A Companion to Fritz Lang “Fritz Lang’s movie-making spans a major part of the history of cinema, across genres, styles, and national contexts. With smartness and sharpness, the essays in this essential volume come from many angles to capture the richness of Lang’s cinema and bring great insight to its study.” Dana Polan, Cinema Studies, NYU Fritz Lang’s influence on cinema cannot be overstated, with a career that stretched from the silent era in Germany to the decline of the Hollywood studio system in the late 1950s, from the Weimar Republic to Nazi Germany, from Depression America to the McCarthy era. One of the best known émigrés from Germany’s school of Expressionism, Lang is also credited with influencing the emergence of film noir. A Companion to Fritz Lang offers the first full-scale collection of scholarship available in English on one of the most important filmmakers of all time. Addressing much of Lang’s voluminous body of work, from Metropolis and M, to lesser-known titles such as Western Union and Clash by Night, this volume offers a superb overview of Lang’s cinema with revealing insights into his enduring influence on directors such as Godard, Scorsese, Chabrol, and Tarantino. The two dozen essays presented here are an unrivaled and up-to-the-minute assessment of the prolific and resilient life and vision of one of cinema’s greatest auteurs.

An authoritative and much-needed overview of the main issues in the field of early cinema from over 30 leading international scholars in the field First collection of its kind to offer in one reference: original theory, new research, and reviews of existing studies in the field Features over 30 original essays from some of the leading scholars in early cinema and Film Studies, including Tom Gunning, Jane Gaines, Richard Abel, Thomas Elsaesser, and André Gaudreault Caters to renewed interest in film studies’ historical methods, with strict analysis of multiple and competing sources, providing a critical re-contextualization of films, printed material and technologies Covers a range of topics in early cinema, such as exhibition, promotion, industry, pre-cinema, and film criticism Broaches the latest research on the subject of archival practices, important particularly in the current digital context

"Over two hundred entries on film actors, directors, producers, cinematographers, critics, film industry, film movements and festivals cover the entire spectrum of German-speaking cinema from the 1890s to the popular comedies of the 1990s. In-depth articles consider the artistic peaks of Weimer cinema, the emigre directors, film politics, and the star system of Nazi cinema, women and film, the New German Cinema and the revival of genre cinema since. Entries evaluate such notables as Fritz Lang, Marlene Dietrich, Leni Riefenstahl, Erich Pommer, Conrad Veidt, Wim Wenders and R.W. Fassbinder, as well as popular genres (the "Heimat" film, literary adaptations, musicals) alongside the major studios (UFA and DEFA) and international personalities such as Klaus Kinski, Wolfgang Petersen, and Michael Ballhaus. Leading international scholar Thomas Elsaesser also contributes an introductory essay on developments in post-unification German cinema, placing it in the context of its recent history and of general relations between Hollywood and European cinema."--Publisher description.

This Companion to the Nibelungenlied draws on the expertise of scholars from Germany, Britain, and the United States to offer the reader fresh perspectives on a wide variety of topics regarding the epic: the latest theories regarding manuscript tradition, authorship, conflict, combat, and politics, the Otherworld and its inhabitants, eroticism (in both the Nibelungenlied and Wagner's Ring), the twentieth-century reception both of the Nibelungenlied and of its most intriguing protagonist, Kriemhild, key concepts used by the poet, the heroic, feudal, and courtly elements in the work, and an analysis of archetypal elements from the perspective of Jungian psychology.

Thea von Harbou's classic was the basis for the screenplay for Fritz Lang's groundbreaking 1926 science fiction epic of the same name. This edition of the novel is "stillustrated" with scenes from the film.

A Companion to German Cinema A Companion to German Cinema regards the shifting terrain of German filmmaking and film studies against their larger social contexts with twenty-two newly commissioned essays by well-established and younger scholars in the field. While several of these focus on classic topics such as Weimar cinema, Fifties cinema, New German Cinema and its legacy, and Holocaust film, the collection is distinguished by its focus on new developments and the innovative light they may shed on earlier practices. A Companion to German Cinema includes essays on Berlin Film, Neue Heimat Film, New Comedy, post-Wall documentaries, the post-Wende RAF genre, and Rabenmutter imagery, as well as on the persistently overlooked and under-theorized Indianerfilme, post-AIDS documentaries, sexploitation films, and new multicultural and transnational films produced in Germany under the auspices of the European Union. Organized into three “movements” representing the significance of these developments for their aesthetic theorization, A Companion to German Cinema challenges its readers to address critical gaps in the field with the aim of opening it further onto new terrains of intellectual engagement.

