Making Movies

**Author:** Sidney Lumet **Estimated Reading Time:** 48 minutes **What You'll Learn:** The complete creative and technical process of directing a film, from first reading the script through the final color correction, as revealed by one of cinema's most accomplished directors. **Who This Book Is For:** Aspiring filmmakers, film students, working directors seeking wisdom from a master, and anyone who has ever wondered what actually happens behind the camera.

Most people watch movies their entire lives without ever understanding how they come to exist. A film appears on a screen. The story unfolds. The credits roll. And somewhere in the back of the audience's mind, there is a vague awareness that someone called a director was involved. But what does a director actually do? Sidney Lumet directed more than fifty films over five decades. He received four Academy Award nominations for Best Director and an honorary Oscar for lifetime achievement. His films include *12 Angry Men*, *Serpico*, *Dog Day Afternoon*, *Network*, and *The Verdict*. He worked with Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, Katharine Hepburn, Henry Fonda, Paul Newman, and Ingrid Bergman. He knew the craft of filmmaking as thoroughly as anyone who ever stepped onto a set. And yet Lumet opens this book with a confession. He does not know how to make a movie. He knows how *he* makes a movie. Every director develops a personal method, a unique way of solving the thousands of problems that arise between the first spark of an idea and the final print. There is no single correct way. There is only the way that works for you. This book is Lumet sharing his way. He takes the reader through the entire process, beginning with the script and ending with the answer print. He explains how he chooses material, how he works with writers, how he casts actors, how he designs shots, how he rehearses, how he shoots, how he edits, how he works with composers and sound designers, and how he navigates the often treacherous waters of studio relationships. But this is not a technical manual. Lumet is not interested in teaching you which lens to use or how to read a light meter. He is interested in something deeper: the thinking behind the choices. Why does a director decide to shoot a scene in a single continuous take rather than cutting between angles? Why does a particular performance feel truthful while another feels false? How does the color of a wall affect the emotional temperature of a scene? Lumet answers these questions through stories from his own films. He describes the agonizing decisions, the happy accidents, the battles with studios, and the moments of pure creative exhilaration. He is candid about his failures…