Faster and Furiouser
Author: Mark Thomas McGee
Publisher:
Published: 1996
Total Pages: 366
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKHistory of the AIP studio, famous for its cheap horror films and beach flicks.
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Ghouls, Gimmicks, and Gold
Author: Kevin Heffernan
Publisher: Duke University Press
Published: 2004-03-25
Total Pages: 333
ISBN-13: 0822385554
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Creature from the Black Lagoon, the Tingler, the Mole People—they stalked and oozed into audiences’ minds during the era that followed Boris Karloff’s Frankenstein and preceded terrors like Freddy Krueger (A Nightmare on Elm Street) and Chucky (Child’s Play). Ghouls, Gimmicks, and Gold pulls off the masks and wipes away the slime to reveal how the monsters that frightened audiences in the 1950s and 1960s—and the movies they crawled and staggered through—reflected fundamental changes in the film industry. Providing the first economic history of the horror film, Kevin Heffernan shows how the production, distribution, and exhibition of horror movies changed as the studio era gave way to the conglomeration of New Hollywood. Heffernan argues that major cultural and economic shifts in the production and reception of horror films began at the time of the 3-d film cycle of 1953–54 and ended with the 1968 adoption of the Motion Picture Association of America’s ratings system and the subsequent development of the adult horror movie—epitomized by Rosemary’s Baby. He describes how this period presented a number of daunting challenges for movie exhibitors: the high costs of technological upgrade, competition with television, declining movie attendance, and a diminishing number of annual releases from the major movie studios. He explains that the production and distribution branches of the movie industry responded to these trends by cultivating a youth audience, co-producing features with the film industries of Europe and Asia, selling films to television, and intensifying representations of sex and violence. Shining through Ghouls, Gimmicks, and Gold is the delight of the true horror movie buff, the fan thrilled to find The Brain that Wouldn’t Die on television at 3 am.
The Persistence of Whiteness
Author: Daniel Bernardi
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2007-09-12
Total Pages: 417
ISBN-13: 1135976457
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Persistence of Whiteness investigates the representation and narration of race in contemporary Hollywood cinema. Ideologies of class, ethnicity, gender, nation and sexuality are central concerns as are the growth of the business of filmmaking. Focusing on representations of Black, Asian, Jewish, Latina/o and Native Americans identities, this collection also shows how whiteness is a fact everywhere in contemporary Hollywood cinema, crossing audiences, authors, genres, studios and styles. Bringing together essays from respected film scholars, the collection covers a wide range of important films, including Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, The Color Purple, Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings. Essays also consider genres from the western to blaxploitation and new black cinema; provocative filmmakers such as Melvin Van Peebles and Steven Spielberg and stars including Whoopi Goldberg and Jennifer Lopez. Daniel Bernardi provides an in-depth introduction, comprehensive bibliography and a helpful glossary of terms, thus providing students with an accessible and topical collection on race and ethnicity in contemporary cinema.
The Guy's Guide to Four Battles Every Young Man Must Face
Author: Jonathan McKee
Publisher: Barbour Publishing
Published: 2019-05-01
Total Pages: 161
ISBN-13: 1643521470
DOWNLOAD EBOOKHonestly?. . . "Why wait for something when I can enjoy it now?" “These images don’t really affect me. . .do they?” "How could smoking a little weed really be that bad when it's becoming legalized everywhere?” “I’d like to tell you I don’t care what others think, but honestly, I want to be liked." Maybe you're thinking, "I've had one. . .maybe even a few of these thoughts, and I don't know how to even begin to deal with them." The good news? You're not alone. And there is a way to fight these battles head-on, overcoming the past, pressing forward, and becoming the person God designed you to be. So what's a guy to do? . . . Join youth culture expert and author of the popular Guy's Guide to God, Girls, and the Phone in Your Pocket, Jonathan McKee, as he gets real about the four common battles every young man will encounter in his life: 1: Sexual Temptation 2. Screens 3: Controlled Substances 4: Self-Esteem With humor and honesty, McKee offers up practical, spiritual advice filled with real-world application helping you face today’s distractions.
Faster and Furiouser
Author: Mark Thomas McGee
Publisher: McFarland
Published: 2011-08-01
Total Pages: 360
ISBN-13: 9780786467341
DOWNLOAD EBOOKIn 1984 Mr. McGee wrote ("very well"--Choice) the acclaimed Fast and Furious, a history of American International Pictures. But, as McGee wrote us in his out of the blue offer to do a bigger and better, "Because of my unnatural interest, I've never stopped." The result of his ceaseless efforts can be found in this updated and expanded look at AIP. From the time Sam Arkoff and Jim Nicholson founded the company, they dominated the low-budget film market with such teen-oriented movies as Beach Party, The Wild Angels and I Was a Teenage Werewolf. Their movies were frowned on by critics not because they were terrible (which they mostly were) but because they were so shameless in their intent--to make money. This new work includes the most comprehensive AIP filmography ever assembled, as well as many new photographs not included in the earlier work.
