Most Tim Burton films are huge box-office successes, and several are already classics. The director's mysterious and eccentric public persona attracts a lot of attention, while the films themselves have been somewhat overlooked. Here, Alison McMahan redresses this imbalance through a close analysis of Burton's key films (Beetiejuice, Ed Wood, Batman, Edward Scissorhands, Sleepy Hollow) and their place within the filmmaking industry. She argues that Burton has been a crucial figure behind many of the transformations taking place in horror, fantasy, and science fiction films over the last two decades. McMahan also demonstrates how Burton's own work draws on a huge range of artistic influences: the films of Georges Melies, surrealism, installation art, computer games, and many more. The Films of Tim Burton is the most in-depth analysis so far of the work of this unusual filmmaker - a director who has shown repeatedly that it is possible to reject mainstream Hollywood contentions while maintaining critical popularity and commercial success.

Alice Guy Blach (1873-1968), the world's first woman filmmaker, was one of the key figures in the development of narrative film From 1896 to 1920 she directed 400 films (including over 100 synchronized sound films), produced hundreds more, and was the first - and so far the only - woman to own and run her own studio plant (The Solax Studio in Fort Lee, NJ, 1910-1914). However, her role in film history was completely forgotten until her memoirs were published in 1976. This book tells her life story and fills in many gaps left by the memoirs. Guy Blach's life and career mirrored momentous changes in the film industry, and the long time-span and sheer volume of her output makes her films a fertile territory for the application of new theories of cinema history, the development of film narrative, and feminist film theory. The book provides a close analysis of the one hundred Guy Blach films that survive, and in the process rewrites early cinema history.

This book celebrates the achievements of Alice Guy Blache (1873-1968), the first woman motion picture director and producer. From 1896 to 1907, she created films for Gaumont in Paris. In 1907, she moved to the United States and established her own film company, Solax. From 1914 to 1920, Guy Blache was an independent director for a number of film companies. Despite her immensely productive and creative career, Guy Blache's indispensable contribution to film history has been overlooked. She entered the world of filmmaking at its nascent stage, when films were seen primarily as a medium in the service of science or as an adjunct to selling cameras. Working with Gaumont cameramen and cameras and the new technical advances for the projection of film, she became one of the film pioneers ushering in the new era of motion pictures as a narrative form. Written by cinema history experts and curators, this handsome volume brings to light a critical new mass of Guy Blache's film oeuvre in an effort to restore her to her rightful place in film history. Published in association with the Whitney Museum of American Art Exhibition Schedule: Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (11/6/09 - 1/24/10)