Portrait of Darren Aronofsky
Reading List
Darren Aronofsky
Film Director and Producer
Darren Aronofsky is an American film director, screenwriter and producer whose work is known for its formal intensity and its interest in obsession, faith and physical endurance.
He made his feature debut with the black-and-white thriller Pi (1998), followed by Requiem for a Dream (2000), The Fountain (2006), The Wrestler (2008) and Black Swan (2010), which brought him an Academy Award nomination for Best Director. His later features include Noah (2014), mother! (2017) and The Whale (2022).
Aronofsky founded the production company Protozoa Pictures and has also produced documentary and non-fiction work, including the natural-history series One Strange Rock.
Hitchcock
The Definitive Study of Alfred Hitchcock
by François Truffaut
“It’s an amazing guide to Hitchcock’s thought process. Truffaut, being a fantastic filmmaker himself, was able to ask really profound, informed questions that really got to the heart of filmmaking. Truffaut got Hitchcock to reveal a lot of the different techniques that he used to put together his monumental body of work.” — via Interview, August 2011
The Ragman’s Son
An Autobiography
by Kirk Douglas
“Kirk was such a brave actor, but he’s also just a brave guy. He broke the blacklist by forcing the studio to put [screenwriter] Dalton Trumbo’s name on Spartacus. It was the first time a blacklisted writer had used his real name, and Douglas used all the power he had built for himself to do that, which was a great risk to his career.” — via Interview, August 2011
Easy Riders, Raging Bulls
How the Sex-Drugs-and-Rock 'n' Roll Generation Saved Hollywood
by Peter Biskind
“This is an incredibly delicious read—just a great, great account of that era from Easy Rider (’69) through the mid-’70s. It’s the story of all those great filmmakers—my icons—Scorsese, Coppola, Friedkin, and Bogdanovich. They changed the way movies were made in America. It recounts their adventures in making movies.” — via Interview, August 2011
The Writer’s Journey
Mythic Structure for Writers
by Christopher Vogler
“Vogler adapted the work of Joseph Campbell, an American academic, to the art of screenwriting. Vogler’s approach to screenwriting was based on Campbell’s theory that, because of myths, the arc of a hero’s journey was a story ingrained deeply inside all of us. I really incorporated his ideas and techniques into how I structured films—I referred to it a lot.” — via Interview, August 2011
Making Movies
by Sidney Lumet · 1996 · Film
“It breaks down the different problems Lumet had in making films, and tells how he solved them. Even though I had only done a bunch of short student films at that point, I could sort of identify with some of the challenges that he dealt with and wrote about. And I eventually got to put some of the stuff to use. Generally, hearing how Lumet navigated the struggles I was running into myself—that was very encouraging.” — via Interview, August 2011