An adjunct professor at UCLA, Schreibman presents an essential outline - culled from his own experience in theater, film, and TV - of what is needed to get the unbelievably complex job done.

Admirably well-sourced, consistently evenhanded, and remarkably succinct, A Life is now the authoritative biography of an appalling, albeit fascinating, figure of cinema.

With in-depth interviews of Billy Wilder, Robert Altman, Martin Scorsese, Stanley Kubrick, Ingmar Bergman and more, you can read this Playboy offering "for the articles."

In his biography of the half-forgotten yet indomitable African-American film pioneer, McGilligan deftly assembles the sterling research of several scholars into a compelling account of a quixotic life.

As this Taschen volume makes clear, the Master of Suspense remains appealing to cineastes young and old, with 50-plus features underscoring his timeless ingenuity.

Author Gwenda Young makes the case that from the silent era to the golden age, Clarence Brown deserves a place among the giants.

Director Ernst Lubitsch, who was idolized by Wilder and Welles, is brought into sharp focus.

The making of George Stevens' Texas-sized epic is recounted in Don Graham's meticulously chronicled book.

As the newly scaled down yet no less comprehensive Taschen book Stanley Kubrick’s Napoleon: The Greatest Movie Never Made demonstrates, Kubrick was nothing if not a completist.