5 comments about Dressing a Galaxy: The Costumes of Star Wars.

1. Absolutely Love Love Love this book! The pictures are fabulous and the costumes gorgeous! The designer did a terrific job! I recommend this book to anyone who loves design. I would've loved to have seen more but alas I'll just have to check out the website Star Wars Fit for a Queen, its combines both.



2. Great photos. NOT recommended for people looking for Episodes IV, V, VI costumes. A lot of this book is dedicated to Padme Amidala and her handmaidens' wardrobe, but they had the most costume changes throughout the first 3 movies. The costumes are beautiful and detailed. I love this book.



3. Each picture in this book is beautiful. Every costume from Star Wars is in here including how to make each costume. Its amazing how beautiful most of the costumes really are especially Padme, Padme's Handmaidens, the Queens of Alderaan and Naboo and the Jedi. Buy this book and it'll make you want to go out and make each costume yourself.



4. Say what you want about the Star Wars prequels, but one thing I think even the staunchest critics of those films must agree on is this: they had fantastic costume designs. This fact is brilliantly attested to in Dressing a Galaxy: The Costumes of Star Wars. Within the pages of this hardbound volume you will find vibrant preliminary sketches as well as radiantly photographed examples of the costumes used throughout the prequels (that's right - this book only contains the costumes form Episodes I, II, and III; the title is a little bit misleading. The revolutionary costumes from the original trilogy are only mentioned in passing a couple of times). For anyone who has an appreciation of the art of costuming, for someone who's a big Star Wars fan, or for someone who, like me, is always looking for a good visual reference for art, this is a tremendous buy - a bargain at any price. Enjoy!



5. This book is a fabulous collection of photographs and information on the Star Wars costumes. The photographs show each costume in great detail and discuss the making of each costume from the sketch stage all the way through completion. I would definitely recommend this book! You do not have to be a Star Wars fanatic to appreciate this book.

5 comments about R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots) (Penguin Classics).

1. Most 20th century plays are focused on the exploration of characters, not ideas. Karel Capek's R.U.R. (short for Rossum's Universal Robots) explores instead ideas, leaving character to one side. The character in this play are somewhat beside the point, irrelevant. The ideas about human beings, about the centrality of labor to give their lives meaning, of the pressures of modern capital to strip workers of their essentially human characteristics are what the play is all about. The robots are emblematic of what, Capek believes, modern capital want to do to workers, taken to their logical extreme.
   
   The play is, therefore, a profoundly political play. Capek's own politics do not fit comfortably on the current political grid. He could properly be called conservative, if one could recover an older conservative tradition that was not linked so powerfully to business and corporate interests. Historically this was not always so. John Adams, for instance, the second American president, wrote passionately about the need for the executive branch of government to stand between the greed of the economic elite and both ordinary Americans and the republic. This tradition in American politics was transformed earlier just after the half century mark in the 20th century, much to the chagrin of traditional conservatives like Russell Kirk. Capek shares much in common with this earlier tradition, seeing the greed of corporate interests, which would reduce workers to mere machines if they could. But Capek also shares with this older conservative tradition a fear of technological development. He does not believe that much genuine good will arise out of increasing technological development.
   
   The play is perhaps most significant for having popularized the use of the word "robot," a word coined by Karel's brother Josef. The robots of Capek's play have far more in common with what we would today call cyborgs or androids, being apparently human creatures made by humans. I find it fascinating that this, the first truly important SF play, focuses on robots. The novel that is usually considered the first SF novel, FRANKENSTEIN by Mary Shelley, also is about an artificially constructed human being. The first SF feature length film, Fritz Lang's METROPOLIS, also had a robot as one of its major characters. Capek's particular version of the robot has many connections with subsequent depictions of constructed people. To take merely one instance, there are many parallels between Capek's robots and the Cylons in BATTLESTAR GALACTICA (the new version, not the 1978 one). In both versions the robots were created to undertake work for humans to make their lives easier. In both versions the robots or Cylons turned against their creators. In both versions the robots or Cylons are obsessed with replicating themselves, though in BSG the Cylons are capable of laboratory reduplication, but aspire to procreation sexually. Clearly Capek anticipated many ongoing questions in SF.
   
