for the aspiring and practicing cinematographer, based on extensive interviews with leading cinematographers and gaffers in the film industry.Film lighting is a living, dynamic art influenced by new technologies and the changing styles of leading cinematographers. A combination...

Newly updated and revised, How to Shoot Video That Doesn?t Suck is a quick and easy guide that will make your video better instantly?whether you read it cover to cover or just skim a few chapters. It?s about the language of video and how to think like a director, regardless of equipment (amateurs think about the camera, pros think about communicati...

In the Blink of an Eye is celebrated film editor Walter Murch's vivid, multifaceted, thoughtprovoking essay on film editing. Starting with what might be the most basic editing question Why do cuts work Murch treats the reader to a wonderful ride through the aesthetics and practical concerns of cutting film. Along the way, he offers his unique...

Elia Kazan was the twentieth century's most celebrated director of both stage and screen, and this monumental, revelatory book shows us the master at work. Kazan's list of Broadway and Hollywood successesA Streetcar Named Desire, Death of a Salesman, On the Waterfront, to name a fewis a testament to his profound impact on the art of directing. ...

From Scorsese and Lynch to Wenders and Godard: interviews with twenty of the world's greatest directors on how they make films and why.Each great filmmaker has a secret method to his moviemaking and each is different. In Moviemakers' Masterclass, Laurent Tirard talks to an illustrious collection of today's greatest directors to get to the core...

Shea Serrano is back, and his new book, Movies (And Other Things), combines the fury of a John Wick shootout, the sly brilliance of Regina George holding court at a cafeteria table, and the sheer power of a Denzel monologue, all into one.Movies (And Other Things) is a book about, quite frankly, movies (and other things). One of the chapters, for ex...

Five years ago, Frank Hauser, then a retired freelance director, and writer Russell Reich, his former student, selfpublished Notes on Directing in hardcover. It was immediately acclaimed as "a gemwitty and full of insight;" "so sensible, so complete, and so right;" and "amazingly illuminating" by the likes of Judi Dench, Edward Albee, and Terry T...

This book is for working film/TV professionals and students alike. If you're a line producer, production manager, production supervisor, assistant director or production coordinatorthe book has everything you'll need (including all the forms, contracts, releases and checklists) to set up and run a productionfrom finding a production office to t...

This book provides a concise presentation of screenwriting basics. The author shows the correct formats for both screenplays and teleplays, and takes the writer through the writing and marketing process....

Master Shots gives filmmakers the techniques they need to execute complex, original shots on any budget. By using powerful master shots and wellexecuted moves, directors can develop a strong style and stand out from the crowd. Most lowbudget movies look lowbudget because the director is forced to compromise at the last minute. Master Shots gives...

Few cinematographers have had as decisive an impact on the cinematic medium as John Alton. Best known for his highly stylized film noir classics TMen, He Walked by Night, and The Big Combo, Alton earned a reputation during the 1940s and 1950s as one of Hollywood's consummate craftsmen through his visual signature of crisp shadows and sculpted beam...

Spike Lee wrote, directed and starred in She's Gotta Have It, the independentfilm success story of 1986. Shot on a shoestring budget of $175,000 in blackandwhite 16mm, the film was made with Spike Lee's persistence and talent plus the help of family and friends. It grossed $8 million at the box office and proved to be a major hit with both crit...

Film production veteran Tom Reilly has worked on the sets of critically praised films and commercial blockbusters for more than three decadesincluding seventeen years alongside director Woody Allen. In The Big Picture, he explores the art and the craft of filmmaking from the vantage point of someone actually running the movie set. Using examples u...

With the aid of photographs and diagrams, this text concisely presents concepts and techniques of motion picture camerawork and the allied areas of filmmaking with which they interact with and impact. Included are discussions on: cinematic time and space; compositional rules; and types of editing....

?When a film is not a document, it is a dream. . . . At the editing table, when I run the strip of film through, frame by frame, I still feel that dizzy sense of magic of my childhood.? Bergman, who has conveyed this heady sense of wonder and vision to moviegoers for decades, traces his lifelong love affair with film in his breathtakingly visual au...

T.J. Newton is an extraterrestrial who goes to Earth on a desperate mission of mercy. But instead of aid, Newton discovers loneliness and despair that ultimately ends in tragedy....

From its humble beginnings as a novelty in a handful of cities, cinema has risen to become a billiondollar industry and the most spectacular and original contemporary art form. In The Oxford History of World Cinema, an international team of film historians traces the history of this enduringly popular entertainment medium. Covering all aspects of ...

Did you know that most of the biggest indie filmmakers, screenwriters, and producers working today each made the same avoidable mistakes early on in their careersThe Reel Truth details the pitfalls, snares, and roadblocks that aspiring filmmakers encounter. Reed Martin interviewed more than one hundred luminaries from the independent film world to...

This international bestseller is filled with visual techniques for filmmakers and screenwriters who want to expand their stylistic knowledge....

Documentary filmmaker Fadiman chronicles her more than 30 years of experience searching out practical approaches to get her productions funded, finished, and seen, balancing inspiration and commitment with financing, shooting, editing, and promotion....

The updated third edition of this popular book offers a clear and detailed overview of the postproduction process, showing readers how to manage each step in taking a film, TV, or media project from production to final delivery, from scheduling and budgeting through editing, sound, visual effects, and more.Accessibly written for producers, post sup...

In this comprehensive guidebook, three experienced entertainment lawyers tell you everything you need to know to produce and market an independent filmfrom the development process to deal making, financing, setting up the production, hiring directors and actors, distributing and marketing your film....

Making a movie may be part art and part science, but it's 100 percent business.In this comprehensive and accessible guide, Kelly Charles Crabb shares the information necessary to understand the legal and financial challenges involved in getting a film from story to the silver screen and beyond.Drawing on over twenty years of experience in the enter...

Editing is what makes a movie a movie. Consulting with master film editors including Walter Murch, Juliette Welfling, Eddie Hamilton, and Anne V. Coates (whose insights and wisdom anchor the book), author Greg Loftin engagingly, smartly details the storytelling nuances and tricks screenwriters can learn from their filmeditor peers.Cuttingroom vet...