The book is unread and the dust jacket is in near new condition. It has slight fading from age.

The vampire film

Ursini, James

A.S. Barnes

The behind-the-scenes story of the quintessential film noir and cult classic, Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity--its true crime origins and crucial impact on film history--is told for the first time in this riveting narrative published for the film's 80th anniversary. &nbsp; From real crime to serial to novel to movie, the history of Double Indemnity is as complex and exciting as the plot of any to hit the screen during film noir's classic period. Born of a true crime that inspired reporter and would-be crime writer James M. Cain's novella, Hollywood quickly bid on the rights but throughout the 1930s a strict code of censorship made certain that no studio could green-light a murder melodrama based on real events. Then World War II loosened some strictures, and director-writer Billy Wilder--before his prime as director of sparkling comedies--could hire hardboiled novelist Raymond Chandler and revamp the story enough to pass the censors. Overcoming strong resistance, Wilder then lined up a star cast led by the incomparable Barbara Stanwyck in her unforgettable turn as the ultimate femme fetale, alongside Fred MacMurray, cast against type as her partner in crime, and Edward G. Robinson as a bloodhound claims adjuster. With these skilled actors set against a low-key look, Wilder's final film became one of the earliest studio noirs to gain critical and commercial success (nominated for 7 Oscars!), to influence the entire noir movement, and to impact filmmakers and audiences to this day. Authors Alain Silver and James Ursini tell the complete history of Double Indemnity in their latest and most provocative work on film noir: From the Moment They Met It Was Murder.

From the Moment They Met It Was Murder: Double Indemnity and the Rise of Film Noir (Turner Classic Movies)

Biographies & Memoirs

SILVER, Alain

Arts & Literature

Running Press Adult

Book by Silver, Alain, Ursini, James

The Vampire Film: From Nosferatu to Bram Stoker's Dracula

Humor & Entertainment

Movies

Limelight Editions

For centuries, perhaps from the beginning of time, people young and old have been drawn to the genre of supernatural horror, first on the printed page and then on the screen. From fairy tales to Freddy Krueger, the appeal of the genre rests on the all too human search for something above nature, something unkown and unnameable. This search has produced works as memorable as they are terrifying, and we feel their power once again in More Things Than Are Dreamt Of. The sweep of the book encompasses almost two centuries as it reconsiders in detail such classics of literature as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, tales of Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Henry James' The Turn of the Screw right up to contemporary novels of horror as Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House, William Peter Blatty's The Exorcist andd Stephen King's The Dead Zone. But what sets this book apart is that the authors go on to study the most significant feature films derived from these and many other works of fiction, from the silent era until today.

More Things Than Are Dreamt Of: Masterpieces of Supernatural Horror (Limelight)

Religion & Spirituality

(Limelight). In the thirty-five years since The Vampire Film first appeared, new generations of filmmakers have constantly reinvigorated the genre. After this book's original in-depth introduction to the vampire myth and a review of the all the classic adaptations of Stoker's Dracula and Le Fanu's Carmilla including the narrative and visual traditions developed by Hammer in England and the Baroque stylists in Italy in the 1960s, this newest edition will track the form's evolution from such 1970s reinventions as Count Yorga Vampire and Blacula , The Hunger and Vampire's Kiss in the Eighties, Interview with a Vampire , Bram Stoker's Dracula , and the Blade series in the Nineties, through 30 Days of Night , I Am Legend and the Twilight and Underworld series in the first decade of the 21st century. All these films plus celebrated international examples such as Thirst and Let the Right One In and the hit television series Buffy , New Amsterdam , Angel , Vampire Diaries , and True Blood , are covered in this long-awaited, completely revised, expanded, and redesigned 4th edition that follows the vampire figures, both male and female, through the millennium and beyond.

The Vampire Film: From Nosferatu to Twilight - 4th Edition, Updated and Revised

The Vampire Film

Tantivy P

The authors of THE NOIR STYLE—and eight other volumes about film noir—turn their attention to the wide array of posters and lobby cards that were used to entice viewers into watching the movies of the classic period. This oversized study contains well over 300 full-color illustrations never before reproduced in book form. In this volume Alain Silver and James Ursini focus their unparalleled expertise on these images that brought audiences into theaters around the world. An Introduction traces the sometimes lurid line of graphics from pulp magazines like Black Mask and the dust jackets of hard-boiled novels to the earliest examples of film noir. A fully detailed survey of recurring themes and styles unfolds through chapters with titles such as Touch of Evil, The Killers, Night and the City, Out of the Past, and Deadly is the Female. Sidebars explore motifs such as fashion and Bogart’s face on posters from the U.S. and Europe. The volume includes an index of illustrations by movie title.

Film Noir Graphics: Where Danger Lives

CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

Film historians and critical commentators, Alain Silver and James Ursini, authors of THE NOIR STYLE and editors of FILM NOIR THE ENCYCLOPEDIA and the FILM NOIR READER series, turn their attention to the myriad of other books and key articles about the classic period from the “discovery” of the cycle by French critics in the aftermath of World War II to the on-going attempts to distill the essence of the noir movement. With 100 illustrations and an extensive Bibliography.

The Film Noir Jigsaw: Critical Perspectives on the Classic Period

More than 150 black-and-white and duotone photographs complement a dramatic history of classic film noir that examines the unique stylistic creation and graphic impact of the genre and analyzes classic noir motifs--including Night and the City and the Deadly Female. Reprint.

The Noir Style

Abrams Press

Los Angeles has always been as much a star in film noir as any actor, be it Humphrey Bogart, Barbara Stanwyck, Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner or Jack Nicholson. In L.A. Noir: The City as Character renowned film historians Alain Silver and James Ursini explore the world of noir cinema in the context of Los Angeles. The book features dozens of noir and neo-noir landmark films from Double Indemnity, Criss Cross, Sunset Boulevard, Gun Crazy, The Big Heat, Kiss Me Deadly, and Touch of Evil in the classic period (1940-1960) to such neo-noir notables as Chinatown, L.A. Confidential, Mulholland Drive, and Pulp Fiction. L.A. Noir illustrates how these noir films use L.A.'s diverse cityscape and architecture to convey a unique vision of urban corruption and existential fatalism, not only in the ever-changing, chaotic downtown of Bunker Hill, Main Street, and Chinatown, but in its affluent coastal communities (Santa Monica, Malibu) as well as its deceptively sunny suburbs (South Bay, San Fernando Valley). The authors deftly analyze the key films of noir while integrating them into the geography and history of this "dark city" which became such an important icon of noir literature and film. L.A. Noir is profusely illustrated with approximately 150 photographs-many of them appearing in print for the very first time-including production stills from the movies discussed, archival photos of the locations from the films and new photographs of the locations today, chronicling the ever-changing cityscape of this noir character-Los Angeles.

L.A. Noir: The City as Character

Santa Monica Press

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