   This remains one of the important works of SF of the 20th century as well as one of the most crucial works in the history of imaginative explorations of what it means to be human through the creation of artificial people.



2. This is a very lean version, with some characters being removed or merged with other characters. Whole sections of original dialogue have been removed, or at best, changed. Avoid this version like a robot plague.



3. don't skip this one - it's the best part of the play. "R.U.R.", from the author of "The War with the Newts", is a major disappointment. Thank goodness I didn't buy tickets for and then have to sit through the least believable dialogue I have ever read, nor did I waste a lot of time wondering why Glory accepted the elephantine attentions of Domin. It was like listening to a play in a language I barely understand - I couldn't believe it, and thought I may have had it wrong. But I didn't: it WAS clumsy, stilted, unbelievable. Read "Newts", and get the same message in a novel you'll never forget, by an author who will never be forgotten.



4. This is definitely a great read. It's got enough 'depth' despite it's small package to interest just about anybody. It surprised me how much Capek touched upon present day issues in a volume authored over 80 years ago.



5. This is a really good play but most reviewers miss the fact that in the play, the robots are not mechanical or androids but genetically engineered from a "protoplasm". I think this really addresses some of the issues today, especially stem cell research.

3 comments about Zoot Suit and Other Plays.

1. I enjoyed reading the play Zoot Suit. It focuses mainly on the Zoot Suit riots of the 1940's in Los Angeles and the great amount of conflict that surround the riots. The main character, Henry, goes out on a date with his girlfriend, Della. After their date they meet with friends at a club to go dancing. The Downey gang, who is their rival gang, show up at the dance and a fight breaks out. One of the members of the Downey gang is stabbed and Henry and the boys are sent to jail after an unfair trial. When Henry is sent to jail you can really feel emotion toward Henry and his family. The reader feels sympathy for Henry because of the way he is treated during the trial. The play really focuses on the treatment of the pachucos and the conflicts they go through. I was hoping for more concentration on the time period rather than the conflict. The play is very well written and is quite powerful at times. The characters seem to come alive and it feels like they are in the room with you.



2. Zoot Suit is the greatest play! I knew nothing about the Zoot Suit Riots until I took a class in Mexican-American Society and Culture and was introduced to this topic. When did it get erased from our history, and why don't we hear about it?

   There is so much symbolism involved in the play, which adds to its appeal. Read it today! Also, take some time and learn about the Sleepy Lagoon trial and the zoot suit riots.




3. Reproduced are three plays by influential Chicano director/playwright Luis Valdez. They are "Zoot Suit," "Bandido!" and "I Don't Have to Show You No Stinking Badges!" Included is a 14-pg. introduction to Valdez's creative history by Univ. of Calif. theater scholar Jorge Huerta.

   I first met Valdez and his wife in San Francisco after a preview of the revised "Badges!" in March of 1990. I was impressed by his unhurried cordiality. Valdez's son Kinan was playing Sonny Villa, a Harvard undergraduate who shocks his Hollywood-extra parents with the news that he has quit school. A 1986 production of "Badges!" inspired Josefina Lopez to write her first play "Simply Maria, or The American Dream" and to go on to create more roles for Chicana/Latina actresses.

   This past weekend I saw Kinan at the San Diego Rep as the gallant outlaw Tiburcio Vasquez in the fun and bawdy musical "Bandido!" Vasquez was a native Californian of good breeding and above-average education whose legal public execution by hanging in 1875 strained relations further between native Californians and Americans of that era. I read the script immediately before the production, but it's best to wait till later so you don't spoil the suspense of what's going to happen next.

   Valdez became the first Chicano playwright to have access to mainstream theater and Broadway stages with the production of "Zoot Suit" in the late '70s. The play was especially successful in Los Angeles, where for people of my father's generation the Sleepy Lagoon case and the Zoot Suit/Servicemen Riots became a part of family history and a bad memory of the virulent racism against Mexicans. Actor Edward James Olmos made the narrator role of El Pachuco memorable.

5 comments about An Ideal Husband (Dover Thrift Editions).

