Book Description

Book Description

Tacita Dean (b. 1965) is an artist internationally known for her compelling work in film. She seeks connections--between history and the present, fact and fiction. Her starting point is typically a chance encounter or discovery. She pursues her investigation like a detective, piecing together evidence and presenting it in a loosely woven, often inconclusive narrative.This book includes an introduction to the artist and her work by Clarrie Wallis, followed by eight responses by writers from diverse backgrounds. The book also contains a full biography, exhibition history, and filmography. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

An informative and insightful compilation
Ably edited by independent scholar and freelance writer Robert Long, John Huston: Interviews is an informative and insightful compilation of interviews with the late John Huston (which took place from 1952 to 1985) in which he personally comments on his life and projects as an acclaimed filmmaker. Among the movies that are surveyed within this context are The Maltese Falcon, Key Largo, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, The African Queen, The Night of the Iguana, Prizzi's Honor, and The Dead. The observations range from his approach to directing; the influence of painting upon his camera work, and his association with stellar actors, to his beginnings in Hollywood as a screenwriter, and the influences of James Joyce and Ernest Hemingway upon his movies. Replete with numerous anecdotes about writers, directors, and actors with whom he collaborated, we are presented with a body of work and a filmmaker's life that will be immensely appreciated by students of his work and a man whose personal life was as prodigious as his professional career. ... Read more

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Erich von Stroheim (1885-1957) was one of the true giants in American film history. Stubborn, arrogant, and colorful, he saw himself as a cinema artist, which led to numerous conflicts with producers and studio executives who complained about the inflated budgets and extraordinary length of his films. Stroheim achieved great notoriety and success, but he was so uncompromising that he turned his triumph into failure. He was banned from ever directing again and spent the remainder of his life as an actor.

For years Stroheim’s life has been wreathed in myths, many of his own devising. Arthur Lennig scoured European and American archives for details concerning the life of the actor and director, and he counters several long-accepted and oft-repeated claims. Stroheim’s tales of military experience are almost completely fictitious; the “von” in his name was an affectation adopted at Ellis Island in 1909; and, counter to his own claim, he did not participate in the production of [The] Birth of a Nation in 1914.

Wherever Stroheim lived, he was an outsider: a Jew in Vienna, an Austrian in southern California, an American in France. This contributed to an almost pathological need to embellish and obscure his past; yet, it also may have been the key to his genius both behind and in front of the camera. He had a fantastic dedication to absolute cinematic truth and believed that his vision and genius would triumph over the Hollywood system.

As an actor, Stroheim threw himself into his portrayals of evil men, relishing his epithet “The Man You Love to Hate.” As a director, he immersed himself in every facet of production, including script writing and costume design. In 1923 he created his masterpiece Greed, infamous for its eight-hour running time. The studio cut the film to two hours and burned the extra footage. Stroheim returned to acting, saving some of his finest performances for La Grande Illusion (1937) and Billy Wilder’s Sunset Boulevard (1950), a role he hated, probably because it was too similar to the story of his own life. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Big Disappointment !
I was eagerly anticipating reading Lennig's bio of von Stroheim. After thefirst chapter my joy turned sour.Very little is revealed that was'ntalready discussed in Richard Kosyarski's The Man You Love To Hate, andWeinberg's Stroheim: A Pictorial Review Of His nine Films. Both of thesebooks are out of print but I beseech you to try to find at your locallibrary or through Amazon's out-of-print service. Lennig prose is ratherdry, the subject rarely comes to life, and when he does offer insightsStroheim the man seems sad forever the outsider, a two bit Viennese hustlerwith visions too great for his talent as a director. I was entranced byStroheim when I was barely in my teens more than twenty years ago. I knowabout his losing battles against the studio heads, his public freaks andfailures. It is the real man behind films like the breathtaking Greed, theunfinished Queen Kelly and the oftimes painfully erotic Foolish Wives thatI wanted brought to life. Perhaps I'm only wishing that he could be broughtback to life.

