Leo McCarey

Leo McCarey PDF Author: Wes D. Gehring
Publisher: Scarecrow Press
ISBN: 9780810852631
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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Book Description
This first full-length biography of a legendary and award-winning Hollywood writer, producer, and director (Duck Soup, My Favorite Wife, An Affair to Remember, Going My Way, and The Bells of St. Mary's) explores the director's life as filtered through his art. Gehring maintains that McCarey's films were often a reworking of his antiheroic self. In addition, the apparent diversity of his films actually represents an interrelated web of various comedy genres and a pattern of antiheroic characters and themes.

Leo McCarey

Leo McCarey PDF Author: Wes D. Gehring
Publisher: Scarecrow Press
ISBN: 9780810852631
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 308

Get Book Here

Book Description
This first full-length biography of a legendary and award-winning Hollywood writer, producer, and director (Duck Soup, My Favorite Wife, An Affair to Remember, Going My Way, and The Bells of St. Mary's) explores the director's life as filtered through his art. Gehring maintains that McCarey's films were often a reworking of his antiheroic self. In addition, the apparent diversity of his films actually represents an interrelated web of various comedy genres and a pattern of antiheroic characters and themes.

The Art of Laurel and Hardy

The Art of Laurel and Hardy PDF Author: Kyp Harness
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476608415
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
From the early days of film came Laurel and Hardy, a comedy team that created slapstick hilarity from life's simplest situations. Some seventy years after their heyday, Arthur Stanley Jefferson and Oliver Norvell "Babe" Hardy are still remembered for the comic chaos they created in film shorts. They gave us something to laugh at by reminding us of our own foibles, in a way that was genuine and unpretentious. The lanky Stan Laurel (1890-1965) and portly Ollie Hardy (1892-1957) had but one objective: to create as many laughs as would fit in one short film. And that, they did. The book begins by exploring their comedy in the early days of film. A chapter is dedicated to each of "the boys"--Laurel from Ulverston, England, and Hardy from the state of Georgia--as a person and performer. Further chapters explore the slapstick and gags of Laurel and Hardy and how the pair survived the transition to sound that left behind many actors of the day. It was only when they began to work for large studios, churning out cookie-cutter scripts, that their art began to lose its way. The book takes the reader through the ups and downs of their careers and to a final comeback. A filmography lists works from 1917 to 1951 with information on availability.

Ozu's Tokyo Story

Ozu's Tokyo Story PDF Author: David Desser
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521484350
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
Ozu's Tokyo Story is generally regarded as one of the finest films ever made. Universal in its appeal, it is also considered to be 'particularly Japanese'. Exploring its universality and cultural specificity, this collection of specially commissioned essays demonstrates the multiple planes on which the film may be appreciated. The introduction outlines Ozu's career as both a contract director of a major studio and as a singular figure in Japanese film history, and also analyses the director's cinematic style, particularly his narrative strategies and spatial compositions. Other essays situate Ozu's cinema in its relationship to Hollywood film-making: his relationship to aspects of Japanese tradition, situating the film within artistic modes, religious systems and beliefs, and socio-cultural and familial formations. Also included is an analysis of how Ozu has been misunderstood in Western criticism.

The Hidden God

The Hidden God PDF Author: Mary Lea Bandy
Publisher: The Museum of Modern Art
ISBN: 9780870703492
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
"... offers a range of approaches to cinema's explorations of a hidden or absent God through a group of essays by thirty-five writers who discuss some fifty movies"--p. 11.

Stan and Ollie

Stan and Ollie PDF Author: Simon Louvish
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 146682722X
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 746

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Book Description
Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy have remained, from 1927 to the present day, the screen's most famous and popular comedy double act, celebrated by legions of fans. But despite many books about their films and individual lives, there has never been a fully researched, definitive narrative biography of the duo, from birth to death. Louvish traces the early lives of Stanley Jefferson and Norvell Hardy and the surrounding minstrel and variety theatre, which influenced all of their later work. Louvish examines the rarely seen solo films of both our heroes, prior to their serendipitous pairing in 1927, in the long-lost short "Duck Soup." The inspired casting teamed them until their last days. Both often married, they found balancing their personal and professional lives a nearly impossible feat. Between 1927 and 1938, they were able to successfully bridge the gap between silent and sound films, which tripped up most of their prominent colleagues. Their Hal Roach and MGM films were brilliant, but their move in 1941, to Twentieth Century Fox proved disastrous, with the nine films made there ranking as some of the most embarrassing moments of cinematic history. In spite of this, Laurel and Hardy survived as exemplars of lasting genius, and their influence is seen to this day. The clowns were elusive behind their masks, but now Simon Louvish can finally reveal their full and complex humanity, and their passionate devotion to their art. In Stan and Ollie: The Roots of Comedy: The Double Life of Laurel and Hardy, Louvish has seamlessly woven tireless and thorough research into an authoritative biography of these two important and influential Hollywood pioneers.

