Standing apart from celebrated Iranian ideals of war and martyrdom, revolutionary filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami was known as a man who praised life and celebrated it in all his works. Creating films for more than 40 years during times of unending war and political turmoil, Kiarostami promoted the Sufi tradition of seeing God as part of nature and the pre-Islamic Zoroastrian ideal of environmental protection. Kiarostami's self-image as a citizen of the world, his renunciation of war, and his concern for the future of nature cement his importance within the art form of poetic cinema. Addressing Kiarostami's illumination of humanity's self-destructive tendencies, author Julian Rice presents a detailed analysis of twelve individual films, from Homework (1989) to Like Someone in Love (2012). Departing from concerns of spectatorship or film in general, Rice's book portrays the human and spiritual core of Kiarostami. Connected to all other humans and to the earth we all inhabit, Kiarostami's vision remains a powerful message for film scholars and peaceful people everywhere.

Since the early 1980s, Jim Jarmusch has produced a handful of idiosyncratic films that have established him as one of the most imaginatively allusive directors in the history of American cinema. Three of his films-Dead Man (1995), Ghost Dog (1999), and The Limits of Control (2009)-demonstrate the director's unique take on Eastern and Aboriginal spirituality. In particular, they reflect Jarmusch's rejection of Western monotheism's fear-driven separation of life and death. While these films address historical issues of imperialism, colonialism, and genocide, they also demonstrate a uniquely spiritual form of resistance to conditions that political solutions have not resolved. The impact of Dead Man, Ghost Dog, and The Limits of Control cannot be fully felt without considering the multicultural sources from which the writer/director drew. In The Jarmusch Way, Julian Rice looks closely at these three films and explores their relation to Eastern philosophy and particular works of Western literature, painting, and cinema. This book also delves deeply into the films' association with Native American culture, a subject upon which Rice has written extensively. Though he has garnered a passionate following in some circles, Jarmusch remains critically underappreciated. Making a case that this director deserves far more serious attention than he has received thus far, The Jarmusch Way thoroughly discusses three of his most intriguing films.

In 1963 Stanley Kubrick declared, "Dr. Strangelove came from my desire to do something about the nuclear nightmare." Thirty years later, he was preparing to film another story about the human impulse for self-destruction. Unfortunately, the director passed away in 1999, before his project could be fully realized. However, fellow visionary Steven Spielberg took on the venture, and A.I. Artificial Intelligence debuted in theaters two years after Kubrick's death. While Kubrick's concept shares similarities with the finished film, there are significant differences between his screenplay and Spielberg's production. In Kubrick's Story, Spielberg's Film: A.I. Artificial Intelligence, Julian Rice examines the intellectual sources and cinematic processes that expressed the extraordinary ideas of one great artist through the distinctive vision of another. A.I. is decidedly a Kubrick film in its concern for the future of the world, and it is both a Kubrick and a Spielberg film in the alienation of its central character. However, Spielberg's alienated characters evolve through friendships, while Kubrick's protagonists are markedly alone. Rice explores how the directors' disparate sensibilities aligned and where they diverged. By analyzing Kubrick's treatment and Spielberg's finished film, Rice compares the imaginations of two gifted but very different filmmakers and draws conclusions about their unique conceptions. Kubrick's Story, Spielberg's Film is a fascinating look into the creative process of two of cinema's most profound auteurs and will appeal to scholars of film as well as to fans of both directors.

Standing apart from celebrated Iranian ideals of war and martyrdom, revolutionary filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami was known as a man who praised life and celebrated it in all his works. Creating films for more than 40 years during times of unending war and political turmoil, Kiarostami promoted the Sufi tradition of seeing God as part of nature and the pre-Islamic Zoroastrian ideal of environmental protection. Kiarostami's self-image as a citizen of the world, his renunciation of war, and his concern for the future of nature cement his importance within the art form of poetic cinema. Addressing Kiarostami's illumination of humanity's self-destructive tendencies, author Julian Rice presents a detailed analysis of twelve individual films, from Homework (1989) to Like Someone in Love (2012). Departing from concerns of spectatorship or film in general, Rice's book portrays the human and spiritual core of Kiarostami. Connected to all other humans and to the earth we all inhabit, Kiarostami's vision remains a powerful message for film scholars and peaceful people everywhere.