THE definitive Stroheim biography!
What can I add to all the glowing reviews of this book except for my own enthusiasm for it!Arthur Lennig has done a spendid job recounting the life and work of Erich von Stroheim, presenting him as the man and genius he was while also debunking a lot of the myths.Not only is it THEdefinitive Stroheim biography, it's also highly entertaining reading!Amust-read for all film lovers.

The Definitive Stroheim Biography Is Here
Few Hollywood notables have been the object of more distorted,misinformed,or outright fabricated profiles than Erich Von Stroheim.Now that Arthur Lennig has come forward with his long-awaitedbiography,we are finally given the amazing truth of a maverickstar/director who bit every hand that tried to feed him.Lennig has made aserious study of Stroheim for over fifty years---he restored "FoolishWives" back in the sixties---he traveled to Austria to uncover thereal story of Stroheim's humble beginnings---in short,Lennig,who prevouslygave us the first and still best of the Bela Lugosi bios,has done it againwith "Stroheim"---in fact,he has surpassed himself,and that'ssaying plenty considering the fact that Arthur Lennig is one of the mostwell-informed and reliable of all the pioneer film historians.Has thereever been a more fascinating(and ultimatly tragic) figure in the wholehistory of Hollywood than Erich Von Stroheim?Here's a guy that took onevery front office in town---gambled it all for creative control that heinvariably lost---but kept returning to the Hollywood arena again and againuntil they finally broke him.Yes,he took on the system and the systemwon---or did it?Stroheim's incredible films,even in their truncatedlatter-day forms,are here to give evidence that this was a directorgenerations ahead of his time---already it's 2000 and we still haven'tcaught up with him.Read this book and get the dope on how"Greed","The Wedding March",and all the rest came tobe. It's riveting.They should give AFI awards for books this good----it'sfrom University Of Kentucky Press,so I don't know how big the print runis,but I suspect it would be a good idea to grab a copy(ortwo)quick,because this one's going to end up being a collector's item. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

The glamour of cinema as seen by our greatest photographers
From the late '40s, Robert Capa's Magnum agency became intimately involved in the world of cinema. His personal contacts with leading directors and producers allowed him exclusive (and lucrative) access to the sets, the movie-makers, and the stars.

This book takes us from that time right up to recent days, but the climax of the book has to be its coverage of The Misfits, the final movie of Clark Gable and Marylin Monroe. The pictures of Monroe's public and private faces, along with commentary of the day, gives us an insight into her last big show - in a way only Magnum photographers can make.

Featured photographers include Henri Cartier-Bresson, Eve Arnold, and Capa himself. Watch out for Hitchcock, Sophia Loren, and Orson Welles. Brilliant. ... Read more

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This book details Warren Miller's experiences behind the camera and on skis. In his Don Quixote-like method of cutting a swath through the wonderful world of freedom, Warren has shared his experiences from all over the world while chasing subjects for his camera. ... Read more

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The words "A Hal Wallis Production" grace the opening credits of several of America’s best-loved films.During nearly half a century of work in Hollywood, Wallis produced timeless classics such as The Adventures of Robin Hood, Yankee Doodle Dandy, Becket, True Grit, Rooster Cogburn and, perhaps the finest representative of American cinematic art, the haunting masterpiece Casablanca. A self-proclaimed "starmaker," Wallis helped launch young talents such as Lizabeth Scott, Kirk Douglas, Burt Lancaster, and Charlton Heston; introduced the comedy team of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis; and brought Elvis Presley to the silver screen.

Hal Wallis: Producer to the Stars is the first biography of the man behind these legendary films and iconic actors. Noted film historian Bernard F. Dick, using extensive research from studio memos, film archives, and personal correspondences, examines Wallis’s creative genius and his stature as Hollywood’s "Gentleman Producer." Several of the people closest to Wallis, including his publicity director Walter Seltzer and his second wife Martha Hyer Wallis, granted Dick exclusive interviews, and their insights reveal glimpses, unseen until now, of Wallis’s remarkable life and career.

