Titles starting with M from Fossil Books

In the mid-19th century, the wife of a great French magician becomes involved with an army officer when her husband is asked to perform his magic tricks for Arab sheikhs in the rebellious province of Algeria.

Director Sidney Lumet's guide to the art of making movies begins in unlikely surroundings: the Ukrainian National Home on Second Avenue in New York City. Explaining how the antiquated and unprepossessing but very spacious ballroom is his favored venue for rehearsing a film in preproduction, Lumet kick-starts an enthralling, sequential trip through the movie-making process. Published in 1995, Lumet draws on his 40 years in the business to delineate how a film gets made, from the initial spark of an idea to the test screenings and promotion that precede a first encounter with the general public. Clearly in love with the art (the first chapter is titled "The Director: The Best Job in the World"), Lumet infuses anecdotal evidence from his experience at the helm of some 39 movies with a nuts-and-bolts approach to the essential ingredients that are vital to the evolution of a motion picture. The 1970s saw Lumet hit a rich vein, with 1974's SERPICO followed in the same year by MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS, and soon after by DOG DAY AFTERNOON (1975) and NETWORK (1976). Important examples of lessons learnt from each movie are liberally scattered throughout MAKING MOVIES to help Lumet illustrate his points. DOG DAY AFTERNOON is used to highlight the difficulties of working in a confined space, as the bulk of the action took place in a bank, while SERPICO is held up as an example of how an actor's performance altered the way Lumet originally perceived a character. A useful guide for any budding filmmaker and a fascinating look at Lumet's meticulous approach to his craft, MAKING MOVIES is a welcome deconstruction of the filmmaking process.