Moviemakers' Master Class
Private Lessons from the World's Foremost Directors
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4.8 • 5 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
From Scorsese and Lynch to Wenders and Godard, interviews with twenty of the world's greatest directors on how they make films--and why
Each great filmmaker has a secret method to his moviemaking--but each of them is different. In Moviemaker Master Class, Laurent Tirard talks to twenty of today's most important filmmakers to get to the core of each director's approach to film, exploring the filmmaker's vision as well as his technique, while allowing each man to speak in his own voice.
Martin Scorsese likes setting up each shot very precisely ahead of time--so that he has the opportunity to change it all if he sees the need. Lars Von Trier, on the other hand, refuses to think about a shot until the actual moment of filming. And Bernardo Bertolucci tries to dream his shots the night before; if that doesn't work, he roams the set alone with a viewfinder, imagining the scene before the actors and crew join him. In these interviews--which originally appeared in the French film magazine Studio and are being published here in English for the first time--enhanced by exceptional photographs of the directors at work, Laurent Tirard has succeeded in finding out what makes each filmmaker--and his films--so extraordinary, shedding light on both the process and the people behind great moviemaking.
Among the other filmmakers included are Woody Allen, Tim Burton, Joel and Ethan Coen, and John Woo.
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From Woody Allen to David Cronenberg, the Coen brothers to Lars Von Trier, all film directors run up against the same essential concerns: how to direct actors, for example, or whether to preplan camera angles. In interviewing these and 16 other notable filmmakers, journalist and screenwriter Tirard finds notable affinities between seemingly dissimilar directors. Tim Burton and Jean-Pierre Jeunet (Amelie) both recommend starting out in animation, for example, while Wong Kar-Wai and David Lynch both select their music far in advance and even play it during filming. Most of the responses will come as no surprise to those familiar with the interviewees' work. Martin Scorsese, who has rather strong opinions about which camera lenses to use, believes that "the more personal the film, the more it can claim to be art." Violence impresario Takeshi Kitano, by comparison, describes film as "a succession of perfect images." All in all, Tirard's healthy balance of nuts-and-bolts information and conceptual musings should be of interest to lay readers as well as would-be auteurs. And the filmographies listed at the end of each interview serve as useful checklists for anyone inspired by these well-reasoned, hard-earned life lessons.
