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Great Books on Films / Actors / Directors, etc.

Started by Small Man Big Horse, December 26, 2021, 11:46:33 AM

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Small Man Big Horse

I was fortunate enough to get a fair amount of Amazon Gift vouchers for Christmas, so wondered if anyone had any recommendations? The following are the ones that I've read and would recommend:

You'll Never Eat Lunch In This Town Again by Julia Phillips - Very gossipy, but a fun, enjoyable read.

Adventures in the Screen Trade / Which Lie Did I Tell / Hype and Glory by William Goldman, all fascinating insights in to how films (sometimes) get made.

If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B Movie Actor by Bruce Campbell - Bit of a cheat as I'm only 100 pages in, but I'm really loving this a lot.

This Is Orson Welles by Orson Welles and Peter Bogdanovich - Possibly all a bunch of made up tales, but incredibly entertaining stuff.

Lynch on Lynch / Cronenberg On Cronberg / Scorsese On Scorsese etc, etc, - Read quite a few of these and always found them a great read.

With Nails by Richard E. Grant - Read it well over twenty years ago and don't remember much, but have a feeling I liked it.

My Indecision is Final: The Rise and Fall of Goldcrest Films by Jake Eberts and Terry Ilott - Fascinating examination of how a film studio went bankrupt.

The Disaster Artist by Greg Sestero and Tom Bissell - The making of The Room, it's a bit too whiny in places but fascinating in others.

I've probably forgotten some really great ones too, but anyhow, yeah, if anyone has any recommendations it'd be enormously appreciated.

McChesney Duntz

I'm a big fan of Art Linson's pair of books about being a producer in Hollywood (and dealing with, let's say, mercurial figures from Hunter S. Thompson to Alec Baldwin), A Pound of Flesh and What Just Happened (the latter of which was made into an underrated film).

Robert Evans' The Kid Stays in the Picture is, of course, a blast. Though definitely best in audiobook form. But you can just read the whole thing with the voice of Bob Odenkirk in the "God's Autobiography" sketch in your head for the same effect.

The recent books on Dazed and Confused (Alright, Alright, Alright), Chinatown (The Big Goodbye) and Midnight Cowboy (Shooting Midnight Cowboy) are all fine reads as well.
 

Magnum Valentino

Yeah the Dazed and Confused book is probably the best moviemaking book I've read.


SweetPomPom

Kevin Brownlow's David Lean book is the nuts - loads of access as he was originally working with Lean on his autobio.

Niven's The Moon's a Balloon and Bring On The Dancing Horses are both staples.

SweetPomPom

Taschen's Bond and Kubrick archives are also worth getting and reasonably affordable.They've also knocked their Star Wars and Hitchcock archives down to budget hardback editions.

touchingcloth

Future Noir - Paul M Sammon's book about the making of Blade Runner is a good read if you like Blade Runner.

SweetPomPom

One more - Room To Dream which is a kind of David Lynch biography but with him alternating chapters with another author - she goes first with a chapter and then he follows with his memories of same period.

Magnum Valentino

The book about the making of the Wicker Man is brilliant as well.

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: McChesney Duntz on December 26, 2021, 04:48:01 PMI'm a big fan of Art Linson's pair of books about being a producer in Hollywood (and dealing with, let's say, mercurial figures from Hunter S. Thompson to Alec Baldwin), A Pound of Flesh and What Just Happened (the latter of which was made into an underrated film).

Robert Evans' The Kid Stays in the Picture is, of course, a blast. Though definitely best in audiobook form. But you can just read the whole thing with the voice of Bob Odenkirk in the "God's Autobiography" sketch in your head for the same effect.

The recent books on Dazed and Confused (Alright, Alright, Alright), Chinatown (The Big Goodbye) and Midnight Cowboy (Shooting Midnight Cowboy) are all fine reads as well.

Thanks for the recommendations - I've read The Kid Stays In The Picture but had completely forgotten about it until now, but it was indeed superb - and I'll definitely look in to the Art Linson, Dazed and Confused and David Lynch books.

Quote from: Magnum Valentino on December 26, 2021, 07:01:57 PMThe book about the making of the Wicker Man is brilliant as well.

I'll definitely get that if I can, as I've been a big fan of the film for a long old time now.

zomgmouse

the script of Do the Right Thing which also contains a whole bunch of behind the scenes info and interviews and the like

depending on your inclination there are also a lot of films about filmmaking by e.g. Alexander Mackendrick, Sidney Lumet, etc.

Magnum Valentino

Roger Moore's diary on the Live And Let Die set was recently reprinted and is quite fucking funny and a very interesting account of someone becoming a megastar talking about the making of a film on a number of levels.

