This revised, updated edition offers screenwriting basics, a workbook covering the writing process from ideas to revisions, correct formats for screenplays and TV scripts, a spec writing guide and a sales and marketing guide. There is a resource guide of addresses and contacts.

The screenplay of the award-winning film Secrets and Lies which centres around a young black Londoner's search for her biological mother, who turns out to be a depressed, unmarried white woman. The climactic lunch party exposes skeletons in the family closet and leaves the characters shattered, but renewed.

Evaluates twenty-six film school programs in the United States, offers tips on the application and admission process, and includes comments from students and faculty.

In the grand tradition of Strunk and White's Elements of Style, Paul Argentini presents an essential reference masterpiece in screenwriting. He provides clear and concise principles of screenplay formatting structure, as well as stylistic advice. Argentini explains how to design and format manuscripts to impress any film school professor, story editor, agent, producer or studio executive. No book in shorter space, with fewer words, will help screenwriters more than this persistent volume.

A Quick Guide to Film Directing provides the reader with a concise and comprehensive overview of this creative and exciting occupation. Written in a fast-paced, easy-to-understand fashion, the book addresses such topics as what film direction is; the history of the profession; how to become a director; the creative and practical duties and challenges of a film director in the three stages of making a movie (preproduction, production, and postproduction); working with actors; working with the members of the technical crew (cinematographers, editors, production designers, etc.); the director's support team (assistant director, production manager, and so on); and the business of being a film director. It also offers a brief look at some of the greatest and most influential film directors in the history of the cinema.

Roman Polanski towers over modern Hollywood, and is responsible for some of the 20th century's most significant films. This retrospective look at Polanski considers the influences which have shaped his life and his development as a director, illustrating the skills which have enabled him to tackle varied subjects with unerring success.

Bestselling author Roy Blount Jr. tells the story of theclassic Marx Brothers wartime satire Duck Soup. As always, Blount isinformed yet informal, tongue-in-cheek yet tempered, providing the perfectvoice to recount the irreverent antics of Harpo, Chico, Groucho, and Zeppo. Readers of HarpoSpeaks, The Essential Groucho, and Monkey Business and fans of Animal Crackers, A Night at the Opera and the Marx Brothers' other timelesscomedies--as well as all fans of Blount's witty and insightful books like Alphabet Juice and Feet on the Street and listeners to NPR's weekly news quiz, Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me--will becaptivated by the lyrical humorist's compelling, behind-the-scenes storytellingof the 1933 classic film.

The insider's guide and perfect companion to the new film starring Harvey Keitel, Mira Sorvino, and Vanessa Redgrave.Stunning and surreal, Lulu on the Bridge is a romantic mystery with a lot on its mind. It is the story of Izzy and Celia, two lonely, wounded, and mismatched strangers, transformed into soul mates by the uncanny powers of a phosphorescent stone. Destiny, as well as some bizarre and near-tragic circumstances, conspire to keep the lovers apart. But the audience and reader are privy to a grand and surprising finale that explains all. Thought-provoking, intriguing, and utterly romantic, Lulu on the Bridge offers a lyrical meditation on what distinguishes chance from fate, reality from illusion, and life from death. Following on the success of the screenplay cornpanion to Smoke and Blue in the Face, this book contains the shooting script; an interview with Paul Auster by Rebecca Prime; interviews with the producer, costume designer, editor, director of photography, and production designer; and stills from the film.

This is the only screenwriting guide by two guys who have actually done it (instead of some schmuck who just gives lectures about screenwriting at the airport Marriott); "These guys are proof that with no training and little education, ANYONE can make it as a screenwriter" (Paul Rudd).

Shot by Shot is the world's go-to directing book, now newly updated for a special 25th Anniversary edition The first edition sold over 250,000 copies, making it one of the bestselling books on film di-recting of all time. Aspiring directors, cinematographers, editors, and producers, many of whom are now working professionals, learned the craft of visual storytelling from Shot by Shot, the most com-plete source for preplanning the look of a movie. The book contains over 800 photos and illustrations, and is by far the most comprehensive look at shot design in print, containing storyboards from movies such as Citizen Kane, Blade Runner, Dead-pool, and Moonrise Kingdom. Also introduced is the concept of A, I, and L patterns as a way to sim-plify the hundreds of staging choices facing a director in every scene. Shot by Shot uniquely blends story analysis with compositional strategies, citing examples then il-lustrated with the storyboards used for the actual films. Throughout the book, various visual ap-proaches to short scenes are shown, exposing the directing processes of our most celebrated au-teurs -- including a meticulous, lavishly illustrated analysis of Steven Spielberg's scene design for Empire of the Sun.