Movies from Neil Gaiman

The Booksellers

What once seemed like an esoteric world now seems essential to our culture: the community of rare book dealers and collectors who, in their love of the delicacy and tactility of books, are helping to keep the printed word alive. D.W. Young’s elegant and entertaining documentary, executive produced by Parker Posey, is a lively tour of New York’s book world, past and present, from the Park Avenue Armory’s annual Antiquarian Book Fair, where original editions can fetch hundreds of thousands of dollars; to the Strand and Argosy book stores, still standing against all odds; to the beautifully crammed apartments of collectors and buyers. The film features a litany of special guests, including Fran Lebowitz, Susan Orlean, Gay Talese, and a community of dedicated book dealers who strongly believe in the wonder of the object and the everlasting importance of what’s inside.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
It's marvelous!!
Movies from Neil Gaiman

Lucky Day

Red, a safe cracker who has just been released from prison, is trying to hold his family together as his past catches up with him in the form of Luc, a psychopathic contract killer who's seeking revenge for the death of his brother.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I really want to see this. When @avary first told me about it, it was a sequel to Killing Zoe, a film I still love. It became its own thing, and it has @CrispinGlover in it.
Movies from Neil Gaiman

Killing Zoe

Zed is an American vault-cracker who travels to Paris to meet up with his old friend Eric. Eric and his gang have planned to raid the only bank in the city which is open on Bastille day. After offering his services, Zed soon finds himself trapped in a situation beyond his control when heroin abuse, poor planning and a call-girl named Zoe all conspire to turn the robbery into a very bloody siege.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I really want to see this. When @avary first told me about it, it was a sequel to Killing Zoe, a film I still love.
Movies from Neil Gaiman

Penn & Teller Get Killed

Penn & Teller enjoy playing jokes on each other. When Penn says on an interview show that he wishes he has someone threatening his life so that he "wouldn't sweat the small stuff," each of them begins a series of pranks on the other to suggest a real threat. Then they find that a real psychopath is interested in them.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Still a remarkable film. The going through the metal detector gag. The pigeon catch...
Movies from Neil Gaiman

Franz Kafka's It's a Wonderful Life

Franz Kafka has been stricken with a serious case of writer's block on Christmas Eve. He's trying to get started on his latest short story, "The Metamorphosis", but he isn't sure what his protagonist Gregor Samsa should become. As Kafka struggles with indecision, he has to contend with a loud holiday party downstairs, several unexpected guests, and a sinister knife salesman who has a bone to pick with him.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I suddenly realised that there are people out there who have Never Seen "Franz Kafka's It's a Wonderful Life" the film that won director Peter Capaldi (the same one, yes) an Oscar.
Movies from Neil Gaiman

Missing Link

The charismatic Sir Lionel Frost considers himself to be the world's foremost investigator of myths and monsters. Trouble is, none of his small-minded, high-society peers seems to recognize this. Hoping to finally gain acceptance from these fellow adventurers, Sir Lionel travels to the Pacific Northwest to prove the existence of a legendary creature known as the missing link.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
This is Ash's favourite film. I loved it too...
Movies from Neil Gaiman

Alice

A quiet young English girl named Alice finds herself in an alternate version of her own reality after chasing a white rabbit. She becomes surrounded by living inanimate objects and stuffed dead animals, and must find a way out of this nightmare- no matter how twisted or odd that way must be. A memorably bizarre screen version of Lewis Carroll’s novel ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
What I find fascinating about Alice is that on the one hand, it's profoundly nightmarish," Gaiman says of the film, in which a mostly live-action young girl wanders through a landscape of animated skulls, socks and pieces of meat. "But the film also, whatever it says about my family, I brought it home on video the moment it came out, and my then 3-year-old daughter, it became her favorite film ... I think, particularly in my daughter Holly's case, I forgot to mention to her that it was supposed to be scary, and she just saw it as a wonderful animation of Lewis Carroll's Alice."
Movies from Neil Gaiman

Time Bandits

Young history buff Kevin can scarcely believe it when six dwarfs emerge from his closet one night. Former employees of the Supreme Being, they've purloined a map charting all of the holes in the fabric of time and are using it to steal treasures from different historical eras. Taking Kevin with them, they variously drop in on Napoleon, Robin Hood and King Agamemnon before the Supreme Being catches up with them.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
It's "basically a film about a small boy who discovers that his bedroom is a hole leading to the rest of the universe, and as he is invaded by a number of dwarfs, escaping God with a map to everything ... it's a glorious feat of imagination." Terry Gilliam's work is "always about pushing the bounds of imagination," Gaiman says.
Movies from Neil Gaiman

The Bride of Frankenstein

Bride of Frankenstein begins where James Whale's Frankenstein from 1931 ended. Dr. Frankenstein has not been killed as previously portrayed and now he wants to get away from the mad experiments. Yet when his wife is kidnapped by his creation, Frankenstein agrees to help him create a new monster, this time a woman.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
The Bride of Frankenstein is one of those dream-films. It exists in the culture as a unique thing, magical and odd: a lurching story sequence as ungainly and as beautiful as the monster itself, that culminates in a couple of minutes of film that have seared themselves onto the undermind of the world.
Movies from Neil Gaiman

