Essential books... - Page 2

All the movie titles are listed under their Italian names. A visit to imdb is all you need to sort out the confusion.

That guy reviews movies like there's no tomorrow at Askew Reviews. They do some pretty off the wall movies, but that site design is the worst thing I've seen since Box Office Guru. Still worth reading tho.

I just finished 'DisneyWar' by James B. Stewart. It's a good read for those interested in the controversy surrounding Eisner's reign at the studio, which paints the picture as almost Shakespearean in detailing his rise and fall.

Stray Dogs & Lone Wolves: The Samurai Film Handbook by Patrick Galloway is good.A great book for newbies interested in samurai films.He has a sequel coming soon

The Samurai Film by Alain Silver is also good but is more on the academic side.

Mondo Macabro by Pete Tombs.Book is OOP but can be had for cheap if you search.Tons of info on obscure cult films from around the world.

Eiji Tsuburaya:Master of Monsters by August Ragone..fans of kaiju & tokusatsu should dig this

Special Effects: The History and Technique is a great read that I came across in 2005 as part of my College's program. A comprehensive breakdown of techniques old and new with insight by people in the industry.

I had fond memories and looked it up- a newer 2nd edition in 2007 was printed with additional content. Given how fast things move a 3rd isn't too far away (Perhaps after Avatar's making is declassified)

I'm a really big fan of Lee Server. He did a biography of Robert Mitchum, Baby, I Don't Care, which I'd totally reccomend to basically *anyone*, you don't even have to be interested in Mitchum as an actor. Tales of young Rob smoking weed while riding the rails as a hobo? Check. Insane six-degrees-of-Kevin-Bacon type digressions about how some crew member on a minor Mitchum flick is related to the guy who did the string arrangements on Donovan's "Sunshine Superman"? Check. A story that begins with Mitchum hanging out with Sinatra, Lee Marvin and Joe DiMaggio and only gets more awesome from thereon? Check. Server clearly has great affection and respect for Mitchum's work, but he'll also crack jokes about his worst movies, and he contextualizes everything.

Server also co-edited a giant anthology called The Big Book Of Noir (only partly about cinema, a lot of it is essays on pulp fiction and even television and comics) which is a must read, and he did this fun out-of-print book called From Tokyo To Bombay: Asian Pop Cinema, which is great both as a time capsule (will annexation kill the HK movie industry??) and because of the chapters on less well known nation's cinematic output - Dominican Republic, Thailand, Korea before the boom, etc.

He's also damn near the only author I've ever gotten interested in who has no Internet presence whatsoever.

You ain't kidding! I'm thankful to that book because of the introduction (which taught me a whole lot about Tokugawa era Japan), but the actual meat of the book I found useless to read without having first seen the movies he's talking about (which by now I probably have, so I should maybe give it a second shot.)

A really good book on japanese genre cinema is Outlaw Masters Of Japanese Film by Chris D.

Thats a really good book.It brought the films of Eiichi Kudo to my attention.The guy made some of the best samurai films.

Speaking of Lee Server he wrote my favotite book on Sam Fuller.I've been meaning to pick up the one he did on Mitchum.He's such a good writer.

I'm bumping the thread to mention Character Kings by Scott Voisin. Great collection of interviews with some of the hardest working character actors currently in the business.

http://www.characterkingsbook.com/

An Empire of Their Own; How the Jews Invented Hollywood is a pretty great read, it's about all the original studio heads and how they came to be in the position they were and Hollywood's rise to power.

I second this. Wilder was incredibly entertaining, able to drop one great anecdote after another. You're right, Misfit, after reading the book it's hard not to be a huge fan and want to see everything he's done.

As for Carol J. Clover's Men, Women and Chainsaws, I had to stop after the first chapter. All the references to psychology, Freud, and especially gender and feminist theories just flew over my head. I could have been in the wrong mood for the material or went in expecting something else.
Should I just continue with it or should I have some more background knowledge on the perspective Clover is taking on her readings of this genre?

It appears the Stanley Kubrick Archive is slowly fading away from Amazon.com as a reasonable purchase, I suggest any holdouts go snap it up from Taschen's website before it's too late. It's a fantastic assembly of material on the man and well worth the investment.

 

And while you're at it, snap up "Stanley Kubrick's Napoleon: The Greatest Movie Never Made" for a cool $44.

 

 

 

Oh bliss, bliss and heaven.

Has no one tried to take a pass at Kubricks Napoleon since it fell through for the man himself?