1. This book is a great nineteenth century literature of one of mi favourites writers ever . It makes a great picture of the english bourgeoisie of the century combined with humour, sarcasm and moral content. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.



2. I love Oscar Wilde's penchant for reversals. This play is terribly good fun but makes you think at the same time. I want to see the play acted out on stage now that I've read it!



3. As a dish for Oscar Wilde's inimitable and devilishly sweet locution, "An Ideal Husband" accentuates adequately.  Like Roger Moore's 70's Bond flicks (before they became cartoons in the 80's), the play is saturated with the style, but very little of the substance from previous genius.
   
   The excuse for, more than the theme of, the play is the unforgiving and insincere moral code among the social elite of fin de siècle London.  Sir Robert Chiltern's otherwise ivory political career grew from selling a Cabinet secret to Stock Exchange speculator, Baron Arnheim, and Mrs. Cheveley, the since-deceased Baron's intimate, possesses the letter of documentation.  All she asks for the letter's destruction is Sir Robert's official support of the Argentine Canal Company, in which she has invested and he knows to be a swindle.  More than an end to his political career, he fears publication of the letter will end his marriage to his admirable, but morally unrelenting wife, Lady Chiltern.  As if to release his audience from any pretension of seriousness, Wilde presents Society's dandy, in the form of Lord Goring, as both his foundation of moral clarity and hedonic flippancy.  A string of one-liners and contrived plot twists later and we delight in what Wilde considers the proper end to any play or romantic relationship, a pleasing settlement.
   
   "An Ideal Husband" is the Daily Star, not the Financial Times. Wilde is truly genius when seriousness is woven through his works, and particularly when his seriousness is personal; but, here he is entertaining nonetheless. If you're just introducing yourself to Oscar Wilde, I recommend including this work after a more flattering introduction, lest you mistake Wilde as merely entertaining.



4. Chevely: "Sometimes. But it is such a difficult pose to keep up."
   
   Perhaps not so well known as "The Importance of Being Earnest," this has all the same banter, manners, and sharp-eyed look at the crumbling edge of the upper crust in Vistorian England. It pleases the attentive listener at many levels. Considered only as a stream of one-liners and clever quips, it delivers all you could ask for.
   
   But because it's Wilde, it's also a wild tirade against the mannered (sometimes ill-mannered) gentry. Behind that, it has a good deal to say about tolerance for the flaws of any fallible human - and Wilde could speak on human flaws with rare authority. And, like any truly great work, its examination of honesty (and dis-) reveals a good bit about today's world, a century later.
   
   I'm not normally a reader of plays. I don't have that inner ear that brings words on the page to life. Wilde gives me some idea what that experience must be like, and I'm grateful for it.
   
   //wiredweird



5. My very favourite of Oscar Wilde's plays. Choc-a-bloc with wit, and humorous repartee, it also is an intriguing story, and fascinating to see how it plays out. No wonder it is still popular 112 years after is first produced with recent productions on video/DVD doing very well.
   Member of Parliament Lord Robert Chiltern is blackmailed by the wicked Mrs. Cheverly, with a secret from his youth, leading to a crisis in his life, and in his marriage to the virtuous Lady Chiltern. It is up to his friend, the delightfully foppish Lord Goring to help extricate him. All is well that ends well, but not after much interplay and intrigue.
   Every word in this play is well measured out for one of the great masterpieces of English Drama.

5 comments about The Power Filmmaking Kit: Make Your Professional Movie on a Next-to-Nothing Budget.

1. Books like this promise a lot but I have to say that Jason has done an excellent job of condensing the complex task of movie making into concise and accurate descriptions of each discipline. I've experienced quite a bit in the film business over 30 years and time and again as I read this book I kept saying "Oh yes, that's true." It is also a great reference for those noodly details one needs from time to time like proper script format. There is no need to hunt through your library for the answer, script format is right here on page 27. The other good thing about Jason's breakdown is the responsibility associated with film making regarding money,permissions, safety and insurance. I cringe when I think back on how we made 16mm indie films back in the 70s. In some cases we were lucky to be alive afterward much less sued! The Power Filmmaking Kit is terrific primer for those who wish to make a movie in the classic tradition for very little money.
   