Born to poor immigrants in Chicago just before the dawn of the twentieth century, Wallis stands as a rare example of the American dream come to life. At the beginning of his career, he quickly rose through the ranks of the Warner Brothers hierarchy on the basis of his organizational skills and creative powers. As a producer at Warner Brothers and later at Paramount, Wallis was always most attracted to narratives that mirrored the transformations that marked his own life: from commoner to gentleman, destitution to luxury, the hard streets to Easy Street.

Wallis produced great films across a number of genres, including comedy, tragedy, action, romance, melodrama, gangster, and Western, and the hands-on producer left his mark on cinematic touchstones such as The Maltese Falcon and Gunfight at the O.K. Corral. During the Golden Age of Hollywood, Wallis brought talented young actors into the limelight while soliciting career-defining performances from the era’s biggest stars, including Bette Davis, Henry Fonda, Richard Burton, and Humphrey Bogart.Bernard Dick’s study of Hal Wallis proves that the title of the great producer’s autobiography—Starmaker—was no idle boast. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

A Major Disappointment
I agree with the other reviewers: Wallis' prime identity and chief claim to fame was his monumental work at Warner Bros. from 1933-1944. This is what he will be best remembered and revered for - and to just quickly brush over this vital period of his career is really unforgivable. The author must have been just walking through the paycheck line in a hurry with this book. It reads like a college thesis in which the student just wanted a passing grade and really had no commitment or interest in his topic. Obviously the Hyer interview was easy to obtain and the author just sailed through with it and made it the bulk of his lazy research. Pretty sorry and poor stuff - what a disappointment for any movie fan who appreciates the classics!

A choppy book
Hal Wallis is a worthy subject for a big biography, but this book doesn't get the job done. It is simply not thorough enough.

A warning: If you're interested in Wallis' fantastic years at Warner Bros. - the era of Bogart, Cagney, Raft, Flynn, Bette Davis, Ann Sheridan - this book isn't for you. The author spends much more time dealing with Wallis' independent productions, particularly his big budget productions in the 1960s and early 1970s. Hal Wallis, a superb movie producer, certainly deserves a book that is more focused and complete.

Wallis deserved better
How Bernard Dick managed to write about the life and films of Hal Wallis in such an uninteresting way is certainly an accomplishment. Wallis was in charge of production at Warner Brothers for most of the 30's and into the 40's, but Dick chooses to ignore that period. This was the period when Wallis gave the studio its look and style.

A movie like "Kings Row" gets no mention at all, but Dick plods on for a dozen pages about movies in which Wallis "could have" cast Lizabeth Scott, and plays he "should have" bought and brought to the screen. It's almost like the author doesn't care for his subject or the movies he made. He'd rather that Wallis made some other movies he could write about.

The book does delve a little more deeply into the personal life, more than Wallis chose to in his autobiography. But what is clearly lacking is why we should be interested in this man who was behind so many beloved films - "Now, Voyager", "Dark Victory", "Confessions of a Nazi Spy", "Yankee Doodle Dandy", "The Rose Tattoo", "Beckett", "Gunfight at the OK Corral", "The Maltese Falcon", and of course "Casablanca". Wallis was a producer who had a hand in every creative decision on his movies (just read "Round Up the Usual Suspects" and see how he shaped "Casablanca"). If you are looking to learn what Wallis did to make his films special, it's not in this book. (...) ... Read more

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art/video/biography of Nam June Paik, illustrated ... Read more