Bedazzled

Stanley is infatuated with Margaret, the statuesque waitress who works with him. He meets George Spiggott AKA the devil and sells his soul for 7 wishes, which Stanley uses to try and make Margaret his own first as an intellectual, then as a rock star, then as a wealthy industrialist. As each fails, he becomes more aware of how empty his life had been and how much more he has to live for.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I felt like that was of the same DNA as the thing that we were doing … Also Bedazzled, the original Peter Cook and Dudley Moore Bedazzled, which again has a lot of the DNA of Good Omens in it.
Books from Neil Gaiman

Featherhood

“I loved every single page.” —Elton John “The best piece of nature writing since H is for Hawk.” —Neil Gaiman ​In this moving, critically acclaimed memoir, a young man saves a baby magpie as his estranged father is dying, only to find that caring for the mischievous bird saves him.One spring day, a baby magpie falls out of its nest and into Charlie Gilmour’s hands. Magpies, he soon discovers, are as clever and mischievous as monkeys. They are also notorious thieves, and this one quickly steals his heart. By the time the creature develops shiny black feathers that inspire the name Benzene, Charlie and the bird have forged an unbreakable bond. While caring for Benzene, Charlie learns his biological father, an eccentric British poet named Heathcote Williams who vanished when Charlie was six months old, is ill. As he grapples with Heathcote’s abandonment, Charlie comes across one of his poems, in which Heathcote describes how an impish young jackdaw fell from its nest and captured his affection. Over time, Benzene helps Charlie unravel his fears about repeating the past—and embrace the role of father himself. A bird falls, a father dies, a child is born. Featherhood is the unforgettable story of a love affair between a man and a bird. It is also a beautiful and affecting memoir about childhood and parenthood, captivity and freedom, grief and love.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Featherhood is a brilliant book and it’s getting a lot of attention, which makes me very happy.
Books from Neil Gaiman

Views

The first two volumes chronicling the unique art and design of Roger Dean met with huge critical and popular success. Views (1975) went straight to number one in the Sunday Times bestseller list and went on to sell over a million copies. Magnetic Storm (1984) sold over 650,000 copies. These new editions, reworked to accompany the publication of the third book in the trilogy, Dragon's Dream, showcase the instantly recognizable work of Roger Dean. Views showcases the first seven years of Roger Dean's work after his graduation from the Royal College of Art in 1968. It includes paintings and graphics; branding such as the Yes typography and the first Virgin Records logo; groundbreaking stage sets; and album art including iconic early Yes covers such as the award-winning Tales From Topographic Oceans. The new edition streamlines the original square format and retains the combination of concept sketches and brilliantly displayed finished work. Featuring a new foreword, revised typography, and graphic openers and identifying icons, Views showcases and celebrates the art that defined an era.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
"Loved it." - Neil Gaiman
Books from Neil Gaiman

Bizarre Romance

Internationally bestselling author Audrey Niffenegger and her husband, graphic artist Eddie Campbell, collaborate on this quirky, irreverent collection that celebrates and satirises love of all kinds. With thirteen different vignettes about love, loss, fairies, misbehaviour, regret, wanton wrongheadedness, cats, supernatural exterminators, spies, ghosts, more cats, more fairies, and a handful of ex-boyfriends, Bizarre Romance runs the gamut when it comes to relationships. It explores the good, the bad, the ugly and the just plain weird – with Niffenegger's sharp, imaginative prose and Campbell's diverse comic styles, always with a sense of humour and cosmic justice.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
"A wonderful book!" - Neil Gaiman
Books from Neil Gaiman

How Do You Live?

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE FROM STUDIO GHIBLI AND ANIME MASTER HAYAO MIYAZAKI (SPIRITED AWAY, MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO, HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE) "In How Do You Live?, Copper, our hero, and his uncle are our guides in science, in ethics, in thinking. And on the way they take us, through a school story set in Japan in 1937, to the heart of the questions we need to ask ourselves about the way we live our lives. We will experience betrayal and learn about how to make tofu. We will examine fear, and how we cannot always live up to who we think we are, and we learn about shame, and how to deal with it. We will learn about gravity and about cities, and most of all, we will learn to think about things -- to, as the writer Theodore Sturgeon put it, ask the next question." -- from the Foreword by Neil Gaiman This bestselling English-language translation of the Japanese classic about finding one's place in the world is perfect for readers of philosophical fiction like Sophie's World, The Alchemist, or The Little Prince, as well as Miyazaki fans eager to learn more about his favorite book and final film.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
"A wonderful book." - Neil Gaiman
Books from Neil Gaiman