   Mark Sawicki
   Motion Picture Effects Cameraman/Actor and Author.



2. Author Jason Tomaric has written, directed and distributed several minor independent features which is a laudable feat. Yet, Tomaric has surprisingly little to say about the filmmaking process. Sure, there's a lot of information here, but nothing you couldn't get anywhere else. Even the skimpy material on his own productions generally amounts to one thought--"Need something for free? Just ask!" What makes similar books like the Complete Guide to Low-Budget filmmaking (Josh Becker) or Make Your Own Damn Movie! (Lloyd Kaufman) interesting is the authors' willingness to share their personal views and stories of their triumphs and failures. Other books like The DV Rebel's Guide (Stu Maschwitz) and Digital Filmmaking (Mike Figgis) are authored by highly-regarded professionals who describe how low-budget technology potentially transforms mainstream filmmaking processes. Tomaric, on the other hand, has very little that he wants to express opting instead for a "wide as an ocean but shallow as a water basin" approach. The result is a paint-by-numbers text that reads less like a book and more like a reasonably executed career move.



3. I was so frustrated with the lack of practical filmmaking instruction that I took two years out of my life to write and illustrate "The Shut Up and Shoot Documentary Guide", so I speak from the heart when I say that Jason Tomaric's "Power Filmmaking Kit" is a rare wonder of practicality, conciseness, and valuable filmmaking wisdom.
   
   There are two ways you learn the things in a solid practical film book like this:
   
   1) the hard way- by doing it and learning from your mistakes (fine if you've got the time and the money) or
   
   2) by being smart enough to study and learn from a book like this how to stretch your time and money and get better results.
   
   After fifteen years in this business, I still found plenty of valuable tidbits, forms, and practical wisdom in Jason's book and the jam-packed DVD lessons to make it more than worth the cover price. I only wish I had access to a book like this back in my film school days.
   
   Yet another big shot in the DV Revolution. Well done, Jason.



4. I am currently a successful stunt woman in the entertainment business and have worked on many big budget films. I bought Jason's book because it laid out step by step everything I needed to do to start and finish my own film. I have found all the behind the camera details very helpful and they have saved me a lot of time in pre-production. His specific layout of what needs to happen when has been a life saver. Being a stunt performer and always in front of the camera has taught me some, but this book has filled in ALL of the blanks.



5. I am very impressed with this book. It goes into so much detail, yet
   it's still really easy to understand and is very well organized. It's
   the best book I've ever read on how to make your own movie. Also, the
   materials on the DVD are worth the cost of the book by themselves.
   Tutorials that cover directing, cinematography pre-production, editing
   all tie in the chapters. The forms are well designed and perfect for
   any filmmaker. I said it once and I'll say it again, if you're going
   to make a movie, you should definitely have The Power Filmmaking Kit.

5 comments about Impulse.

1. I found this book as intriguing as her FBI series which I normally have favored. I have read many of her books (all of the FBI) and now the small number grouped with Impulse. I wish she'd stay with these two!



2. This book kept me wondering the entire time. Great romance between the two main characters. I would give it more credit then the other reviews I have read.



3. Coulter does a great job of taking her characters in and out of the mysterious criminal element and the romance. I hope she decides to continue to develope her talents in writing mystery/romance novels.



4. This is the first book I've read by this author and I honestly don't know if I will try another.
   
   This book was lacking in a lot of ways. I didn't find the relationship between the two main characters engaging at all and by the end of the book I found I didn't care at all what happened to any of them....



5. Always heard that Catherine Coulter was a good author. First book by her that I've read. Book leaves a lot to be desired in more ways than one. Not very action-packed and at points unrealistic. Didn't mind the sex just wish there was a reason for some of it. Felt the relationship between the female lead and her "father" wasn't explained and developed fully. This was just an ok book.

5 comments about Making Music Make Money: An Insider's Guide to Becoming Your Own Music Publisher (Berklee Press).

1. If you're a songwriter or composer with a growing collection of marketable songs, you'll want to read this book and learn the best way to get AND stay in the music business. You'll learn that the best way to get "signed" with a great publisher is simply to become one. This important point is covered in the first chapter so you won't miss anything.
   
