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Before the sun rises, an artist and her daughter slip out of their cottage into the morning air to explore and record the treasures of their North Carolina barrier island. They sketch, paint, and observe the sights around them and as night falls they return to their cottage, bringing back pieces of their island home to compile this scrapbook of a special time and place.
Today, the director is considered the leading artistic force behind
a film. The production of a Hollywood movie requires the labor of
many people, from screenwriters and editors to cinematographers and
boom operators, but the director as author of the film overshadows
them all. How did this concept of the director become so deeply
ingrained in our understanding of cinema? In Hollywood's Artists,
Virginia Wright Wexman offers a groundbreaking history of how movie
directors became cinematic auteurs that reveals and pinpoints the
influence of the Directors Guild of America (DGA). Guided by Frank
Capra's mantra "one man, one film," the Guild has portrayed its
director-members as the creators responsible for turning Hollywood
entertainment into cinematic art. Wexman details how the DGA
differentiated itself from other industry unions, focusing on
issues of status and creative control as opposed to
bread-and-butter concerns like wages and working conditions. She
also traces the Guild's struggle for creative and legal power,
exploring subjects from the language of on-screen credits to the
House Un-American Activities Committee's investigations of the
movie industry. Wexman emphasizes the gendered nature of images of
the great director, demonstrating how the DGA promoted the idea of
the director as a masculine hero. Drawing on a broad array of
archival sources, interviews, and theoretical and sociological
insight, Hollywood's Artists sheds new light on the ways in which
the Directors Guild of America has shaped the role and image of
directors both within the Hollywood system and in the culture at
large.
Today, the director is considered the leading artistic force behind
a film. The production of a Hollywood movie requires the labor of
many people, from screenwriters and editors to cinematographers and
boom operators, but the director as author of the film overshadows
them all. How did this concept of the director become so deeply
ingrained in our understanding of cinema? In Hollywood's Artists,
Virginia Wright Wexman offers a groundbreaking history of how movie
directors became cinematic auteurs that reveals and pinpoints the
influence of the Directors Guild of America (DGA). Guided by Frank
Capra's mantra "one man, one film," the Guild has portrayed its
director-members as the creators responsible for turning Hollywood
entertainment into cinematic art. Wexman details how the DGA
differentiated itself from other industry unions, focusing on
issues of status and creative control as opposed to
bread-and-butter concerns like wages and working conditions. She
also traces the Guild's struggle for creative and legal power,
exploring subjects from the language of on-screen credits to the
House Un-American Activities Committee's investigations of the
movie industry. Wexman emphasizes the gendered nature of images of
the great director, demonstrating how the DGA promoted the idea of
the director as a masculine hero. Drawing on a broad array of
archival sources, interviews, and theoretical and sociological
insight, Hollywood's Artists sheds new light on the ways in which
the Directors Guild of America has shaped the role and image of
directors both within the Hollywood system and in the culture at
large.
Who decides how, when, and where Americans fall in love and get
married? Virginia Wexman's acute observations about movie stars and
acting techniques show that Hollywood has often had the most
powerful voice in demonstrating socially sanctioned ways of
becoming a couple. Until now serious film critics have paid little
attention to the impact of performance styles on American romance,
and have often treated "patriarchy," "sexuality," and the "couple"
as monolithic and unproblematic concepts. Wexman, however, shows
how these notions have been periodically transformed in close
association with the appearance, behavior, and persona of the stars
of films such as "The Maltese Falcon," "The Big Sleep," "Way Down
East," "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance," "Sunset Boulevard," "On
the Waterfront," "Nashville," "House of Games," and "Do the Right
Thing."
The author focuses first on the way in which traditional
marriage norms relate to authorship (the Griffith-Gish
collaboration) and genre (John Wayne and the Western). Looking at
male and female stardom in terms of the development of
"companionate marriage," she discusses the love goddess and the
impact of method acting on Hollywood's ideals of maleness. Finally
she considers the recent breakdown of the ideal of monogamous
marriage in relation to Hollywood's experimentation with
self-reflexive acting styles. "Creating the Couple" is must reading
for film scholars and enthusiasts, and it will fascinate everyone
interested in the changing relationships of men and women in modern
culture.
In outstanding films that are sharply focused on unusual women
Jane Campion has gained worldwide admiration and respect. This New
Zealand director first attracted international attention with her
1989 film "Sweetie," an acerbic study of two sisters in a wildly
dysfunctional family. She followed this in 1990 with the television
miniseries "An Angel at My Table," based on the autobiography of
New Zealand author Janet Frame. Subsequently released in theatres,
the film chronicles the early trials of the young writer. Poor,
timid, and physically awkward, Frame was misdiagnosed as
schizophrenic and was scheduled for a lobotomy, but her success as
a writer enabled her to escape this fate and won her fame and
acceptance. In 1993 in yet another story about an extraordinary
woman, Campion made the award-winning film "The Piano." It starred
Holly Hunter as the Victorian mail-order bride who refuses to
speak. Arriving in New Zealand with her young daughter, the young
Scottish widow confronts isolation in the wilderness and
communicates only via her piano until she finds real love in her
husband's neighbor, played by Harvey Keitel. Campion next adapted
Henry James's "The Portrait of a Lady," starring Nicole Kidman as
Isabel Archer, a young American heiress seduced by a decadent pair
of expatriates living in Italy.
In this collection of interviews Campion speaks of these films
that have given women a revival as a strong screen presence.
Campion tells of her early life in Wellington and of her training
as a filmmaker in the 1980s at the Australian School of Film and
Television. She speaks of those who have influenced her style and
her experiences in making movies.
Campion received the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay
in 1993 and was the first woman director to win the Palme d'Or at
Cannes.
Virginia Wright Wexman, a professor of English and Associate
Vice-Chancellor of Academic Affairs at University of Illinois,
Chicago, has published "Creating the Couple," "Roman Polanski," and
"Letter from an Unknown Woman," as well as articles in "Film
Quarterly" and "Cinema Journal."
Mikey loves everything about Christmas except one thing--deciding
what gift he wants. As Christmas nears he frantically flips the
pages of his mother's department store catalogs, looking for a toy
that he wants most. Turning to his best friend Charlie for ideas,
he finally finds the answer. But will he get what he wants this
year? The Christmas Secret is an inspiring Christmas story written
in a tone reminiscent of Christmas past--recommend for children and
adults alike
Join this very adventurous little bear cub, as she wanders too far
from the den in the snow covered mountains of Maine.
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