A collection of conversations about the filmmaker whose life and work spanned six decades of film history

“A must have for any film nut.”—Details Peter Bogdanovich, award-winning director, screenwriter, actor and critic, interviews 16 legendary directors over a 15-year period. Their richly illuminating conversations combine to make this a riveting chronicle of Hollywood and picture making. Join him in conversations with: Robert Aldrich • George Cukor • Allan Dwan • Howard Hanks • Alfred Hitchcock • Chuck Jones • Fritz Lang • Joseph H. Lewis • Sidney Lumet • Leo McCarey • Otto Preminger • Don Siegel • Josef von Sternberg • Frank Tashlin • Edgar G. Ulmer • Raoul Walsh NOTE: This edition does not include photographs. Praise for Who the Devil Made It “Illuminating . . . These were (and sometimes are: a few yet breathe) men rooted in history as much as in Hollywood. Their collected memories make the past look fearfully rich beside a present that is poverty-stricken in everything except money.”—The New Yorker “Bogdanovich is one of America’s finest writers on the cinema. . . . Thank goodness [his] Who the Devil Made It has come along to remind us that films and writing about film were, at one time, focused on the work and not strictly on the bottom line.”—The Boston Globe “A treasure trove on the craft of directing.”—Newsday “Monumental . . . The directors’ reminiscences about technique, working methods, sources of ideas, and relationships with actors and studios are thoroughly entertaining.”—Publishers Weekly “A fine achievement that helps illuminate the art and craft of some remarkable directors . . . There are plenty of revealing anecdotes.”—Kirkus Reviews

A Companion to Martin Scorsese A Companion to Martin Scorsese “This valuable book brings the exceptional scale of Martin Scorsese’s film work into clear view. His achievements are monumental, and the essays collected in this work provide wonderfully detailed and vivid analyses of his oeuvre. A comprehensive study of the most exciting filmmaker working today.” Robert Burgoyne, University of St Andrews A Companion to Martin Scorsese, Revised Edition is a comprehensive collection of original essays assessing the career of one of America’s most prominent contemporary filmmakers. The first reference work of its kind, this book contains contributions from influential scholars in North America and Europe. The essays use a variety of analytic approaches to study numerous aspects of Scorsese’s work, from his earliest films to his place within the history of American and world cinema. They consider his work in relation to auteur theory, the genres in which he has worked, his use of popular music, and his recent involvement with film preservation. Several of the essays offer fresh interpretations of some of Scorsese’s most influential films, including Mean Streets, Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, GoodFellas, Gangs of New York, Hugo, and The Irishman. Others take a broader approach and discuss the representation of violence, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, gender, race, and other themes across his work. With insights that will interest film scholars as well as movie enthusiasts, this is an important contribution to the scholarship of contemporary American cinema.

This highly original book draws on narrative and film theory, psychoanalysis, and musicology to explore the relationship between aesthetics and anti-Semitism in two controversial landmarks in German culture. David Levin argues that Richard Wagner's opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and Fritz Lang's 1920s film Die Nibelungen creatively exploit contrasts between good and bad aesthetics to address the question of what is German and what is not. He shows that each work associates a villainous character, portrayed as non-Germanic and Jewish, with the sometimes dramatically awkward act of narration. For both Wagner and Lang, narration--or, in cinematic terms, visual presentation--possesses a typically Jewish potential for manipulation and control. Consistent with this view, Levin shows, the Germanic hero Siegfried is killed in each work by virtue of his unwitting adoption of a narrative role. Levin begins with an explanation of the book's theoretical foundations and then applies these theories to close readings of, in turn, Wagner's cycle and Lang's film. He concludes by tracing how Germans have dealt with the Nibelungen myths in the wake of the Second World War, paying special attention to Michael Verhoeven's 1989 film The Nasty Girl. His fresh and interdisciplinary approach sheds new light not only on Wagner's Ring and Lang's Die Nibelungen, but also on the ways in which aesthetics can be put to the service of aggression and hatred. The book is an important contribution to scholarship in film and music and also to the broader study of German culture and national identity.