Escape Velocity
Author: Bradley Schauer
Publisher: Wesleyan University Press
Published: 2017-01-03
Total Pages: 285
ISBN-13: 0819576603
DOWNLOAD EBOOKToday, movie theaters are packed with audiences of all ages marveling to exciting science fiction blockbusters, many of which are also critically acclaimed. However, when the science fiction film genre first emerged in the 1950s, it was represented largely by exploitation horror films—lurid, culturally disreputable, and appealing to a niche audience of children and sci-fi buffs. How did the genre evolve from B-movie to blockbuster? Escape Velocity charts the historical trajectory of American science fiction cinema, explaining how the genre transitioned from eerie low-budget horror like It Came from Outer Space to art films like Slaughterhouse-Five, and finally to the extraordinary popularity of hits like E.T. Bradley Schauer draws on primary sources such as internal studio documents, promotional materials, and film reviews to explain the process of cultural, aesthetic, and economic legitimation that occurred between the 1950s and 1980s, as pulp science fiction tropes were adapted to suit the tastes of mainstream audiences. Considering the inescapable dominance of today's effects-driven blockbusters, Escape Velocity not only charts the history of science fiction film, but also gives an account of the origins of contemporary Hollywood.
New American Teenagers
Author: Barbara Jane Brickman
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Published: 2014-03-27
Total Pages: 281
ISBN-13: 1628922788
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe author challenges the neglect of the 1970s in studies on teen film and youth culture by locating a number of subversive and critical narratives.
Golden State, Golden Youth
Author: Kirse Granat May
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
Published: 2010-03-15
Total Pages: 256
ISBN-13: 0807898961
DOWNLOAD EBOOKSeen as a land of sunshine and opportunity, the Golden State was a mecca for the post-World War II generation, and dreams of the California good life came to dominate the imagination of many Americans in the 1950s and 1960s. Nowhere was this more evident than in the explosion of California youth images in popular culture. Disneyland, television shows such as The Mickey Mouse Club, Gidget and other beach movies, the music of the Beach Boys--all these broadcast nationwide a lifestyle of carefree, wholesome fun supposedly enjoyed by white, middle-class, suburban young people in California. Tracing the rise of the California teen as a national icon, Kirse May shows how idealized images of a suburban youth culture soothed the nation's postwar nerves while denying racial and urban realities. Unsettling challenges to this mass-mediated picture began to arise in the mid-1960s, however, with the Free Speech Movement's campus revolt in Berkeley and race riots in Watts. In his 1966 campaign for the governorship of California, Ronald Reagan transformed the backlash against the "dangerous" youths who fueled these actions into political triumph. As May notes, Reagan's victory presaged a rising conservatism across the nation.
Michael Reeves
Author: Benjamin Halligan
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Published: 2003-11-08
Total Pages: 268
ISBN-13: 9780719063510
DOWNLOAD EBOOKMichael Reeves died at age 25 in 1969, between the end of Swinging London and the collapse of the British film industry--an apt candidate to represent all that could have been. This critical biography claims Reeves as the great, lost auteur of British cinema and traces his conception of film back to his childhood and formative experiences. Benjamin Halligan examines Reeves' films in the context of the times, citing The Sorcerers and Witchfinder General as foreshadowing and critiquing the psychedelic and revolutionary zeitgeist. Reeves's earlier work on the fringes of the freewheeling European exploitation cinema is also covered, with particularly emphasis on his Revenge of the Blood Beast.
The Lost One
Author: Stephen Youngkin
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Published: 2005-09-30
Total Pages: 678
ISBN-13: 0813171857
DOWNLOAD EBOOKOften typecast as a menacing figure, Peter Lorre achieved Hollywood fame first as a featured player and later as a character actor, trademarking his screen performances with a delicately strung balance between good and evil. His portrayal of the child murderer in Fritz Lang’s masterpiece M (1931) catapulted him to international fame. Lang said of Lorre: “He gave one of the best performances in film history and certainly the best in his life.” Today, the Hungarian-born actor is also recognized for his riveting performances in The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934), The Maltese Falcon (1941), and Casablanca (1942). Lorre arrived in America in 1934 expecting to shed his screen image as a villain. He even tried to lose his signature accent, but Hollywood repeatedly cast him as an outsider who hinted at things better left unknown. Seeking greater control over his career, Lorre established his own production company. His unofficial “graylisting” by the House Committee on Un-American Activities, however, left him with little work. He returned to Germany, where he co-authored, directed, and starred in the film Der Verlorene (The Lost One) in 1951. German audiences rejected Lorre’s dark vision of their recent past, and the actor returned to America, wearily accepting roles that parodied his sinister movie personality.The first biography of this major actor, The Lost One: A Life of Peter Lorre draws upon more than three hundred interviews, including conversations with directors Fritz Lang, Alfred Hitchcock, Billy Wilder, John Huston, Frank Capra, and Rouben Mamoulian, who speak candidly about Lorre, both the man and the actor. Author Stephen D. Youngkin examines for the first time Lorre’s pivotal relationship with German dramatist Bertolt Brecht, his experience as an émigré from Hitler’s Germany, his battle with drug addiction, and his struggle with the choice between celebrity and intellectual respectability.Separating the enigmatic person from the persona long associated with one of classic Hollywood’s most recognizable faces, The Lost One is the definitive account of a life triumphant and yet tragically riddled with many failed possibilities.