   Read it carefully, take good notes and apply the basic principles. You'll be glad you did and you'll be on the way to becoming your own "best" music publisher! If you have quality material you'll be in a strong position to negotiate licensing deals for your songs while keeping full control of your own publishing. This is especially important if you're producing "hit" material whose value will increase over time.
   
   As a self-published music composer and producer I can tell you that this book, "Making Music Make Money", has really helped me apply and understand the things I've been doing with my own music publishing and licensing ventures. Don't sell yourself short, learn how to copyright, publish and license your own music. This book will show you how and save you years of trouble and wasted time. Publish your own music and join the new Music Biz 2.0!



2. Great ideas for starting your own publishing company, but the book is more focused on the song plugger. A better book for publishing company start-up is "Start & Run Your Own Record Label," by Daylle Schwartz.



3. Has some insight about how to get put on, but not much more than I already knew about.



4. This book is a must read for anyone that's serious about starting their own music publishing business. It's full of good advice on how to become a music publisher and the roles that a music publisher fills. Eric makes you really think about the course you want your business to take.
   
   I highly recommend it!



5. It's not cool to promote your book at another authors expense.
   You be the judge. Check out the "interesting" reviews of the Ty Cohen book the previous reviewer is promoting.
   But to be promoting that book here is inapropriate at best.

5 comments about Spring's Awakening.

1. I bought this title after hearing all the buzz about the current Broadway musical of the same name inspired by this original. I personally found it dated, full of the cliches of late Imperial German culture and its outlook: histrionic, melodramatic and just plain corny. Perhaps readers more sympathetic to or in-tune with that epoch and its values might find this a moving or interesting read. What I got from it, though was a clearer idea of why the post-World War I Weimar Republic's avante-garde couldn't wait to sweep away the cultural system that produced this kind of stuff.



2. I assigned this play to my drama class this fall. At first reading, I witnessed my students' eyes light up and watched them get involved in serious introspection and discussion for the first time. They were inspired. One ignorant parent contacted school administration, and the play was officially banned from our school and the classroom. What a shame. Sad to say...the narrowmindedness of parents haven't changed much in 100 years. Maybe this parent should read the play and then try to get to know her teenager a little better.



3. this play took me about an hour to read, and moved very slowly in my opinion. I love the musical adaptation, but reading this was not exciting at all, it felt like I was reading it for class.



4. Who'd have believed that this work, first created in 1891, could still be just as accessable and classic today? But it was - and is- although it was surrounded by a swirl of controversy when first published. The play focuses on teen sexuality, abortion, angst, guilt and all the throes of puberty and adolescence. As of this writing, it has received many Tony Awards, well deserved.
   If you don't have a chance to see the play in person, this is the next best thing. If you'd like to hear the music, check this out:
   
   Spring Awakening (2006 Original Broadway Cast)



5. I admit I was intrigued to read this play both because I am going to see the musical adaptation in New York and because of the controversy surrounding the content for over a hundred years. The numerous forwards are tough to slog through at times but the play itself is a great read and really captures the angst of youth. Read in 1890 or 2007, this play is relevant to all of us who remember the strange and scary trip that was or is puberty.

3 comments about What an Art Director Does: An Introduction to Motion Picture Production Design.

1. I am a video production teacher and this book is an outstanding resource to teach kids what a career as an art director can entail. The chapters are clear and have great graphics and pictures to reinforce the information. My students who have used the book so far have enjoyed it.



2. Es un libro que explica bien el trabajo de los directores artísticos norteamericanos, su utilidad en otros países es más dudosa. Buenas ilustraciones, bien escrito.



3. For the art or architecture student who is into films and is still uncertain of a career direction, this book lays out the procedure and the challenges in becoming a motion picture art director or a production designer. While covering the "nuts and bolts" of the work, the messages are often driven home by war stories from the author's own experiences in the business. Easy Reading.

1 comments about Fundamentals of Organizational Communication (6th Edition).

1. They said they would ship in 1-2 days. I got it 3 weeks later. Disappointed.