On Film-Making: An Introduction to the Craft of the Director.(Book Review): An article from: Cineaste

I have read many books on filmmaking & I have a film school degree (from CalArts, as it happens, where Mackendrick once taught). You can't learn filmmaking from a book or from school, only by making films. Nevertheless, "On Film-making" comes as close as any book I've ever found to explaining precisely & beautifully the work of a film director. Whether you want to make films or are simply a film fan, this book will be an immensely rewarding & illuminating experience.

Great book by a great filmmaker & a great teacher. Anyone serious about how to create meaning in the cinema by using the "grammar," the form, should read this book. Ditto 4 the creation of story along classical lines --

When Sandy MacKenrick told my CalArts MFA Thesis committee that my thesis film script was, "long, much too long, & very much too long" and, "doomed to never be completed", I was shocked & terrified.

Sandy was one of the most brilliant & irritating people ever to tell a story or to browbeat an egotistical young film student. His films & lectures convey that contradiction -- his every work is a pearl.

If you were not lucky enough to get Sandy's notes while at CalArts, you must buy this book.

Odds are good, you won't have the genius of Sandy MacKendrick, but you will appreciate how much you could grow as you strive to attain what he found so simple.

I was proud to invite Sandy to the first screening of my thesis film, "Pirate's Dagger", & it still hurts that he was too ill to attend. I wouldn't have gotten it done without his special form of encouragement.

Too intelligent to be a director, to make compromises in the craft of film making with the studio system of his time, Alexander Mackendrick only left us a glimpse of his own potential in his body of work. He did however pass his vision & passion 4 creativity onto the next generation in his teaching. In this book his voice is loud & clear, without being dogmatic. It's like having a drink with a friend in a bar & having him sort out all your problems with scripts, actors & life. No director should be without a copy. From the beginner to the established star everybody can find something in this book & all conveyed in the manner both intense & unpatronising that was uniquely his.

Unlike most how-to directing & writing books, Mackendrick was an accomplished director with decades of professional experience. He speaks from hard-won experience, not dubious armchair notions of what makes a successful film or director. He is wise enough to know there are no "secrets" or immutable laws of storytelling, only rules of thumb. Every time I go back to it, I learn something new, & with every film I make, I am struck by points in the book which ring ever more true. This book will not make you a great director by reading it, but Mackendrick has the good sense & candor to know that a book or a course never will, only lots & lots of hard work & dedication.

This digital document is an article from Cineaste, published by Cineaste Publishers, Inc. on June 22, 2005. The length of the article is 8774 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format & is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: On Film-Making: An Introduction to the Craft of the Director.(Book Review)
Author: Alexander Mackendrick
Publication: Cineaste (Magazine/Journal)
Date: June 22, 2005
Publisher: Cineaste Publishers, Inc.
Volume: 30 Issue: 3 Page: 46(9)

Article Type: Book Review

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