Download or read book The Art of the Hollywood Backdrop written by Richard M. Isackes and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-11 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Once a guarded cinematic secret, this definitive history reveals for the first time the art and craft of Hollywood's hand painted-backdrops, and pays homage to the scenic artists who brought them to the big screen." -- Slipcase.

Download or read book Designs on Film written by Cathy Whitlock and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2013-02-05 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Who can forget the over-the-top, white-on-white, high-gloss interiors through which Fred Astaire danced in Top Hat? The modernist high-rise architecture, inspired by the work of Frank Lloyd Wright, in the adaptation of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead? The lavish, opulent drawing rooms of Martin Scorsese's The Age of Innocence? Through the use of film design—called both art direction and production design in the film industry—movies can transport us to new worlds of luxury, highlight the ornament of the everyday, offer a vision of the future, or evoke the realities of a distant era. In Designs on Film, journalist and interior designer Cathy Whitlock illuminates the often undercelebrated role of the production designer in the creation of the most memorable moments in film history. Through a lush collection of rare archival photographs, Whitlock narrates the evolving story of art direction over the course of a century—from the massive Roman architecture of Ben-Hur to the infamous Dakota apartment in Rosemary's Baby to the digital CGI wonders of Avatar's Pandora. Drawing on insights from the most prominent Hollywood production designers and the historical knowledge of the venerable Art Directors Guild, Whitlock delves into the detailed process of how sets are imagined, drawn, built, and decorated. Designs on Film is the must-have look book for film lovers, movie buffs, and anyone looking to draw interior design inspiration from the constructions and confections of Hollywood. Whitlock lifts the curtain on movie magic and celebrates the many ways in which art direction and set design allow us to lose ourselves in the diverse worlds showcased on the big screen.

Download or read book Hollywood Highbrow written by Shyon Baumann and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2018-06-05 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Today's moviegoers and critics generally consider some Hollywood products--even some blockbusters--to be legitimate works of art. But during the first half century of motion pictures very few Americans would have thought to call an American movie "art." Up through the 1950s, American movies were regarded as a form of popular, even lower-class, entertainment. By the 1960s and 1970s, however, viewers were regularly judging Hollywood films by artistic criteria previously applied only to high art forms. In Hollywood Highbrow, Shyon Baumann for the first time tells how social and cultural forces radically changed the public's perceptions of American movies just as those forces were radically changing the movies themselves. The development in the United States of an appreciation of film as an art was, Baumann shows, the product of large changes in Hollywood and American society as a whole. With the postwar rise of television, American movie audiences shrank dramatically and Hollywood responded by appealing to richer and more educated viewers. Around the same time, European ideas about the director as artist, an easing of censorship, and the development of art-house cinemas, film festivals, and the academic field of film studies encouraged the idea that some American movies--and not just European ones--deserved to be considered art.

Download or read book The Hidden Art of Hollywood written by John Fawell and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2008-10-30 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although we tend to accord our highest praise to films with strong messages, Hollywood is resolutely unserious in its goals, and closer perhaps to music than to literature in this regard. Thus, in order to appreciate Hollywood's classic movies, we have to understand them as the result of a style of filmmaking that justifies itself through the grace and beauty of its form. This beauty, when seen, challenges our notion of film as the poorer cousin of the high arts, or as worthwhile only when it serves a social purpose. The Hidden Art of Hollywood draws from a huge fund of recorded interviews with the directors, writers, cinematographers, set designers, producers, and actors who were a part of the studio process, in order to give the filmmakers themselves the chance to explain a very elusive phenomenon: the glancing beauty of the Hollywood film. While the greatness of the classic Hollywood film is, for many of us, settled business, there are also a great number who have difficulty understanding why these films—which can often seem dated and unrealistic compared to modern fare—are taken as seriously as they are. Although we tend to accord our highest praise to films with strong and often didactic messages, Hollywood is resolutely unserious in its goals, and closer perhaps to music than to literature in this regard. Thus, in order to appreciate classic American movies, we have to understand them as the result of a style of filmmaking that justifies itself not through ideas or social relevance, but through the grace and beauty of its form. The beauty of the Hollywood film challenges our notion of film as the poorer cousin of the high arts, or as worthwhile only when it serves a social purpose. In his effort to answer the many questions that classic American cinema suggests, author John Fawell considers previous criticism of Hollywood, but also draws from a huge fund of recorded interviews with the directors, writers, cinematographers, set designers, producers, and actors who were a part of the studio process, in order to give the filmmakers themselves the chance to explain a very elusive phenomenon: the glancing beauty of the Hollywood film. The films of certain great auteurs, including Charlie Chaplin, Ernst Lubitsch, Preston Sturges, Alfred Hitchcock, Billy Wilder, John Ford, and Orson Welles, receive particular attention here, but this book is organized by ideas rather than films or artists, and it draws from a wide array of Hollywood films, both successes and failures, to make its points.

