The best books on film direction
My favorite books about filmmaking are the ones that are very much about technique, and as it turns out some of the most technique-oriented are for department heads, rather than for the director. Given that, my favorites:
- Woody Allen on Woody Allen: In Conversation with Stig Bjorkman. Craft-oriented interviews. It contains, for example, great discussions of how Allen shoots in long takes, and of the way Husbands and Wives was constructed (no blocking, no careful lighting, no avoidance of jump cuts).
- Conversations with Woody Allen by Eric Lax. More craft-oriented interviews with Allen conducted over 30+ years. The parts about editing, music, and the directing of actors are pretty satisfying.
- Hitchcock by Truffaut. Hitch talks about what worked and what didn't.
- In the Blink of an Eye by Walter Murch, who talks about editing in great detail.
- FIlm Lighting by Kris Malkiewicz. Works through the technical details of what cameramen and gaffers do. Lots of technical detail, much of it in the form of lengthy quotes from about a dozen cameramen (Wexler, Zsigmond, Cronenweth, ...).
- The Writer's Journey by Chris Vogler, which is about story structure
- Myth and the Movies by Stuart Voytilla, which is also about story structure.
- Making Movies by Sidney Lumet
- On Directing Film by David Mamet
- Rebel Without a Crew: Or How a 23-Year-Old Filmmaker with $7,000 Became a Hollywood Player by Robert Rodriguez
- Directing 101 by Ernest Pintoff
- Direct Your Own Damn Movie! by Lloyd Kaufman
- Directors Tell the Story: Master the Craft of Television and Film Directing by Bethany Rooney & Mary Lou Belli
- How Not to Make a Short Film: Secrets from a Sundance Programmer by Roberta Marie Munroe
- The Visual Story: Creating the Visual Structure of Film, TV and Digital Media by Bruce Block
- Film Directing Shot by Shot: Visualizing from Concept to Screen by Steven Katz
- On Directing by Harold Clurman
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