Motion Pictures: Making Cinema Magic

Profiles eight inventors of motion picture technology, including W.K.L. Dickson, Auguste and Louis Lumiáere, Lee de Forest, Herbert Kalmus, Linwood Dunn, Mike Todd, and Garrett Brown.

Gr 6 Up-One could, perhaps, not find a better case study of the combined potency of unbridled imagination, scrappily competitive technical innovation, and gutsy entrepreneurship than the history of cinema. By thoroughly profiling the lives and work of eight of the major technological innovators, De Angelis provides a sweeping and nearly seamless chronological overview of the evolution of the motion-picture industry, from the first crude "flickers" to the advent of fully computer-generated productions. While the book provides a basic history of moviemaking that's easily understandable to readers with no prior knowledge of the subject, it's also valuable as a collective biography. The innovators include W. K. L. Dickson, Auguste and Louis LumiŠre, Lee de Forest, Herbert Kalmus, Linwood Dunn, Mike Todd, and Garrett Brown, and they can be researched individually without losing too much contextual understanding. Students who read the entire book, though, will find a cohesive, wide-angle, 125-year-long chronicle of the influential medium's fascinating history, illustrated with black-and-white archival photos and reproductions.-Jeffrey Hastings, Highlander Way Middle School, Howell, MI Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.