Download or read book The Lost Artwork of Hollywood written by Fred E. Basten and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: tars that appeared exclusively in trade magazines to promote the great films of the '30s, '40s, and '50s. The Lost Artwork of Hollywood is a sumptuous package: the color, the quality of the printing all give immense eye appeal to this first-time look at some of the art that made the movies glamorous. 100 full-color illustrations.

Download or read book MGM Style written by Howard Gutner and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2019-09-17 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: MGM Style is an overview of the career and achievements of Hollywood’s most famous art director. Cedric Gibbons was the supervisor in charge of the art department at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film studios from its inception in 1924 until Gibbons chose to retire in 1956. Lavishly illustrated with over 175 pristine duotone photographs, the vast majority of which have never before been published, this is the first volume to trace Gibbons’ trendsetting career. At its height in the late 1930s and early 1940s, Gibbons was regularly acknowledged by his peers as having shaped the craft of art direction in American film; his work was recognized as representing the finest in motion picture sets and settings. Gibbons and his associates constructed the villages, towns, streets, squares and edifices that later appeared in hundreds of films, and whose mixed architecture stood in for army camps and the wild west, Dutch New York and Dickensian London, ancient China and modern Japan. Inspired by the work of Le Corbusier and the Bauhaus masters, as well as the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris and Frank Lloyd Wright’s experiments with open planning, Gibbons championed the notion that movie decor should move beyond the commercial framework of the popular cinema

Download or read book Setting the Scene written by Robert Sennett and published by . This book was released on 1994-09-15 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critical to a movie's success, the art director helps create the overall "look" for which a film is remembered. This book, filled with 165 stunning illustrations--some in color--surveys the careers of the greatest Hollywood art directors from the silent era to the present. Covers such movies as The Birth of a Nation (1915) and Batman(1989).

Download or read book Cecil B DeMille written by Cecilia de Mille Presley and published by Running Press Adult. This book was released on 2014-12-16 with total page 1006 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Colossal. Stupendous. Epic. These adjectives, used by movie companies to hawk their wares, became clichélong ago. When used to describe the films of one director, they are accurate. More than any filmmaker in the history of the medium, Cecil B. DeMille mastered the art of the spectacle. In the process, he became a filmland founder. One hundred years ago, he made the first feature film ever shot in Hollywood and went on to become the most commercially successful producer-director in history. DeMille told his cinematic tales with painterly, extravagant images. The parting of the Red Sea in The Ten Commandments was only one of these. There were train wrecks (The Greatest Show on Earth); orgies (Manslaughter); battles (The Buccaneer); Ancient Rome (The Sign of the Cross); Ancient Egypt (Cleopatra); and the Holy Land (The Crusades). The best of these images are showcased here, in Cecil B. DeMille: The Art of the Hollywood Epic. This lavish volume opens the King Tut's tomb of cinematic treasures that is the Cecil B. DeMille Archives, presenting storyboard art, concept paintings, and an array of photographic imagery. Historian Mark A. Vieira writes an illuminating text to accompany these scenes. Cecilia de Mille Presley relates her grandfather's thoughts on his various films, and recalls her visits to his sets, including the Egyptian expedition to film The Ten Commandments. Like the director's works, Cecil B. DeMille: The Art of the Hollywood Epic is a panorama of magnificence-celebrating a legendary filmmaker and the remarkable history of Hollywood.

Download or read book Hirschfeld s Hollywood written by David Leopold and published by Harry N. Abrams. This book was released on 2001 with total page 104 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Published to accompany an exhibition at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, this book recounts Hirshfeld's career as a graphic artist, and reprints 100 plus drawings, paintings, collages, posters, billboards, and murals. Classic caricatures and behind-the scenes perspectives of major players in Hollywood are accompanied by more vibrantly colored works. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Download or read book The Unseen Art of Hollywood written by Trevor Goring and published by . This book was released on 2012-01-10 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comic book and storyboard artist Trevor Goring, together with Joyce Goring, detail the history of film storyboards. This important and long-neglected art is now given its due with this comprehensive history of the art of film storyboards. Featuring a genre-by-genre discussion of over one-hundred great films and their storyboards, this visual tour features a full range of classic and contemporary films with examples of how directors utilize storyboards in the creation of their films.

Download or read book Hollywood Art written by Beverly Heisner and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2011-09-09 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the 1930s and 40s heyday of Hollywood studio art departments, strong art directors like Cedric Gibbons and Hans Dreier brought together more artists and artisans working on the same projects than any other enterprise in the history of modern American art. This is the first book to trace the history of studio art direction. The origins of art direction in the early motion pictures, the organization of art departments, and the nature of art direction from the 1920s to the 1950s are covered first. Then each studio is discussed individually with a survey of its art department output through the fifties. Comprehensive filmographies (a first) provide films and release dates for 226 art directors.

