James Mottram's "Making of Memento" is an interesting and intriguing look into the making of the modern day classic Memento. Offered up are excerpts from conversations with director/screen writer Christopher Nolan and actors Guy Pearce, Carrie Anne-Moss, and Joe Pantoliano, while offering a few different interpertations on the film itself. Mottram's style is crisp and clear and he never seems to go too far from his source material while offering up some interesting little known facts (the fact that Brad Pitt strongly considered and wanted to do the role of Lenny came as a shock and I have more respect for him now than I ever did before) that keep the reader interested for most of the time. Also included is the original short story by Jonathan Nolan (brother to Christopher) that inspired the film. All in all, consider this an essential companion piece if your a fan of the film or are trying to tie up some loose ends.

Want to delve deeper into mystery that is Memento? Then look no further as James Mottram does an excellent job of steering us back through the labyrinth of the film (with it's myriad of possible meanings) and it's production. Christopher Nolan is interviewed (along with key cast members and crew) to help shed further light on this fascinating film. With 11 pages of pictures, 3 pages of drawings (concerning Leonard's tattoos), and even Jonathan Nolan's short story (Memento Mori), Mottram seems to have covered all the bases. He wrote it down so that you (and Leonard) wouldn't have to.

Mottram's book offers a fascinating account of how Memento came into being, the trials its creators went through to get it distributed, and offers several interpretations of the film's meaning. It's also filled with interesting vignettes from movie set. The book roughly parallels the movie in that its chapters work backwards toward the source material, Nolan's brother's shortstory Memento Mori. However, its primary focus is on the construction of the movie itself, and how the disparate elements (acting, direction, writing, sound, music) came together to form the first truly great film of the 21st century. Mottram's writing style is clean, focused, and never overwraught. He doesn't make the mistake of overintellectualizing or overinterpreting the the film. This is a must have for Memento fans and offers keen insight as to how independent movies are made.

I've always needed a book where the whole recipe for producint a melodrama was in a single book. The ingredients to producing a melodrama is contained in this book. Name it!!! All of the sheet music needed to add the tunes to your show. Jokes and gags! Even the history. If you want to be a villain, heroine or hero, this book is for you. (You can even get it in tape or CD form from Pioneer Drama Service, Inc. They're the real publisher!)

As an expatriate Quarterite of beau coup years duration, living there from 1964 through 1985, I found this delightful compilation to be a bit like taking a stroll through the old neighborhood. The characters spring to life fully formed in their unforgetable settings, recreating a palpable experience of all the yats and dawlins who make life in the Crescent City almost tolerable...

This fiction collection is a jam session of impressions and emotions with the rhythm and mystique of the French Quarter as the background. The established authors, Ford, Gilchrist, Tennessee Williams, et.al., stories are predictably wonderful, but most interesting are the new writers, notably Jason Wiese's "The Dive", with his fresh perspective on the uniquely "light/dark" aspects of the Quarter.

Biedma is a genious in that he captures a very real, non-traditional side of Spanish life. The truth in his poems is captivating and somewhat addictive. However, as a bi-lingual speaker, I found Nolan's translation to be inacurate and therefor I was forced to give this book only 3 stars. If it had been a Spanish-only version or had been translated properly I would have given it 5.

This is one of finest pieces of Spanish poetry of the second half of this century. It is cunningly sharp and precise, picturing life with a whole range of different colors and yet I must confess that, as with wines, the book acquires a different and better taste as time goes on. It is, with no doubt, good value for money.

There are better, there are more comprehensive, but nothing compares to the every-man approach of this book.

Good writers should be able to make their work suitable for all ages (especially younger readers) without making their prose sound overly simplistic or juvenile. This should be especially easy for books on baseball, since there's "a lot of little boy" in both the writers and readers - it should come naturally. Perfect, unfortunately, is just plain bad. How these writers can take some of the most dramatic stories of baseball and make them uninteresting and virtually unreadable leaves me (nearly) speechless. Even Ken Burns' Baseball series' mention of some of the perfect games in far less space is far more compelling. In addition, I found that there was really very little information - even with the recent games - that isn't already readily available in the briefest of articles found elsewhere. At most a few known quotes and dugout/clubhouse anecdotes can be found for each game, amid a wash of overly simplistic and juvenile text. Book should have been titled "See Spot Pitch". Can't recommend it, sadly.

I just have to say that the writing in this book was very bad, and the best part that someone pionted out as the "nearly perfect" section in the back was written by someone else.

do not buy it.

If a "PERFECT GAME" is a flawless pitching effort, well, author James Buckley didn't pitch one here. Good solid outing, however, by one of the most knowledgeable writers of the Diamond Arena. The research here is as respectable as the writing itself, with the latter being a bit simplistic for the mature reader. Especially rewarding for the student of the game are the earlier pieces and Buckley does a fine job of recalling those faded days when the game was young and fresh and Americans everywhere just could not get enough of it. Highly recommended, especially if, like myself and probably every true baseball fan, you love stats.

It is troubling that this book's author does not properly credit the pioneer in exposing the threats and intrusions of the Therapeutic State. For decades Thomas Szasz has written powerful books decrying the corruption of American society by rampant medicalization of virtually every aspect of life. Much of this book is timidly derivative of Szasz's works, yet he is mentioned only once, just two pages from the end. Nolan didn't even have the decency to credit Szasz with coining the term "Therapeutic State." Given Nolan's watered down critique and standing in the professoriat, perhaps he didn't want to bring himself into professional disrepute by properly and honestly crediting the firebrand Szasz. Ultimately, Szasz's writings are better written, more tightly reasoned and thorough, and far more penetrating. Amazon stocks Thomas Szasz's 1984 book, "Therapeutic State : Psychiatry in the Mirror of Current Events," and that is a far better choice, along with many other works by the one of the great social critics of the last 50 years. Nolan's work is better suited for those who like their reading bland and unchallenging.

This is an impressive and important scholarly work atuned to the cultural pulse of America. Nolan's comprehensive and well argued handling of contemporary American society's "therapeutic ethos" is very insightful and helpful to anyone studying law, education, politics, government, and popular culture in general. This is sociology at its finest--founded strongly in history, and sensitive to the subtle ways we understand ourselves, how we communicate that, and how that affects the way we live.

This book is clearly organized and actually well written-- a rarity in scholarly works. For people with no knowledge of sociology or political science, this book is still very approachable.

I enjoyed reading it and highly reccomend it.

As stated, good cases -still apply to modern business, however, technology demonstrated in the cases is circa '92.

This book, written in 1995, is full of valuable information. Unfortunately, because it is five years old a LOT of the information is out of date. This book seriously needs to be updated.