In this book, film scholars, anthropologists, and critics discuss star-making in the contemporary Hindi-language film industry in India, also known as "Bollywood." Drawing on theories of stardom, globalization, transnationalism, gender, and new media studies, the chapters explore contemporary Hindi film celebrity. With the rise of social media and India's increased engagement in the global economy, Hindi film stars are forging their identities not just through their on-screen images and magazine and advertising appearances, but also through an array of media platforms, product endorsements, setting fashion trends, and involvement in social causes. Focusing on some of the best-known Indian stars since the late 1990s, the book discusses the multiplying avenues for forging a star identity, the strategies industry outsiders adopt to become stars, and the contradictions and conflicts that such star-making produces. It addresses questions such as: What traits of contemporary stars have contributed most to longevity and success in the industry? How has filmmaking technology and practice altered the nature of stardom? How has the manufacture of celebrity altered with the recent appearance of commodity culture in India and the rise of a hyper-connected global economy? By doing so, it describes a distinct moment in India and in the world in which stars and stardom are drawn more closely than ever into the vital events of global culture. Hindi films and their stars are part of the national and global entertainment circuits that are bigger and more competitive than ever. As such, this is a timely book creates opportunities for examining stardom in other industries and provides fruitful cross-cultural perspectives on star identities today. "Grounded in rigorous scholarship as well as a palpable love of Hindi cinema, this collection of 19 essays on a dizzying array of contemporary Hindi film stars makes for an informative, thought-provoking, illuminating, and most of all, a joyful read. Pushing boundaries of not only global Star Studies but also film theory as a whole, this de-colonised and de-colonising volume is a must read for film scholars, students and cinephiles!" Dr. Sunny Singh, Senior Lecturer - Creative Writing and English Literature, Sir John Cass School of Art, Architecture & Design, London Metropolitan University "A wide-ranging overview of Hindi cinema's filmi firmament today, focussing on its most intriguing and brightest-burning stars. The variety of approaches to stardom and celebrity by both established and upcoming scholars reveals a web of interconnecting stories and concerns that provide fascinating new insights into the workings of today's Hindi film industry, while shining fresh light on contemporary India and the world we live in." Professor Rosie Thomas, Centre for Research and Education in Arts and Media (CREAM), College of Design, Creative and Digital Industries, University of Westminster

A retelling of Disney Frozen, accompanied by art from the original Disney Studio artists. Collect the whole Animated Classics series! This beautiful hardback features premium sparkling cloth binding, a ribbon marker to match the cover, foil stamping and illustrated endpapers, making this the perfect gift for all those who have been enchanted by the magic of Frozen and a book to be treasured by all. A family favourite, Disney Frozen is one of the best-loved films of all time. Relive the magic through this retelling of the classic animated film, accompanied by paintings, story sketches and concept art from the original Disney Studio artists. Also featured is a foreword by a Lisa Keene, a co-production designer at the Walt Disney Animation Studios. Turn to the back of the book to learn more about the artists who worked on this iconic animated film.

The Dark Crystal Bestiary is the definitive in-depth exploration of the flora and fauna found in the world of Thra. Created by Jim Henson for his 1982 puppet masterpiece, Thra is a remarkable realm in which all living things are connected and the lines between animal, vegetable, and mineral are blurred-rocks can sing and trees can walk! For the first time, this deluxe volume delves into the many creatures, plants, and beings created for the Dark Crystal universe, from the original film through to the expanded universe of novels and comics, and Netflix's TV series The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance. Filled with beautiful illustrations of the many specimens, each accompanied by in-world commentary on their unique biology, The Dark Crystal Bestiary is the ultimate guide to the world of Thra and its inhabitants.

Let your creativity soar with Totoro!

Celebrated for being one of the best hand-drawn films in the history of animation, My Neighbor Totoro is a true inspiration. This luxe hardcover sketchbook is a must-have for Totoro fans.

• Cloth case with a foil stamping of Totoro on the cover
• Lay-flat binding for ease of writing or drawing
• Extra-thick blank pages are perfect for sketching—no ghosting or show-through
• 7 x 9 inches, 128 pages—a great size for all types of creative work
• A great gift or self-purchase for Studio Ghibli and animation fans; collectors; artists; and anyone who owns other My Neighbor Totoro products or loves cute Japanese art, stationery, and pop culture