Download or read book The Art of Immersion How the Digital Generation Is Remaking Hollywood Madison Avenue and the Way We Tell Stories written by Frank Rose and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2012-03-05 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a field guide to the visionaries - and the fans - who are reinventing the art of storytelling.

Download or read book America s Corporate Art written by Jerome Christensen and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2012-01-11 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contrary to theories of single person authorship, America's Corporate Art argues that the corporate studio is the author of Hollywood motion pictures, both during the classical era of the studio system and beyond, when studios became players in global dramas staged by massive entertainment conglomerates. Hollywood movies are examples of a commodity that, until the digital age, was rare: a self-advertising artifact that markets the studio's brand in the very act of consumption. The book covers the history of corporate authorship through the antithetical visions of two of the most dominant Hollywood studios, Warner Bros. and MGM. During the classical era, these studios promoted their brands as competing social visions in strategically significant pictures such as MGM's Singin' in the Rain and Warner's The Fountainhead. Christensen follows the studios' divergent fates as MGM declined into a valuable and portable logo, while Warner Bros. employed Batman, JFK, and You've Got Mail to seal deals that made it the biggest entertainment corporation in the world. The book concludes with an analysis of the Disney-Pixar merger and the first two Toy Story movies in light of the recent judicial extension of constitutional rights of the corporate person.

Download or read book Face to Face written by Brian Grazer and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 2019-09-17 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Featured on CBS This Morning, Squawk Box, MSNBC, CNN, Bloomberg, Forbes, Fast Company, The New York Times, and more. “Reading Face to Face is like being a fly on the wall, watching Brian Grazer work his magic. Utterly entertaining, this is how you become Hollywood’s best producer.” —Malcolm Gladwell, author of Talking to Strangers Legendary Hollywood producer and author of the bestselling A Curious Mind, Brian Grazer is back with a captivating new book about the life-changing ways we can connect with one another. Much of Brian Grazer’s success—as a #1 New York Times bestselling author, Academy Award–winning producer, father, and husband—comes from his ability to establish genuine connections with almost anyone. In Face to Face, he takes you around the world and behind the scenes of some of his most iconic movies and television shows, like A Beautiful Mind, Empire, Arrested Development, American Gangster, and 8 Mile, to show just how much in-person encounters have revolutionized his life—and how they have the power to change yours. With his flair for intriguing stories, Grazer reveals what he’s learned through interactions with people like Bill Gates, Taraji P. Henson, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Eminem, Prince, Spike Lee, and the Afghani rapper activist Sonita: that the secret to a bigger life lies in personal connection. In a world where our attention is too often focused downward at our devices, Grazer argues that we are missing an essential piece of the human experience. Only when we are face to face, able to look one another in the eyes, can we form the kinds of connections that expand our world views, deepen our self-awareness, and ultimately lead to our greatest achievements and most meaningful moments. When we lift our eyes to look at the person in front of us, we open the door to infinite possibility.

Download or read book American Epics written by Austen Barron Bailly and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2015-05-12 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This generously illustrated book explores the connections between Thomas Hart Benton’s art and Hollywood movies from groundbreaking perspectives. Thomas Hart Benton was a thoroughly American artist. His regionally focused paintings and murals depicted everyday American life as well as the country’s history. This volume focuses on one of the most American of Benton’s associations: Hollywood. Not only did Benton create commissioned murals and portraits of film stars and movies, but he also developed a style that was highly theatrical and narrative. This volume is the first to collect all the works conceived by Benton for the film industry. It includes related ephemera, photographs, and documents of Benton at work, along with a series of thought-provoking essays that explore a diverse array of topics—from Benton’s engagement with American identity from the 1920s to the 1960s, to parallels between Benton’s use of Old Master methods and film production techniques. Fans of Thomas Hart Benton will find surprising insights into his career, while those fascinated by Hollywood history will discover how one of America’s most revered artists shaped and was in turn influenced by the film industry.

Download or read book What Just Happened written by Art Linson and published by Grove Press. This book was released on 2008-10-03 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Producer Linson gives readers a brutally honest, funny, and comprehensive tour through the horrors of Hollywood, from script to screen.

Download or read book Mighty Movies written by Lawrence Bassoff and published by Lawrence Bassoff Collection. This book was released on 2000 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The splendour, savagery and spectacle of the screen epics that staggered the world! Mighty Movies chronicles the age of the classic Hollywood blockbuster (1932--1970) by presenting and evaluating 200 authentic movie posters, lobby cards, and related memorabilia items from 100 film examples. A special appendix features an additional movie poster retrospective of the muscleman-driven 'sword and sandal' costume spectacles produced in Europe from 1957 to 1965. Originally displayed in movie theatres, these rare, ravishing, and valuable movie posters and lobby cards also illustrate the in-house movie poster styles and printing processes utilised by the major Hollywood studios of the day.