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This is the first serious intellectual biography of GuyDebord,prime mover of the Situationist International (1957-1972) and author ofTheSociety of the Spectacle, perhaps the seminal book of May 1968 inFrance. AnselmJappe rejects recent attempts to set Debord up as a "postmodern" icon,arguingthat he was a social theorist in the Hegelian-Marxist traditionnot aprecursorof Jean Baudrillard but an heir of the young Georg Lukcs of History andClassConsciousness (1923). Neither hagiographical nor sectarian, Guy Debordplacesits subject squarely in his historical context: the politicizingLetterist andSituationist "anti-artists" who, in the European aftermath of World WarII,sought to criticize and transcend the Surrealist legacy. The book offersalively, critical, and unusually reliable account of Debord's "lastavant-garde"on its way from radical bohemianism to revolutionary theory. Jappe alsodiscusses Debord's films, which are largely inaccessible at present.ThisEnglish language edition of the book has been revised by the author andfeaturesan updated critical bibliography of Debord and the Situationists. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

demise of public space
With a variety of historical references and cultural events to offer a sound foundation for the events thwarted and formulated by Debord, Jappe constructs an informative synopsis of the development of the situationalists. The transformative evolution from the LI (Letterist International) to the SI (Situationalist International)is explored, as are multiple situations which gained both groups recognition by intellectual circles. Well referenced, well written.

Why bother?
Reading books won't help ... Read more

Book Description

The lavishly illustrated companion book to the new film by the award-winning director of Quest for Fire, The Bear, and The Name of the Rose—about twin tiger brothers in the jungles of French Indochina in the colonial period, a major family summer movie from Universal Pictures.

"This movie is a combination of three of my greatest passions: the animal world; a love of temples and monasteries; and my fascination with the European colonial period. Although it is a fable, Two Brothers also deals with important contemporary issues.

"I am very sad to see that the world that we share with many other species is vanishing. My great hope is that Two Brothers will help us understand the pleasure of sharing the world with animals and to encourage their conservation.

"Humans are not alone on the earth, they are not the only ones who have feelings and experience adventures. I think it is important for cinema to give the viewpoint of the forgotten 'people.'"—Jean-Jacques Annaud

Five months shooting a major feature film in Thailand and Cambodia, amidst the temples of Angkor, with tigers imported from France and the US was an extraordinary, even life-changing experience for the international cast, starring Guy Pearce (Memento, L.A. Confidential), and a crew of more than 400 people. Their leader was the intrepid director/writer/producer Jean-Jacques Annaud who has always been willing to undergo enormous hardship in order to bring the film that he has imagined to the screen, as evidenced by his visionary work on such movies as Quest for Fire, The Name of the Rose, The Bear, and Seven Years in Tibet.

In riveting detail and fully illustrated with stills, drawings, historical paintings, and images that inspired and tracked the process, this beautiful book covers the entire moviemaking odyssey, from pre-production, begun more than a year prior to shooting, through the final post-production stages. Included are fascinating sections on the selection and training of the tigers—cubs and full-grown—by world-renowned animal handlers, including Thierry Le Portier, who worked on the movies The Bear and Gladiator.

Two Brothers is the story of twin tiger brothers born amidst the temple ruins and exotic jungles who are separated as cubs and taken into captivity, one tiger to become a circus performer, the other a trained killer. Years later, the brothers find themselves reunited, but as forced enemies pitted against each other. Guy Pearce plays an adventurer of English origin, whose tragic intervention into the idyllic lives of the two tiger brothers forever intertwines their fates. 100 color illustrations. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Woody Allen once controlled the press like his actors--and as critic Andrew Sarris observed, Woody "is almost a ventriloquist and all his actors are marionettes. It's his nature. He has to be on top." The Soon-Yi scandal cost him $7 million and his protected reputation, and now we've got Marion Meade's unblinking look at his blighted life (superior to John Baxter's Woody Allen, not quite as good as Meade's Dorothy Parker: What Fresh Hell Is This?). The son of a loveless dad and mom who respectively ignored and beat him daily, Woody grew up mean, scarred, and scared: he slept with a night-light until his early 40s and considered suicide daily until at least age 51. His uncanny gift for comedy gave him no comfort, but movies did. His most autobiographical character is Cecilia in The Purple Rose of Cairo, who took refuge in theaters from "the ugly light" of real life.

