Blockbuster: How Hollywood Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Summer

"It's a typical summer Friday night and the smell of popcorn is in the air. Throngs of fans jam into air-conditioned multiplexes to escape for two hours in the dark, blissfully lost in Hollywood's latest glittery confection complete with megawatt celebrities, awesome special effects, and enormous marketing budgets. The world is in love with the blockbuster movie, and these cinematic behemoths have risen to dominate the film industry, breaking box office records every weekend. With the passion and wit of a true movie buff and the insight of an internationally renowned critic, Tom Shone is the first to make sense of this phenomenon by taking readers through the decades that have shaped the modern blockbuster and forever transformed the face of Hollywood. The moment the shark fin broke the water in 1975, a new monster was born. Fast, visceral, and devouring all in its path, the blockbuster had arrived. In just a few weeks Jaws earned more than $100 million in ticket sales, an unprecedented feat that heralded a new era in film. Soon, blockbuster auteurs such as Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, and James Cameron would revive the flagging fortunes of the studios and lure audiences back into theaters with the promise of thrills, plenty of action, and an escape from art house pretension. But somewhere along the line, the beast they awakened took on a life of its own, and by the 1990s production budgets had escalated as quickly as profits. Hollywood entered a topsy-turvy world ruled by marketing and merchandising mavens, in which flops like Godzilla made money and hits had to break records just to break even. The blockbuster changed from a major event that took place a few times a year into something that audiences have come to expect weekly, piling into the backs of one another in an annual demolition derby that has left even Hollywood aghast. Tom Shone has interviewed all the key participants -- from cinematic visionaries like Spielberg and Lucas and the executives who greenlight these spectacles down to the effects wizards who detonated the Death Star and blew up the White House -- in order to reveal the ways in which blockbusters have transformed how Hollywood makes movies and how we watch them. As entertaining as the films it chronicles, Blockbuster is a must-read for any fan who delights in the magic of the movies. "

Share your thoughts on the Blockbuster: How Hollywood Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Summer ebook with other internet viewers!

Title of ebook: Blockbuster: How Hollywood Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Summer
ISBN: 9780743274319
parent-ISBN: 9780743235686
Publisher: Free Press
Internet download file size: 2901 kb
Published: 12-2004
Released online for download: 12-07-2004
Author of eBook: Shone, Tom

Format

Encrypted

Sku

ISBN

File size

Security

Printing

Copying

Read aloud

Devices

Digital Editions

Yes

5551414825

9780743274319

2901 KB

n/a

Not allowed

Sys Requirments

Download reader

Blockbuster

How Hollywood Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Summer

Chapter 1: Panic on the 4th of July

"We entered the bicentennial year having survived some of the bitterest times in our brief history. We longed for something to draw us together again."
-- America's Bicentennial Report, 1976

"She was the first..."
-- Jaws poster, 1975

The final cut of Steven Spielberg's Jaws was unveiled to the world on the night of March 28, 1975, at the Lakewood Theater, in Long Beach, California.

It wasn't the first screening of the film; a rough cut had already been tested in Dallas -- as far away from salt water as possible, to see how the movie would play in the mainland. "There was a driving rain," remembers producer Richard Zanuck, "and we were concerned that nobody would show up. In those days we didn't use recruited audiences. We used regular audiences. Somebody from publicity would tell a local disc jockey to drop a rumor once or twice during the day." A nervous Spielberg hovered at the back by the door, biting his nails and watching the audienc ... read full excerpt from Blockbuster: How Hollywood Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Summer ebook

Other Shone, Tom ebooks:

receive alert on new Shone, Tom ebooks

Blockbuster: How Hollywood Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Summer

"It's a typical summer Friday night and the smell of popcorn is in the air. Throngs of fans jam into air-conditioned m ...

Best price: $22.82

Other Art & Music eBooks Categories

Architecture (242)

Art (877)

Comics & Graphic Novels (71)

Film & Video (267)

Mass Media (34)

Music (978)

Performing Arts (181)

Photography (180)

Television (118)

Theater (154)

Top eBooks in Performing Arts

An Education
by Hornby, Nick

From the New York Times bestselling author�''the shooting script to his award-winning film, with an original Introduction and vivid stills from the movie. ...more

Best price: $14.00

Cutting Rhythms: Shaping the Film Edit
by Pearlman, Karen

There are many books on the technical aspects of film and video editing: e.g., how to use software packages like Final Cut Pro and Avid. Much rarer are books on...more

Best price: $43.90

Court TV's You Be the Judge: 100 Incredible, Provocative, and Fascinating Real-Life Cases
by Sauer, Patrick J.

A drug dealer gets shot in a hotel parking lot - is the hotel liable?
Do workers have a right to organize when they're illegal aliens?
Can the KKK march ...more

Best price: $6.13

Church Dramas: Volume 4
by Knill, Rebecca A.

Church Dramas: Volume 4 packs 30 comedies and dramas into a sharp, tightly-written compilation of scripts suitable for the Sunday service. Volume 4

Best price: $5.42

2 Plays by Donald Batchelor
by Batchelor, Donald

Old Raleigh Road is a play in three acts. It is a serious look at the tobacco issue both economically and morally. A tobacco farmer contracts ...more

Best price: $15.16

Adobe Reader Information:

Adobe Digital Editions requirements

Windows

Microsoft® Windows® 2000 with Service Pack 4, Windows XP with Service Pack 2, or Windows Vista™ (32- and 64-bit editions supported)
Intel® Pentium® 500MHz processor. 128MB of RAM. 800 x 600 monitor resolution

Macintosh PowerPC

Mac OS X v.10.3.9 or 10.4.8
PowerPC® G4 or G5 500MHz processor
128 MB of RAM

Note: Mac OSX 10.5 is not yet supported.

Linux

Digital Editions does not support Linux OS

Adobe Reader 7 requirements

Windows

Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 or 7, Mozilla Firefox 2
Adobe Flash® Player 7, 8, or 9

Macintosh

Apple Safari 2.0.4, Mozilla FireFox 2
Adobe Flash Player 8 or 9

Why must I activate my Adobe Reader?

Many publishers require powerful copy protection for their eBook titles. In order for you to be able to purchase and download eBook titles that have been secured for distribution, you first need to activate your Adobe Reader. Just as a credit card typically must be activated by a bank before use, your Adobe Reader needs to be activated before you can purchase and read eBooks packaged for secure distribution.

Can I print or copy my Adobe ebook?

To protect copyrights, publishers and authors establish their own guidelines for how much of their eBooks can be printed or copied. This means that these permissions will differ from book to book. Each ebook file has a differing level of encryption which is controlled by the author/publisher at creation. For example, a publisher might give users the ability to print several pages of a cookbook within a set period of time. You'll see specifc settings for the Adobe title under the ebook description.