Small Man Big Horse

I've finished If Chins Could Kill now, with the second half disappointing me a little, here's the review I wrote for elsewhere:

Bit of an odd one this, as I really liked the first half an awful lot as it recounts Bruce's early years in a brief manner, than devotes a lot of time to the super-8 films he made with Sam Raimi, and then the making of the first Evil Dead movie. After that he speeds through the rest of his career a little too quickly, ignoring some projects completely, and slowing down again whenever it's a tv show he starred in, and though he insists over and over again he's just like us and not a movie star, some of the stories are a little patronising and despite his protestations he comes across as egotistical in places. Newer versions of the book have an extra forty pages about the pr tour publicising it, and only about ten of these are any good, I have an annoying brain which forced me to read all of it but unless you want to read a huge amount of words concerning Bruce's opinions on handshakes, or descriptions of the weather during the tour, it's not of any value. 3.75/5 (though if he'd only written about his career up to the early nineties it would have been a 4.5/5 rating)

While I was still reading the first half I liked it so much I ordered "Make Love! The Bruce Campbell Way" but now feel a lot less enthusiastic about reading it, has anyone done so, and if so was it any good?

studpuppet

These are the ones that have stayed on my shelves while other books have been moved on.

Heaven & Hell To Play With by Preston Neal Jones (the making of Night Of The Hunter)

Nightmare Of Ecstasy by Rudolph Grey (Edward Wood Jr. biography)

+1 for the Taschen Bond Archives and also Charles Helfenstein's The Making Of On Her Majesty's Secret Service

The Making Of David Lean's Lawrence Of Arabia by Adrian Turner

Performance by Mick Brown

Egyptian Feast

Mention of the excellent Rudolph Grey Ed Wood bio reminded me of another book that's been sat next to it on my bookshelf for 20+ years. Roger Corman's How I Made 100 Movies In Hollywood And Never Lost A Dime is a fascinating and inspiring read, packed full of low-budget anecdotes and cameos from future stars.

beanheadmcginty

Mr. T's autobiography "The Man With The Gold" is an eye-opener. He's done some remarkable things.

Magnum Valentino

John Carpenter: The Prince Of Darkness is an excellent book-length interview but appears to have become very hard to find. It's a shame if they can't keep these sorts of books in print they can't at least make them available digitally. Transcribe it once and that's it done forever.

Shit Good Nose

Quote from: Magnum Valentino on December 26, 2021, 11:51:54 PMRoger Moore's diary on the Live And Let Die set was recently reprinted and is quite fucking funny and a very interesting account of someone becoming a megastar talking about the making of a film on a number of levels.

A big second for this - one of my favourite on-set books.  Moore had a genuine funny bone (also cf. his cameo in Curse of the Pink Panther, which is the only good bit of the film).


I'd like to add:
The Jaws Log;
Jaws 2 Log - started out life as a local newspaper reporter who was only supposed to be on set for a day to write a short inner-page filler piece, and he ended up staying on for the entire shoot (but good luck finding it for a sensible price - LONG overdue a reprint);
Spielberg, Truffaut and Me;
Something To Do With Death (and, by association, Once Upon A Time In The West: Shooting A Masterpiece);
Mark Kermode's book about The Exorcist (also, if you quite like Kermode, The Good The Bad and The Multiplex. His other two books - It's Only A Movie and Hatchet Job are okay as well, but not as engaging);
Most - not all, but most - of the stuff Creation Books released in the 90s and early 00s are good reads too, covering genre and transgressive cinema (plus Creation Books is a fascinating story in itself - some say it was a front for massive financial fraud)

Rev+

Quote from: SweetPomPom on December 26, 2021, 06:37:36 PMOne more - Room To Dream which is a kind of David Lynch biography but with him alternating chapters with another author - she goes first with a chapter and then he follows with his memories of same period.

Definitely seconding this one.  It's very much more about the person rather than his work, and the structure of it means that you can almost feel him pacing the room and composing his rebuttal while you're reading the straight biographical bits.  It's also one of those books that you feel must be entirely honest, because it paints a picture of him as something of a dick, yet he signed off on it.

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Magnum Valentino on December 26, 2021, 11:51:54 PMRoger Moore's diary on the Live And Let Die set was recently reprinted and is quite fucking funny and a very interesting account of someone becoming a megastar talking about the making of a film on a number of levels.

Quote from: Shit Good Nose on January 12, 2022, 11:18:08 PMA big second for this - one of my favourite on-set books.  Moore had a genuine funny bone (also cf. his cameo in Curse of the Pink Panther, which is the only good bit of the film).

Thanks to both of you for the recommendation, I've just ordered this now as it definitely sounds like my cup of tea, plus it was under a fiver so appealed to the cheapskate in me.

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Small Man Big Horse on January 13, 2022, 09:18:24 AMThanks to both of you for the recommendation, I've just ordered this now as it definitely sounds like my cup of tea, plus it was under a fiver so appealed to the cheapskate in me.

And I just finished it tonight, it was a fast but very fun read, and I'd agree with both of you that it's really funny, but also a fascinating insight in to how they made the film, and how dangerous it was too, I'm planning on watching Live And Let Die tomorrow and am really looking forward to it now and I'm not normally that big of a Bond fan.