Synopses & Reviews
From David Puttnam--producer of such modern film classics as Chariots of Fire, The Killing Fields, Midnight Express,
and The Mission, and the only European to have run a major Hollywood studio--an insightful and provocative history that
explains the personalities and events which shaped film's transformation from a technological curiosity into one of the
world's most powerful cultural and economic forces.
From the early rivalry between its inventors to the power-brokering and political influence of today's mega-stars;
from Zukor and Laemmle to Ovitz and Eisner; from the serendipitous discovery of Los Angeles ("flagstaff no good," wired
Cecil B. De Mille. "want authority to rent barn for $75 a month in place called hollywood") to the exploitation and
depredation of Europe's film culture in the name of the marketplace, Puttnam captures the urgency and wonder that swept
through a young industry and set it spinning on an axis of money and power. Movies and Money chronicles the unprecedented
collision between art and commerce, and incisively analyzes its implications in today's global arena.
Puttnam's engaging history is also an impassioned polemic: From the moment Thomas Edison stole the first crude attempt at a
movie camera from the French scientist Étienne Jules Marey, Hollywood and Europe have existed, the author claims, in a state
of undeclared hostility--hostility that has occasionally erupted into open battle for control of the century's most powerful
artistic medium. And this battle, he contends, will ultimately determine the nature of Europe's cultural identity. He also argues
forcefully for the intelligent application of the language and techniques of cinema to education, urging filmmakers to make films
that challenge and inspire as well as entertain.
Ten years after his abrupt departure from Columbia, Puttnam re-enters the debate about cinema with characteristic audacity,
with the irreverence of an iconoclast and the canniness of a seasoned player. Movies and Money is a book that will change our
understanding of the history--and future--of film.
Synopsis
From David Puttnam, the award-winning producer and former president of Columbia Pictures, a riveting chronicle of the birth of film and how Hollywood won the war for control of world cinema.
Producer of such modern classics as Chariots of Fire, The Killing Fields, and Midnight Express, and the only European ever to run a Hollywood studio, Puttnam is at once a consummate insider and the ultimate rebel. Now, 10 years after his abrupt departure from Columbia, he delivers the controversial Movies and Money.
It is the story of an unprecedented collision between art and commerce, and of the tacit war that erupted between Europe and America when movies exploded into high-stakes business. From the rivalry between its first inventors to the unparalleled influence of today's megastars, Puttnam describes how film became one of the most powerful economic and cultural forces of all time, how America relentlessly plundered European markets to gain control of the industry, and how America's victory has affected the hearts, minds, and imaginations of audiences around the world.
At once judicious, impassioned, and provocative, this is a book that will change our understanding of the history of film.
About the Author
David Puttnam is the Oscar-winning producer of Chariots of Fire, The Killing Fields, Midnight Express, Local Hero,
and The Mission. He was chairman of Columbia Pictures from 1986 to 1988 and now works principally in the field of
education, serving as an adviser to a number of UK government departments; as chancellor of the University of Sunderland;
and as a governor and lecturer at the London School of Economics. In 1995 he received a knighthood for his services to the
British film industry, and in August 1997 he was appointed to the House of Lords. He divides his time between England and
Ireland.