At the Movies

For being a summer full of expected blockbuster hits, the box office returns have been somewhat subdued this season. Except, of course, for some notable exceptions -- like Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which is only the eighth movie of all time to cross the billion dollar mark at the worldwide box office. And of course there's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, which drew in nearly $170 million in the U.S. alone just in its opening weekend (setting a new record for biggest opening weekend ever).

It's made for a strange summer of huge hits and big misses (anybody go see Green Lantern? I didn't think so). But even if this latest offering of blockbuster hopefuls isn't your cup of tea, the summer season can still be a great time to explore the world of cinema. We've got a fabulous, ever-growing DVD collection at MPL (check out some of our latest additions here) -- and we've also got some great materials on the culture and people of the motion picture industry. From directors and producers' interviews and memoirs, to genre critiques and movie reviews, there's lots of great ways to take a behind-the-scenes look at the making of motion pictures.

So if you consider yourself a movie buff or cinephile, check out these DVDs and great reads on the production, history, and culture of the movies. Enjoy the show!

Films

• Reel Bad Arabs [videorecording] : How Hollywood Vilifies a People
  "A devastating tour of the American cinematic landscape, moving from the earliest days of silent film to today's biggest Hollywood blockbusters, to reveal an astonishing and persistent pattern of slanderous Arab stereotyping." --Container.
• Beyond Wiseguys [videorecording] : Italian Americans and the Movies
  Using interviews, film clips, and home movies, this documentary shows the history of portrayals of Italian Americans in film, especially how those depictions moved beyond the gangster stereotype.

Books

• Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People, by Jack G. Shaheen. [non-fiction]
• My First Movie, Take Two: Ten Celebrated Directors Talk About Their First Film: Richard Linklater, Richard Kelly, Alejandro González Iñárritu, Takeshi Kitano, Shekhar Kapur, Emir Kusturica, Agnès Jaoui, Lukas Moodysson, Terry Gilliam, Sam Mendes, edited by Stephen Lowenstein. [non-fiction]
• Directors Close Up: Interviews With Directors Nominated for Best Film by the Directors Guild of America, moderated and edited by Jeremy Kagan. [non-fiction]
• Why We Make Movies: Black Filmmakers Talk About the Magic of Cinema, by George Alexander. [non-fiction]
• Goodbye Cinema, Hello Cinephilia: Film Culture in Transition, by Jonathan Rosenbaum. [non-fiction]
  "The esteemed film critic Jonathan Rosenbaum has brought global cinema to American audiences for the last four decades. His incisive writings on individual filmmakers define film culture as a diverse and ever-evolving practice, unpredictable yet subject to analyses just as diversified as his own discriminating tastes. For Rosenbaum, there is no high or low cinema, only more interesting or less interesting films, and the pieces collected here -- from an appreciation of Marilyn Monroe’s intelligence to a classic discussion on and with Jean-Luc Godard -- amply testify to his broad intellect and multi-faceted talent. Goodbye Cinema, Hello Cinephilia gathers together over fifty examples of Rosenbaum’s criticism from the past four decades, each of which demonstrates his passion for the way we view movies, as well as how we write about them." --Product Description
• My Year of Flops: The A.V. Club Presents One Man's Journey Deep Into the Heart of Cinematic Failure, by Nathan Rabin. [non-fiction]
  "In 2007, Nathan Rabin set out to provide a revisionist look at the history of cinematic failure on a weekly basis. What began as a solitary ramble through the nooks and crannies of pop culture evolved into a way of life. My Year Of Flops collects dozens of the best-loved entries from the A.V. Club column along with bonus interviews and fifteen brand-new entries covering everything from notorious flops like The Cable Guy and Last Action Hero to bizarre obscurities like Glory Road, Johnny Cash’s poignantly homemade tribute to Jesus. Driven by a unique combination of sympathy and Schadenfreude, My Year Of Flops is an unforgettable tribute to cinematic losers, beautiful and otherwise." --Product Description
• Fifth Avenue, 5 a.m. : Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and the Dawn of the Modern Woman , by Sam Wasson. [non-fiction]
• When I Stop Talking, You'll Know I'm Dead: Useful Stories From a Persuasive Man, by Jerry Weintraub, with Rich Cohen. [non-fiction]
  Autobiography of the producer (and "Hollywood power player") Weintraub.
• He Was Some Kind of a Man: Masculinities in the B Western, by Roderick McGillis. [non-fiction]

-- Post by Ms. B