An Excellent Analysis of Films | Understanding Movies, 11th Edition

amazon never delivered! | Understanding Movies, 11th Edition | Louis Giannetti

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	• Understanding Movies, 11th Edition Louis Giannetti Prentice Hall, 2007 - 624 pages average customer review:based on 17 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

An excellent resource for would-be filmmakers

Giannetti's book is an excellent and very comprehensive resource for anyone interested in the art of filmmaking. Countless films (both classic and modern) from around the globe are dissected and illustrated throughout the book alongside each chapter's content, and I found the material as entertaining and interesting as it was informative. As a novice in the field, I learned plenty about the art of creating films and I gained a newfound respect for many popular and obscure titles. I applaud Giannetti for writing such a detailed, yet readable textbook and would recommend this book to all students, teachers, and general film enthusiasts.

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An Excellent Analysis of Films

What I like about this book is the way it's laid out for easy reading. The pictures are great memory refreshers of movies one may have seen and did not fully understand their rational and purpose. As a poet, I like the way it's linked with poetry and creative writing in many ways. One may also find several references to poetic style filtered through the book. The reading goes into details regarding the classification and various styles of films in the areas of realism, classicism and formalism. The principle regarding Mise en Scene was very interesting, especially the movies. The editing of shots from different angles make it clear as to why some films are disjointed and do not flow smoothly. Understanding how sound effects really bring movies to life over stage plays is an interesting process. The various styles of writing, storylines, ideology and drama are really strong areas in the text. This is an excellent book regarding the understanding of movies and their existing relationships to stage plays, musicals, and poetry. Other interesting books to read are: "Trilogy Moments for the Mind, Body and Soul" with the new Epulaeryu poetic form; "Everyday Miracles" by Margaret Okudo; "The Language of Poetry Forms" by Tree Good; and, "My Walk with Jesus" by Christina Jussaume.

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amazon never delivered!

This is a great book although, amazon never delivered. I had ordered this book 2 weeks before school(along with 2 other books for school), it never came. Amazon said that i have an "undeliverable" address, but when i ordered it from ebay i got it in 3 dAys! Then i had to wait forever for a refund!

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Great guide to film analysis

This is an essential book for students of cinema. It does one thing and it does it quite well: it introduces you to the language of film analysis, the categories that critics use to analyze a film. It doesn't try to cover film technology or history.

I totally agree with the other reviewer that the new editions are completely unnecessary, and serve only to destroy the market for used copies. Buy one of the older editions unless it's for a college class and you need the same edition as the class.

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The best and most clear introduction to the analysis of film

Gianetti's classic textbook has been around for a long time, and gone through several printings and new editions. There's a reason for that: it is one of the best introductions to the analysis and appreciation of film that is around. This is the book I was assigned when I took my first film class ("Film as Humanities") in college, and it opened up my eyes to a whole range of elements that contribute to the making of film meaning. Now, a few editions later, I am still assigning the book for my introduction to film studies classes.

What makes it so useful is that Gianetti focuses a chapter each on all of the different components that contribute to the significance of the final film product. He has a chapter on photography -- that introduces vocabulary for describing the images of film, the lighting, the framing, and the way in which the arrangement of elements on screen can direct the eye of the viewer. He has other chapters on movement, composition, editing, acting, story, drama, sound, and ideology, among others.

A refreshing feature of the book, especially for an introductory level text, is that it does not make a sharp distinction between "art" films and "entertainment" flicks -- all of the elements he discusses apply to any films, and he illustrates them with copious examples from both the history of cinema and also from popular and accessible films of the last decade and even last year. At the same time, he is not timid about making judgments about films -- and giving his readers several tools for making critical judgments about what makes some films better than others.

A guiding theme of the book, that lends continuity to each of the chapters and to the book as a whole, is Gianetti's emphasis on a distinction between the "realist" and the "classicist" and the "formalist" tendencies in film. In his chapter on story, among other helpful analyses of narrative styles and the formation and development of genres of film storytelling, he also explains what one would expect from a realist approach to storytelling versus a classicist (i.e. mainstream Hollywood) style versus a formalist approach. He similarly discusses realist and formalist approaches to editing and composition and acting and sound. This basic distinction turns out to be the key to understanding a wide range of differences between approaches to film.

While he doesn't go into film theory directly, he points out where some of the critical ideas he raises have provoked controversy among film theorists, and he is able to capture clearly the key ideas that are debated by film theorists without in any way bogging the text down in jargon. He maintains througout an emphasis on what might be called first-level film analysis -- before we can apply theory to films, before we can reflect on the nature of film, or on the deeper meanings of films, we really do need to learn how to get clear about what is on the surface: what is happening on the screen and in the sound and in the story, and why. While there are other good introductory film books out there that focus on different aspects of film (like Bordwell's Film Art), I really can't imagine a better guide than Gianetti's to getting clear about what is there on the surface. Highly recommended for those interested in the nature of film.

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Helps readers understand how the many languages of film work together to create meaning. Louis Giannetti organizes Understanding Movies around the key elements of filmmaking, including cintematography, Mise en Scène, movement, editing, sound, acting, drama, casting, story, screenwriting, ideology, and theory. He synthesizes every element through a complete case study: Citizen Kane. This book's ideas are illuminated with hundreds of high-quality still photos, more than 70 in full color, taken from movies such as The Matrix, Almost Famous, jackass the movie, Chicago, Lord of the Rings, Mystic River, and Traffic. New in this edition: a full section on contemporary special effects and computer generated imagery (CGI); up-to-the-minute information on new developments in film technology; more coverage of recent films and filmmakers; more ethnic diversity (including new material on the Islamic cinema); and more lavish use of color and high-quality paper. An updated Companion Website contains animations, video clips from interviews with movie professionals, and Research Navigator access to New York Times film reviews. For everyone who wants to understand the artistry and meaning of the movies.

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