Over the past decade, movie audiences have become hungry for films based on real people and historical events. Never was this more evident than during the best-picture showdown between The King’s Speech and The Social Network during the 2011 Academy Awards, a scene then repeated, with Argo, Lincoln and Zero Dark Thirty in the 2013 awards.. While Hollywood moguls have come to recognize the box-office revenue and critical acclaim that accompany such films and are now fast-tracking many docudramas into theaters, there remains a need for more reality-based film scripts. In From “Chariots of Fire” to “The King’s Speech,” writer, director, and producer Alan Rosenthal presents a manual for screenwriters to develop their bio-pic or docudrama from concept to completion. This comprehensive guide begins with an overview of the genre before providing screenwriters with all the techniques and insights needed to navigate the often intimidating landscape of screenwriting for reality-based scripts. Included within the volume are tips for such challenges as inception and research, developing dialogue and narration, and capably addressing any legal and rights issues that may arise. Also included are appendixes containing useful marketing tips and broadcast guidelines. A practical, down-to-earth manual for experienced and novice screenwriters alike, From “Chariots of Fire” to “The King’s Speech” is the only manual dedicated explicitly to writing the bio-pic and docudrama. Rosenthal shares his decades of experience in the film industry, along with hands-on tools and maps, to help screenwriters completely master this popular film genre.

Assesses how cinematic biographies of key figures reflect and shape what it means to be British. Rule, Britannia! surveys the British biopic, a genre crucial to understanding how national cinema engages with the collective experience and values of its intended audience. Offering a provocative take on an aspect of filmmaking with profound cultural significance, the volume focuses on how screen biographies of prominent figures in British history and culture can be understood as involved, if unofficially, in the shaping and promotion of an ever-protean national identity. The contributors engage with the vexed concept of British nationality, especially as this sense of collective belonging is problematized by the ethnically oriented alternatives of English, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish nations. They explore the critical and historiographical issues raised by the biopic, demonstrating that celebration of conventional virtue is not the genre’s only natural subject. Filmic depictions of such personalities as Elizabeth I, Victoria, George VI, Elizabeth II, Margaret Thatcher, Iris Murdoch, and Jack the Ripper are covered. “This exceptional collection offers new ways of looking at these films as films, as well as a fresh approach to British history as a cultural whole.” — Wheeler Winston Dixon

In a new edition of this popular guidebook, filmmakers Alan Rosenthal and Ned Eckhardt show readers how to utilize the latest innovations in equipment, technologies, and production techniques for success in the digital, web-based world of documentary film. All twenty-four chapters of the volume have been revised to reflect the latest advances in documentary filmmaking. Rosenthal and Eckhardt discuss the myriad ways in which technological changes have impacted the creation process of documentary films, including how these evolving technologies both complicate and enrich filmmaking today. The book provides crucial insights for the filmmaker from the film’s conception to distribution of the finished film. Topics include creating dynamic proposals, writing narration, and navigating the murky world of contracts. Also included are many practical tips for first-time filmmakers. To provide context and to illustrate techniques, Rosenthal and Eckhardt reference more than one hundred documentaries in detail. A new appendix, “Using the Web and Social Media to Prepare for Your Career,” guides filmmakers through the process of leveraging social media and crowdsourcing for success in filmmaking, fund-raising, and promotion. A day-to-day field manual packed with invaluable lessons, this volume is essential reading for both novice and experienced documentary filmmakers.

This revelatory memoir from Britain's former Prime Minister offers vital insights into our extraordinary times. Former Prime Minister and the country's longest-serving Chancellor, Gordon Brown has been a guiding force for Britain and the world over three decades. This is his candid, poignant and deeply relevant story. In describing his upbringing in Scotland as the son of a minister, the near loss of his eyesight as a student and the death of his daughter within days of her birth, he shares the passionately-held principles that have shaped and driven him, reminding us that politics can and should be a calling to serve. Reflecting on the personal and ideological tensions within Labour and its successes and failures in power, he describes how to meet the challenge of pursuing a radical agenda within a credible party of government. From the invasion of Iraq to the tragedy of Afghanistan, from the coalition negotiations of 2010 to the referendums on Scottish independence and Europe, Gordon Brown draws on his unique experiences to explain Britain's current fractured condition. By showing us what progressive politics has achieved in recent decades, he inspires us with a vision of what it might yet achieve. Riveting, expert and highly personal, this historic memoir is an invaluable insight into our times.

Producing and Directing the Short Film and Video, Fifth Edition is the definitive book on the subject for the serious film student or beginning filmmaker. Its unique two-fold approach looks at filmmaking from the perspectives of both the producer and director, and clearly explains how their separate roles must work together to create a successful short film or video. Through extensive examples from award-winning shorts and insightful interviews, you will learn about common challenges the filmmakers encountered during each step of filmmaking process—from preproduction to production, postproduction, and distribution—and the techniques they used to overcome them. In celebrating this book’s twentieth anniversary, this edition has been updated to include: Two all-new, in-depth cases studies of esteemed short films—Memory Lane and the Academy Award-winning God of Love A revised chapter progression that reinforces the significance of the actor - director relationship Interviews with the filmmakers integrated alongside the text, as well as new images and behind-the-scenes coverage of production processes Revamped sections on current financing strategies, postproduction workflows, and the wide variety of distribution platforms now available to filmmakers A "Where are They Now" appendix featuring updates on the original filmmakers covered in the first edition An expanded companion website (www.focalpress.com/cw/rea) containing useful forms and information on distributors, grants and financing sources, film and video festivals, film schools, internet sources for short works, and professional associations

The vast majority of screenplay and writing books that focus on story development have little to say about the initial concept that inspired the piece. Developing Story Ideas: The Power and Purpose of Storytelling, Third Edition provides writers with ideational tools and resources to generate a wide variety of stories in a broad range of forms. Celebrated filmmaker and author Michael Rabiger demonstrates how to observe situations and themes in the writer’s own life experience, and use these as the basis for original storytelling. This new edition has been updated with chapters on adaptation, improvisation, and cast collaboration’s roles in story construction, as well as a companion website featuring further projects, class assignments, instructor resources, and more. Gain the practical tools and resources you need to spark your creativity and generate a wide variety of stories in a broad range of forms, including screenplays, documentaries, novels, short stories, and plays Through hands-on, step-by-step exercises and group and individual assignments, learn to use situations and themes from your own life experience, dreams, myth, and the news as the basis for character-driven storytelling; harness methods of screenplay format, dialogue, plot structure, and character development that will allow your stories to reach their fullest potential

In our era of ‘fake news’, Stella Bruzzi examines the dynamism that results from reusing and reconfiguring raw documentary data (documents, archive, news etc.) in creative ways. Through a series of individual case studies, this book offers an innovative framework for understanding how, in our century, film and media texts frequently represent reality and negotiate the instabilities of ‘truth’ by ‘approximating’ factual events rather than merely representing them, through juxtaposing disparate, often colliding, perspectives of history and factual events. Covering areas such as true crime, politics and media, the book analyses the fluidity and instability of truth, arguing that 'approximation' is more prevalent now in our digital age, and that its conception is a result of viewers’ accidental or unconscious connections and interventions. Original and thought-provoking, Approximation provides students and researchers of media, film and cultural studies a deeper insight into our understanding and acceptance of what truth really means today.