Boy, does Meade cast ugly light on Woody and his work. His best role for a woman, Annie Hall, is "basically stupid," as Diane Keaton said. In life and art, Woody sought leading ladies he could dominate. He stalled Mia forever before granting her the right to keep her shampoo at his apartment "alongside toiletries belonging to Diane Keaton, preserved there like so many fossilized relics in King Tut's tomb for more than a decade." Mia was horrified that he spilled her family's nasty secrets in Hannah and Her Sisters, and fretted over his obsession with Keaton and her sisters, Mariel Hemingway's sister, and Mia's own sister Steffi--whose photos she discovered (shades of Soon-Yi!) in his apartment. Woody's lovable persona was as fake as his transplanted, dyed hair. And Mia's no sweetheart herself: having caught her scuzzy dad with Ava Gardner one night as a child, she married Ava's squeeze Frank Sinatra at 19, and then stole her friend Dory Previn's husband, André, saying, "You don't fight what feels good."

If Meade's sour, thorough tome is true, nobody in Hollywood fights what feels good, and they all come out looking pretty bad. --Tim Appelo ... Read more

Reviews (22)

What was the point?
As with any book, I would expect a certain amount of author bias toward the subject. From the first few pages it is obvious that Marion Meade doesn't respect Woody Allen professionally, believes his success a matter of luck, detests his films, and thinks even less of him as a person. So why bother writing about him?

There is a lot of biographical information about Woody's childhood, his family, his stand-up career and his filmmaking--which is the only reason I gave this book 2 stars. I did force myself to finish the book. However, every topic the author covers is tainted by her low opinion of Mr. Allen. I don't agree with the personal choices Woody Allen has made with regard to the Mia Farrow, Soon-Yi fiasco, but at the same time, I do like Woody Allen's films and respect him as a director. Ms. Meade doesn't, so her book is a difficult load to swallow.

If you're looking for a biography that gives Woody Allen credit for his contribution to American cinema, avoid this one.

Visionary vs. voyeur, contributor vs. parasite
What a great opportunity a Woody Allen biography represents. Here's one of the great masters of American cinema, an artist who has been producing prolifically for over thirty years. Before our eyes, he went through mastering various cinematic styles and then transcending them all, contributing as a philosopher, writer, comedian, actor, director, even musician. Along the way, Allen produced a body of work replete with a quality all too rare in any, particularly American motion pictures: a thinking, interesting approach. The audiences and critics speak for themselves: here's a true visionary.

Unfortunately, those who make a name for themselves are destined to attract parasites. Enters Marion Meade, the voyeur. Unable to create worthwhile art or even advancing the cause of understanding it better or enjoying it more intelligently, she has nothing to offer that's pertinent to the art of Woody Allen. What she does offer is plenty of gossip and garbage. After having the Allen-Farrow "scandal" publicly dished out for too long, who needs more of this? Is it really a surprise to anyone after watching W.A. movies that the man should have character flaws, past pain and ongoing neuroses. Isn't the genius of his work to allow us to identify so readily with his character?

If you need gossip to make yourself feel superior to a man who has had something genuinely great to offer, then don't pass this one up. If you prefer some degree of integrity in your writing, and are desirous to learn about subjects worth remembering, avoid this one at all cost.

Delightful, but guilty pleasure
With 'The Unruly Life of Woody Allen', Marion Meade has written a delightful, gossipy life story of the irreplacable New York artist. Anyone who has seen his work knows the basic gist of the story: raised in Flatbush during the '40s, a dropout of NYU film school, a self-made auteur by his late 20s. A filmmaker whose work manages to nostalgize, lampoon, and transcend the New York Jewish intellectual scene.