Who the Devil Made It

Who the Devil Made It PDF Author: Peter Bogdanovich
Publisher: Ballantine Books
ISBN: 0307817458
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 1127

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Book Description
“A must have for any film nut.”—Details Peter Bogdanovich, award-winning director, screenwriter, actor and critic, interviews 16 legendary directors over a 15-year period. Their richly illuminating conversations combine to make this a riveting chronicle of Hollywood and picture making. Join him in conversations with: Robert Aldrich • George Cukor • Allan Dwan • Howard Hanks • Alfred Hitchcock • Chuck Jones • Fritz Lang • Joseph H. Lewis • Sidney Lumet • Leo McCarey • Otto Preminger • Don Siegel • Josef von Sternberg • Frank Tashlin • Edgar G. Ulmer • Raoul Walsh NOTE: This edition does not include photographs. Praise for Who the Devil Made It “Illuminating . . . These were (and sometimes are: a few yet breathe) men rooted in history as much as in Hollywood. Their collected memories make the past look fearfully rich beside a present that is poverty-stricken in everything except money.”—The New Yorker “Bogdanovich is one of America’s finest writers on the cinema. . . . Thank goodness [his] Who the Devil Made It has come along to remind us that films and writing about film were, at one time, focused on the work and not strictly on the bottom line.”—The Boston Globe “A treasure trove on the craft of directing.”—Newsday “Monumental . . . The directors’ reminiscences about technique, working methods, sources of ideas, and relationships with actors and studios are thoroughly entertaining.”—Publishers Weekly “A fine achievement that helps illuminate the art and craft of some remarkable directors . . . There are plenty of revealing anecdotes.”—Kirkus Reviews

The Look of Catholics

The Look of Catholics PDF Author: Anthony Burke Smith
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
ISBN: 0700636153
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 296

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Book Description
When John Kennedy ran for president, some Americans thought a Catholic couldn't—or shouldn't—win the White House. Credit Bing Crosby, among others, that he did. For much of American history, Catholics' perceived allegiance to an international church centered in Rome excluded them from full membership in society, a prejudice as strong as those against blacks and Jews. Now Anthony Burke Smith shows how the intersection of the mass media and the visually rich culture of Catholicism changed that Protestant perception and, in the process, changed American culture. Smith examines depictions of and by Catholics in American popular culture during the critical period between the Great Depression and the height of the Cold War. He surveys the popular films, television, and photojournalism of the era that reimagined Catholicism as an important, even attractive, element of American life to reveal the deeply political and social meanings of the Catholic presence in popular culture. Hollywood played a big part in this midcentury Catholicization of the American imagination, and Smith showcases the talents of Catholics who made major contributions to cinema. Leo McCarey's Oscar-winning film Going My Way, starring the soothing (and Catholic) Bing Crosby, turned the Catholic parish into a vehicle for American dreams, while Pat O'Brien and Spencer Tracy portrayed heroic priests who championed the underclass in some of the era's biggest hits. And even while a filmmaker like John Ford rarely focused on clerics and the Church, Smith reveals how his films gave a distinctly ethnic Catholic accent to his cinematic depictions of American community. Smith also looks at the efforts of Henry Luce's influential Life magazine to harness Catholicism to a postwar vision of middle-class prosperity and cultural consensus. And he considers the unexpected success of Bishop Fulton J. Sheen's prime-time television show Life is Worth Living in the 1950s, which offered a Catholic message that spoke to the anxieties of Cold War audiences. Revealing images of orthodox belief whose sharpest edges had been softened to suggest tolerance and goodwill, Smith shows how such representations overturned stereotypes of Catholics as un-American. Spanning a time when hot and cold wars challenged Americans' traditional assumptions about national identity and purpose, his book conveys the visual style, moral confidence, and international character of Catholicism that gave it the cultural authority to represent America.