Providing a detailed historical overview of animated film and television in the United States over more than a century, this book examines animation within the U.S. film and television industry as well as in the broader sociocultural context. From the early 1900s onwards, animated cartoons have always had a wide, enthusiastic audience. Not only did viewers delight in seeing drawn images come to life, tell fantastic stories, and depict impossible gags, but animation artists also relished working in a visual art form largely free from the constraints of the real world. This book takes a fresh look at the big picture of U.S. animation, both on and behind the screen. It reveals a range of fascinating animated cartoons and the colorful personalities, technological innovations, cultural influences and political agendas, and shifting audience expectations that shaped not only what appeared on screen but also how audiences reacted to thousands of productions. Animation and the American Imagination: A Brief History presents a concise, unified picture that brings together divergent strands of the story so readers can make sense of the flow of animation history in the United States. The book emphasizes the overall shape of animation history by identifying how key developments emerged from what came before and from the culture at large. It covers the major persons and studios of the various eras; identifies important social factors, including the Great Depression, World War II, the counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s, and the struggles for civil rights and women's rights; addresses the critical role of technological and aesthetic changes; and discusses major works of animation and the responses to them. Documents the evolution of U.S. animation, from its origins in newspaper cartooning at the beginning of the 20th century to the digital creations of the late 20th century and beyond Reveals social influence on animation across history, including issues of race and gender Identifies a new preoccupation of the American public with animation and reconsiders popular animated films and TV shows in this light Discusses major figures, themes, and studios involved in the production of American animated film and television Identifies major achievements and controversies in the history of animation in the United States

The relationship of French national identity to its cinema is a well-established field. Yet so far, most studies have either taken a broad historical approach or focused on a particular director or period. Using various theoretical approaches, this book investigates an area that is--as of today--either ill or untreated by scholars: what is the relationship of film form to the historical and social reflections of a given work, whether they be overt or hidden? To answer this question, Noah McLaughlin conducts a close formal analysis of ten French war films from across the twentieth century. His subjects range from Abel Gance's 1919 J'Accuse to Jean-Pierre Jeunet's 2004 Un long dimanche de fianailles and his theoretical approaches change to best examine each one. This study builds upon the broader histories of French cinema by Alan Williams (Republic of Images) and Susan Hayward (French National Cinema). Its approaches to the intersection of cinema and history owe a particular debt to Robert Rosentstone (Film on History/History on Film). There are very few book-length studies of French films about war. A close look at French cinematic explorations of war gives us a glimpse at the evolution of French identity over the course of the 20th century. It equally illuminates the story of how that nation's cinema has spent the past hundred years growing up: from its first steps leaning upon the coffee table of older literary conventions to its current adulthood as a means of cultural expression and critical exploration. One significant challenge is that the French war film is quite different from its Anglo-American counterpart. This book works through to a useful definition. It is a kind of cinematic creation that treats through form or content real armed conflicts that have significance in French history. The genre is often hybrid in nature and frequently uses metaphor. Its subjects are most often characterized collectively and in order to understand the past, psychology is emphasized over physical violence. Its plot structure is frequently non-linear and other forms over time have developed to place modernist historiography in doubt. Increasingly sophisticated, it has attained a point where historic meditations are often seamlessly but visibly integrated into both form and content. This is an important book for people interested in film studies and French studies as well as historians and historiographers.

Once called the ""perfect example of a homeless waif"" by director Cecil B. DeMille, Junior Coghlan has been acting in movies for over 70 years. Perhaps best remembered for his role as Billy Batson in the Republic serial The Adventures of Captain Marvel, he has worked with many of the legends of Hollywood, such as Charlie Chaplin, Mickey Rooney, Jackie Cooper, and Shirley Temple. Also included are the stories of Coghlan's 23-year naval service, where he enlisted as an aviator during World War II and eventually rose to the rank of Lieutenant Commander. Included are the stories of his eight years as the naval liaison on such films as The Caine Mutiny and Mr. Roberts. A filmography traces his career.

A Kansas City Star 2008 Notable Book

Since the early days of Hollywood film, portrayals of interracial romance and of individuals of mixed racial and ethnic heritage have served to highlight and challenge fault lines within Hollywood and the nation&#8217s racial categories and borders. Mixed Race Hollywood is a pioneering compilation of essays on mixed-race romance, individuals, families, and stars in U.S. film and media culture.

Situated at the cutting-edge juncture of ethnic studies and media studies, this collection addresses early mixed-race film characters, Blaxploitation, mixed race in children&#8217s television programming, and the "outing" of mixed-race stars on the Internet, among other issues and contemporary trends in mixed-race representation. The contributors explore this history and current trends from a wide range of disciplinary perspectives in order to better understand the evolving conception of race and ethnicity in contemporary culture.

Delve behind the scenes of Oscar-winning director Guillermo del Toro's first foray into stop-motion animation with Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio: A Timeless Tale Told Anew Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio: A Timeless Tale Told Anew takes readers on an unprecedented journey into the creation of Guillermo del Toro's hit musical fantasy version of the beloved story of Pinocchio. Inspired by the art from Gris Grimly's 2002 edition of The Adventures of Pinocchio, del Toro's adaptation is a dark take on the classic fairy tale. Featuring exclusive interviews with the star-studded cast, which includes Finn Wolfhard, Christoph Waltz, Tilda Swinton, Ewan McGregor, Cate Blanchett, and more, this book showcases the creativity and effort it takes to produce a stop-motion animation film, from concept art to building the puppets to the filming process and beyond.