Who is the man behind all this? Marion Meade supplies a lot of details about his life without ever really getting to the heart of the man. I can't fault her for that, since I'm not sure any writer could understand someone at once so sentimental and mean spirited, so artistic and tired, so trailblazing and so old fashioned. Why do we need to? His films speak for himself, and his life speaks for itself. We don't need to like or understand the man to be entertained by his movies.

This book is a gossipy, guilty pleasure. It will hold the interest of anyone curious about what the Woodman eats for breakfast, which co-stars are still his friends, what a declining audience has done to his career. The Mia Farrow fiasco is covered in some detail -- probably a little too much time in spent on the custody trial and subsequent legal problems with his film production company. The book covers no new ground but does provide a lot of new details. I enjoyed it and would recommend it to fans.

Enjoyably scandalous
Bright as he was, or perhaps because he was so intelligent, Woody (born Allan Konigsberg) was a difficult child at school, often playing hooky, his mother making numerous trips to school to explain his behavior. He was a reluctant reader, although he would devour as many as fifty comic books per day. He was addicted to movies, plunking down 11 cents for a double feature in the air-conditioned comfort of the neighborhood theater, a rather forbidding place with rats scurrying around the floor.

Despite his self-depiction in his movies, Allen was not bashful nor repressed as a child, and he was considered a bad influence by the parents of most of his friends. He would practice magic tricks for hours each day, becoming quite proficient. His mother could be quite a nag, but Woody would often dish it right back. Once, when she had a patch over one eye because of a cataract and she was haranguing him about something, he shot back, "Shut up Mom, or I'll blind your other eye."

His first marriage, to Harlene, was not a success. Married in their teens, they had to move back in with her parents after the Colgate Show folded. He had been writing for them. Neil Simon's brother, Danny, took an interest in him and taught him that writing jokes was not enough; he needed to learn how to write whole sketches. It was about this time that he began therapy, insisting he was constantly depressed. He used to joke that his wife's cooking tasted like coffee, everything, even the eggs. The marriage was strained, but his career was beginning to take off, and he wrote for Sid Caesar's Show of Shows. He was soon working around the clock. His jokes about their marriage were borne silently by "Mrs. Woody" as she was rather derisively called. He remarked she looked like Olive Oil in the Popeye comics. She was studying philosophy and German, however, and she encouraged him to broaden his reading. They realized the marriage was a mistake and his belittling of his wife did not help. (For example he made comments that he almost choked to death on a bone in her chocolate pudding and he gave her an electric chair disguised as a hair dryer for her birthday; she was so bumble-brained that after burning herself it took her two minutes to think of the word "ouch;" or his wife was raped, but knowing her it was not considered a moving violation.) They were divorced after six years, just before Woody made it big.

Soon he became enamored with Louise Lasser, a talented actress and singer. Her mother was a depressive and never forgave Louise for preventing her suicide, something she was to eventually succeed at. More grist for Woody's therapy mill.
Allen's comedy was evolving into the self-deprecating analysis of Allen Konigsberg ("My parents rented out my room after I was kidnapped," and "My mother nursed me through falsies.") By 1969, he had gotten over his stage fright and become the hottest comic in the U.S.

Meade, author of a very good biography of Eleanor of Aquitaine, goes into considerable detail concerning the accusations and counter-charges related to Woody's affair and subsequent marriage to Sooni, Mia Farrow's adopted daughter. Bizarre doesn't even begin to describe the hate that resulted from this ill-advised liaison. Meade also describes Allen's movies, although most after the Sooni debacle and media frenzy hardly seem worth watching. It must be hard to write a biography of a living person and we'll just have to watch and see what happens in future years. Stay tuned.