The American Cinema

The American Cinema PDF Author: Andrew Sarris
Publisher: Da Capo Press
ISBN: 9780306807282
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 392

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Book Description
"The American Cinema is the Citizen Kane of film criticism, a brilliant book that elevated American directors from craftsmen to artists, launched the careers of numerous film critics, and shaped the aesthetics of a whole generation of viewers by providing new ways of looking at movies."--Emanuel Levy, author of George Cukor, Master of Elegance The auteur theory, of which film critic Andrew Sarris was the leading American proponent, holds that artistry in cinema can be largely attributed to film directors, who, while often working against the strictures of studios, producers, and scriptwriters, manage to infuse each film in their oeuvre with their personal style. Sarris's The American Cinema, the bible of auteur studies, is a history of American film in the form of a lively guide to the work of two hundred film directors, from Griffith, Chaplin, and von Sternberg to Mike Nichols, Stanley Kubrick, and Jerry Lewis. In addition, the book includes a chronology of the most important American films, an alphabetical list of over 6000 films with their directors and years of release, and the seminal essays "Toward a Theory of Film History" and "The Auteur Theory Revisited." Over twenty-five years after its initial publication, The American Cinema remains perhaps the most influential book ever written on the subject.

Box Set: Ingrid Bergman, Bette Davis, Katharine Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor

Box Set: Ingrid Bergman, Bette Davis, Katharine Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor PDF Author: Grace May Carter
Publisher: New Word City
ISBN: 1640191917
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 1128

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Book Description
Here, from New York Times bestselling biographer Grace May Carter, are the extraordinary lives of Ingrid Bergman, Bette Davis, Katharine Hepburn, and Elizabeth Taylor. Ingrid Bergman emerges as a devoted artist whose refusal to be a caricature caused her endless trouble - but also produced brilliant performances, from her early role opposite Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca to her profound and final appearance as Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. In between, there were four children (including actress Isabella Rossellini), three husbands, and passionate affairs with war photographer Robert Capa, Wizard of Oz director Victor Fleming, and Spellbound co-star Gregory Peck. She was perhaps the most international star in the history of entertainment, and, without a doubt, one of the most misunderstood. In a career that spanned six decades, two Academy Awards, and ten Oscar nominations, Bette Davis became one of the greatest screen legends of all time. But, as her epitaph says, "She did it the hard way." She was in constant battles with co-stars, directors, and studios and struggled with addictions to alcohol and cigarettes. She had four stormy marriages, and even her three children brought pain and controversy - one wrote a scathing tell-all book, another had a severe mental disability, and a third was the subject of a prolonged custody battle. But in her iconic film roles, Davis transcended her troubles to leave an indelible mark on American cinema. Possessing none of the glamorous beauty of Greta Garbo, she had something more powerful and lasting: a restless, incandescent energy that made her mesmerizing to watch on the big screen. Katharine Hepburn was far more than an iconic movie star who won four Academy Awards for best actress and made classic films that still rank among the greatest of all time. She also exerted a unique influence on American popular culture, challenging rigid assumptions about how women should behave - and almost single-handedly gave them permission to wear pants. The list of adjectives used to describe Hepburn - bold, stubborn, witty, beautiful - only begin to hint at the complex woman who entranced audiences around the world. So here is the full, epic story of "the patron saint of the independent American female," as one critic described her. Hepburn always lived life strictly on her own terms. And oh, what a life it was. For a time, Elizabeth Taylor was the world's biggest star, but it was her off-screen life - eight stormy marriages, a jewel-encrusted lifestyle, and struggles with weight and various addictions - that provided the most riveting drama. Long before the age of reality television, Taylor showed how fame could take on a volatile life of its own, obscuring the real person behind the media façade. Now, in this compelling biography, we meet the real Elizabeth Taylor as she grows from precocious child star to "the most beautiful woman in the world" to serious actress to pop-culture punch line, and finally, successful entrepreneur, philanthropist, and HIV/AIDS activist. Along the way, she is vilified by fans for stealing singer Eddie Fischer from Debbie Reynolds, becomes trapped in a cycle of destructive affairs with Richard Burton, and desperately tries to recapture the childhood she never had with the eccentric pop star Michael Jackson. "I've always admitted that I'm ruled by my passions," she once said - and those passions make for a gripping, epic tale of tribulation and triumph.

The First Hollywood Sound Shorts, 1926-1931

The First Hollywood Sound Shorts, 1926-1931 PDF Author: Edwin M. Bradley
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476606846
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 561

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Book Description
This study of early sound shorts begins with an explanation of the development of sound motion pictures in Hollywood by such influential companies as Warner Bros. and Fox, with an emphasis on short subjects, leading up to the first few months when all of the major studios were capable of producing them. The next chapters discuss the impact on other mass entertainments, the development of audible news reels and other non-fiction shorts, as well as the origins of animated sound subjects. A comprehensive list of pre-1932 American-made shorts completes the volume.