The Total Film-Maker

London: Vision Press Limited. Near Fine in Near Fine dj. 1974 (c.1971). 1st U.K. edition. Hardcover. [extremely light foxing to edges of text block, otherwise a nice book with no significant wear; jacket a teensy bit rubbed, tiny piece torn off lower corner of front flap, faint soiling to the all-white rear panel]. (B&W photographs) The first British edition of this highly-regarded primer on the basics of movie-making. For several years, beginning in the Fall of 1967, Lewis taught a graduate seminar at the University of Southern California cinema school; this book, derived from hundreds of hours of tape recordings made during his classes, is a distillation of all the wisdom dispensed by Jer during that time, including his thoughts on comedy, which constitute the latter section of the book. Although Lewis as a director has taken far more than his share of snarkiness and disdain from his fellow countrymen (usually accompanied by some ignorant comment directed at "the French"), in fact as he has always been insightful and innovative, and every page of this book communicates his enthusiasm for the nuts and bolts of the filmmaking process. One critic, reviewing the book many years after it had gone out of print, called it "probably the most readable and common-sensical book any aspiring director could own. If you want to make movies, do what you have to do to find a copy." If you are reading this, you've found one; so whattya gonna do? .