This book brings together nine original chapters to examine genre agency in East Asian cinema within the transnational context. It addresses several urgent and pertinent issues such as the distribution and exhibition practices of East Asian genre films, intra-regional creative flow of screen culture, and genre's creative response to censorship. The volume expands the scholarly discussion of the rich heritage and fast-changing landscape of filmmaking in East Asian cinemas. Confronting the complex interaction between genres, filmic narrative and aesthetics, film history and politics, and cross-cultural translation, this book not only reevaluates genre's role in film production, distribution, and consumption, but also tackles several under-explored areas in film studies and transnational cinema, such as the history of East Asian commercial cinema, the East Asian film industry, and cross-media and cross-market film dissemination.

No other silent film director has been so extensively studied as D. W. Griffith. However, only a small group of his more than 500 films has been the subject of a systematic analysis and the vast majority of his other works stills await proper examination. For the first time in film studies, the complete creative output of Griffith - from Professional Jealousy (1907) to The Struggle (1931) - will be explored in this multi-volume collection of contributions from an international team of leading scholars in the field.

Employing innovations in media studies, southern cultural studies, and approaches to the global South, this collection of essays examines aspects of the southern imaginary in American cinema and offers fresh insight into the evolving field of southern film studies. In their introduction, Deborah Barker and Kathryn McKee argue that the southern imaginary in film is not contained by the boundaries of geography and genre; it is not an offshoot or subgenre of mainstream American film but is integral to the history and the development of American cinema. Ranging from the silent era to the present and considering Hollywood movies, documentaries, and independent films, the contributors incorporate the latest scholarship in a range of disciplines. The volume is divided into three sections: "Rereading the South" uses new critical perspectives to reassess classic Hollywood films; "Viewing the Civil Rights South" examines changing approaches to viewing race and class in the post-civil rights era; and "Crossing Borders" considers the influence of postmodernism, postcolonialism, and media studies on recent southern films. The contributors to American Cinema and the Southern Imaginary complicate the foundational term "southern," in some places stretching the traditional boundaries of regional identification until they all but disappear and in others limning a persistent and sometimes self-conscious performance of place that intensifies its power.

Over the course of his career, legendary director Werner Herzog (b. 1942) has made almost sixty films and given more than eight hundred interviews. This collection features the best of these, focusing on all the major films, from Signs of Life and Aguirre, the Wrath of God to Grizzly Man and Cave of Forgotten Dreams. When did Herzog decide to become a filmmaker? Who are his key influences? Where does he find his peculiar themes and characters? What role does music play in his films? How does he see himself in relation to the German past and in relation to film history? And how did he ever survive the wrath of Klaus Kinski? Herzog answers these and many other questions in twenty-five interviews ranging from the 1960s to the present. Critics and fans recognized Herzog's importance as a young German filmmaker early on, but his films have attained international significance over the decades. Most of the interviews collected in this volume--some of them from Herzog's production archive and previously unpublished--appear in English for the very first time. Together, they offer an unprecedented look at Herzog's work, his career, and his public persona as it has developed and changed over time.

How phony and real were defined and undermined in late twentieth-century literature and film? The epithet 'phony' was omnipresent during the postwar period in the United States. It was an easy appellation for individuals who appeared cynically to conform to codes of behavior for social approbation or advancement. Yet Holly Golightly 'isn't a phony because she's a real phony', says her agent in Breakfast at Tiffany's. In exploring this remark, Abigail Cheever examines the ways in which social influence was thought to deform individuals in mid century American culture. How could a person both be and not be herself at the same time? The answer lies in the period's complicated attitude toward social influence. If being real means that one's performative self is in line with one's authentic self, to be a real phony is to lack an authentic self as a point of reference - to lack a self that is independent of the social world. According to Cheever, Holly Golightly 'is like a phony in that her beliefs are perfectly in accordance with social norms, but she is real insofar as those beliefs are all she has'. ""Real Phonies"" begins in the postwar period to examine the twinned phenomena of phoniness and authenticity across the second half of the twentieth century - from adolescents like Holly Golightly and Holden Caulfield to sports agents like Jerry Maguire. Countering the critical assumption that, with the emergence of postmodernity, the ideal of 'authentic self' disappeared, Cheever argues that concern with the authenticity of persons proliferated throughout the past half-century despite a significant ambiguity over what that self might look like. Cheever's analysis is structured around five key kinds of characters: adolescents, the insane, serial killers, and the figures of the assimilated Jew and the 'company man'. In particular, she finds a preoccupation in these works not so much with faked conformity but with the frightening notion of real uniformity - the notion that Holly, and others like her, could each genuinely be the same as everyone else.

Science Fiction Film develops a historical and cultural approach to the genre that moves beyond close readings of iconography and formal conventions. It explores how this increasingly influential genre has been constructed from disparate elements into a hybrid genre. Science Fiction Film goes beyond a textual exploration of these films to place them within a larger network of influences that includes studio politics and promotional discourses. The book also challenges the perceived limits of the genre - it includes a wide range of films, from canonical SF, such as Le voyage dans la lune, Star Wars and Blade Runner, to films that stretch and reshape the definition of the genre. This expansion of generic focus offers an innovative approach for students and fans of science fiction alike.