Mitchum: the Film Career of Robert Mitchum

Crowther, Bruce

Biographies & Memoirs

F. A. Thorpe Publishers

Traces the life and career of this public legend and obsessively private man: from his hobo life in the late 1930s to the superstar status of the 90s, from bit parts to leads. Special attention is given to some of his greatest films, including "Farewell, My Lovely" and "Night of the Hunter."

Mitchum: The Film Career of Robert Mitchum

Robert Hale, Ltd.

For many years, Hollywood gave the best roles in the best movies to men, and women were merely objects, useful to have around but dispensable when the action started. But, gradually, the quality of roles began to improve and in the past dozen years a number of remarkable actresses have emerged to show audiences world-wide what they have been missing. The list is long, and it includes Michelle Pfeiffer. After playing small roles in television and a handful of undistinguished films, Michelle Pfeiffer soon made an impact. A hard-working, intelligent actress, she has consistently impressed with a succession of fine film performances which include "The Russia House", "Batman Returns", "Frankie and Johnny" and "Love Field" (for which she was nominated for an Oscar in 1993). Her co-stars have included some of the leading actors of the day, among them Al Pacino, Jack Nicholson, Michael Caine, Mel Gibson, Sean Connery and Daniel Day Lewis In this biography, Bruce Crowther examines the career of this exceptional young actress, discussing all her film roles. He also takes a long look at the difficulties faced by someone who is young and beautiful and involved in an industry which has all too often abused youth and beauty.

Michelle Pfeiffer: A Biography

Arts & Literature

The life and times of Gene Krupa Traces the life and career of the late drummer and assesses his influence on modern jazz. In depth account of Gene's life and the times surrounding that period. Includes selected discography and plenty of photographs.

Gene Krupa: Life and Times (Jazz Life & Times)

OMNIBUS

Prison has long fascinated film makers and audiences alike. The author explores the dark enclosed world of prisons on film from light-hearted comedies to the deeper implications of people imprisoned for their political and religious beliefs. The book covers the whole spectrum of prison life - gangster movies such as "Riot in Cell Block Eleven"; the particular fascination of Alcatraz, including the memorable "Birdman of Alcatraz"; prisoners of war featured in "The Great Escape" and "The Colditz Story"; the complex psychological themes of prisoners of conscience in "Kiss of the Spiderwoman"; women in "Yield to the Night"; and the ultimate sanction of society against its transgressors, the death penalty in "I Want to Live". While many of the films are simple adventure stories using prison as a backdrop, others consider the social issues sensitively. Occasionally a movie has stirred a nation to change its way of thinking about its wrong-doers.

Captured on Film: The Prison Movie

Arts & Photography

Performing Arts

B.T.BATSFORD LTD

The Jazz Singers: From Ragtime to the New Wave

Blandford Press

The Big Band Years

PINFOLD, Mike

Driggs, Franklin S.

Music

FACTS ON FILE+

Yesterday's Yorkshire

History

Europe

David&Charles

Looks at the history of Big Band music and the top bands, soloists, singers, and bandleaders

With the advent of the Second World War a new mood was discernible in film drama â€“ an atmosphere of disillusion and a sense of foreboding, a dark quality that derived as much from the characters depicted as from the cinematographerâ€™s art. These films, among them such classics as Double Indemnity, The Woman in the Window, Touch of Evil and Sunset Boulevard, emerged retrospectively as a genre in themselves when a film critic referred to them collectively as film noir.Bruce Crowther looks into noirâ€™s literary origins (often in the novels of so-called â€˜hard-boiledâ€™ school typified by Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett and Cornell Woolrich), and at how the material translated into the screen, noting in particular influences from German expressionist films and the almost indispensable techniques of flashback and voice-over narration.He also assesses the contribution made by the players â€“ by actors such as Robert Mitchum, Dick Powell, Alan Ladd and John Garfield and actresses such as Barbara Stanwyck, Lizabeth Scott, Joan Crawford and Gloria Grahame, together with a roll-call of supporting players whose screen presence could lend almost any film the noir imprimatur.Noir was in its heyday from 1945 to 1955, a time when paranoia and disillusion, anxiety and violence could be said to have been part of the fabric of American, and particularly Hollywood, society, yet its impact and its influence are with us still â€“ in films as diverse as The French Connection, Chinatown and Body Heat. This book commemorates a special period in film-making and a unique combination of talent resulting in a spectrum of films that are as welcome today on their small screen as they were when they were first shown in the cinema.

Film Noir: Reflections in a Dark Mirror

Humor & Entertainment

Movies

Continuum Intl Pub Group

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Books by Crowther, Bruce