book: Down and Dirty Pictures: Miramax, Sundance, and the Rise of Independent Film
This book was recommended to me by Greg from coffee mornings. For some reason, we were chatting about films in the 1990s, and he mentioned this book. Its main agenda appears to be painting Harvey Weinstein and, to a lesser extent Robert Redford in a negative light for the changes they made to the independent film industry in the US, but along the way it tells the story of Weinstein’s company – Miramax. Miramax was co-founded by brothers Harvey and Bob Weinstein, and named after their parents – Miriam and Max Weinstein.
In looking at ten or twenty years worth of the film industry and its evolution, details are unearthed (from literally hundreds of interviews) about the deals made behind the scenes, how the movie industry works, and the way that Miramax was involved with a great many of the favourite films from the last decade of the 20th century.
The language in the book (mostly from Harvey Weinstein) is enough, at times, to make a sailor blush, but I found the backstory to a lot of films to be a fascinating read.
If you liked that one, Dave, you should also try Easy Riders, Raging Bulls. Same author, slightly earlier cinematic era.