A mean, spiteful book
The biographical points in this book are very interesting and well researched. But it seems as if on every point Margaret finds some unknown nobody with a nasty quote that should be taken as gospel. The facts are interesting, but the nasty commentary is just spiteful and irrelevant. ... Read more

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Riveting book
Spencer Haywood's story is one that is not uncommon in sports. A brilliant career derailed by drug abuse. What I found especially compelling about this book was Haywood and Ostler's harrowing account of Spencer's crack addiction. After reading this part of the book, I found myself rooting when Spencer beat his problem and went back to try out in the NBA. A great story. ... Read more

Book Description

Along with Sergei Eisenstein and Vsevolod Pudovkin, Alexander Dovzhenko became one of the major pioneers of Soviet filmmaking. During his thirty-year career, his films-including Zvenyhora, Arsenal, Earth, and Ivan-won international acclaim and have become classics of the silent and early sound eras. Combining images from Ukrainian history and folklore, stark realism, visual poetry, propaganda, and gentle humor, his films celebrated nature and our relationship to the land. Based on archival research in Moscow and Kiev and interviews with Dovzhenko's colleagues and students, George O. Liber provides the first definitive account in any language of this important director's personal and professional life. Liber's biography explores the political context of Dovzhenko's filmmaking, investigates the divisions between his public and private worlds, and analyzes his struggles within and against the Stalinist system. Illustrated ... Read more

Book Description

Rainer Werner Dassbiner left behind him a literary and cinematic collection which will take a unique place in history of European film and in the culture of the twentieth century. It is a collection which evolved as the expression of an era, between 1966 and 1982, in a country which was then another Germany and which no longer exists. ... Read more

Book Description

Yorkshire-born Ken Annakin was one of the greatest international film directors.The last of the English directors to make it in the international arena (others included Hitchcock and Lean), this autobiography traces Annakin's career from his early British films through to Hollywood.He has directed, written and produced over 50 feature films in Africa, India, Malaysia, Scandinavia, China, Europe and the United States.His films include: Swiss Family Robinson, The Longest Day, Battle of The Bulge, and Those Magnificent Men and Their Flying Machines.His autobiography includes personal and revealing insights into many film personalities including: Walt Disney, Claudette Colbert, Edward G. Robinson, Peter Sellers, Charlton Heston and Raquel Welch.Ken Annakin's book is forthright and pulls no punches; it will soon become a classic among director's autobiographies.Detailing his own frustrations with sex-mad producers, drug-addicted actors, and politics which sabotaged multi-million dollar fims, Ken Annakin describes a career of dizzying highs and bleak lows.This master of "family entertainment" also sounds a clarion call for a return to motion pictures which are fun for the whole family.So You Wanna Be A Director? is an entertaining and witty travelogue, as well as an important document of film history. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

A Giant From An Era of Giants
Ken Annakin, one of fildom's greatest international directors, has written an autobiography every bit as entertaining as it is informative. His globetrotting film adventures gives "So You Wanna Be a Director?" the kind of page-turning narrative thrust of a mystery novel while, at the same time, providing astute analysis of the world cinema past and present. Annakin learned his craft well, a protege of Sir Carol Reed who launched his career with the hugely successful Hugget series, family entertainment resulting in major box office on both sides of the Atlantic. Annakin later became a premier filmmaker for Walt Disney and Daryl Zanuck. His Disney family classic, "The Swiss family Robinson," filmed entirely on the island of Tobago, remains one of the top grossers in world film history. His 1957 classic, "Across the Bridge," was one of the most intriguing film noir spellbinders ever made and helped propel into high gear the career of its star, Rod Steiger. Annakin's "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines" was the most inventive satire ever filmed about the early days of aviation, earning him an Oscar nomination for "Best Original Screenplay" along with co-writer Jack Davies. Annakin sketches enduring portraits of Sir Carol Reed, Walt Disney, Daryl F. Zanuck, Rod Steiger, Peter Ustinov, Raquel Welch, Glynis Johns, Tony Curtis, Robert Mitchum, and many others. For cinema lovers this is a "must read." ... Read more