The Black Ridge

'Will undoubtedly become a classic narrative of this scenically magnificent, legend-rich and geologically unique part of Scotland' Cameron McNeish, The Herald Rising a kilometre out of the storm-scoured waters around Scotland's Isle of Skye is a dark battlement of pinnacles and ridgelines: the Cuillin. Plagued by ferocious weather and built from rock that tears skin and confounds compasses, a crossing of the Cuillin is the toughest mountaineering expedition in the British Isles. But the traverse is only part of its lure. Hewn from the innards of an ancient volcano, this mountain range stands like a crown on an island drenched in intrigue. While nineteenth-century climbers flocked to the Alps, the ridge lay untrodden and unyielding. When a generation of mountaineers did come, they found a remarkable prize: the last peaks of Britain to be climbed - peaks that would be named after those who climbed them. Along the way, many others, from artists and poets to mystics and wanderers, have been lured by the Cuillin's haunting beauty and magic. Those who have been seduced by the deadly magic of these mountains attest to the complexity of humans' relationship with the intrigue of our wildest, most dangerous places.The Black Ridge is a journey through the history and into the heights of the Cuillin of Skye - from the ridge's violent birth to the tales of its pioneers, its thrills, its myths and its monsters. From a night spent in a cave beneath its highest peak to the ascent of its most infamous pinnacle, this is an adventure on foot through all seasons across the most mesmerising mountain range in Britain.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
"It felt like it was written for me." - Neil Gaiman
Books from Neil Gaiman

The Colour of Magic

'His spectacular inventiveness makes the Discworld series one of the perennial joys of modern fiction' Mail on SundayNAMED AS ONE OF THE BBC'S 100 MOST INSPIRING NOVELS The Discworld is very much like our own - if our own were to consist of a flat planet balanced on the back of four elephants which stand on the back of a giant turtle, that is . . . ____________________In the beginning there was…a turtle.Somewhere on the frontier between thought and reality exists the Discworld, a parallel time and place which might sound and smell very much like our own, but which looks completely different. Particularly as it’s carried though space on the back of a giant turtle (sex unknown). It plays by different rules.But then, some things are the same everywhere. The Disc’s very existence is about to be threatened by a strange new blight: the world’s first tourist, upon whose survival rests the peace and prosperity of the land.Unfortunately, the person charged with maintaining that survival in the face of robbers, mercenaries and, well, Death, is a spectacularly inept wizard…____________________The Discworld novels can be read in any order but The Colour of Magic is the first book in the Wizards series.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Neil Gaiman mentioned this book on "The Tim Ferriss Show" podcast.
Books from Neil Gaiman

The Jungle Book

Rudyard Kipling's "The Jungle Book" is a childhood classic that has seen many adaptations since it was first published. This is the original 1894 edition that started it all. It includes the original illustrations which introduced the imagination of Kipling to a generation of readers. While many know Mowgli and Baloo and other beloved favorites from the movies, many parents will enjoy presenting the original tale to their children almost exactly the way young people enjoyed it from the beginning. In fact, this original edition also includes illustrations that were drawn by Rudyard Kipling's own father. This 1894 reprint edition will be a family heirloom for generations to come.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Neil Gaiman mentioned this book on "The Tim Ferriss Show" podcast.
Books from Neil Gaiman

Johnny and the Dead

Sell the cemetery?Over their dead bodies . . . Not many people can see the dead (not many would want to). Twelve-year-old Johnny Maxwell can. And he's got bad news for them: the council want to sell the cemetery as a building site. But the dead have learnt a thing or two from Johnny. They're not going to take it lying down . . . especially since it's Halloween tomorrow. Besides, they're beginning to find that life is a lot more fun than it was when they were . . . well . . . alive. Particularly if they break a few rules . . .The second book in the Johnny Maxwell trilogy.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Neil Gaiman mentioned this book on "The Tim Ferriss Show" podcast.
Books from Neil Gaiman

The 13 Clocks

How can anyone describe this book? It isn't a parable, a fairy story or a poem, but rather a mixture of all three. It is beautiful and it is comic. It is philosophical and it is cheery. What we suppose we are trying fumblingly to say is, in a word, that it is Thurber. There are only a few reasons why everybody has always wanted to read this kind of story, but they are basic: Everybody has always wanted to love a Princess. Everybody has always wanted to be a Prince. Everybody has always wanted the wicked Duke to be punished. Everybody has always wanted to live happily ever after. Too little of this kind of thing is going on in the world today. But all of it is going on valorously in "The 13 Clocks.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Neil Gaiman mentioned this book on "The Tim Ferriss Show" podcast.
Books from Neil Gaiman

Trieste And The Meaning Of Nowhere

A book for lovers of all things Italian -- an homage to the city of Trieste. This history-drenched city on the Adriatic has always tantalized Jan Morris with its moodiness and changeability. After visiting Trieste for more than half a century, she has come to see it as a touchstone for her interests and preoccupations: cities, seas, empires. It has even come to reflect her own life in its loves, disillusionments, and memories. Her meditation on Trieste is characteristically layered with history and glows with stories of famous visitors from James Joyce to Sigmund Freud. A lyrical travelogue, Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere is also superb cultural history and the culmination of a singular career -- "an elegant and bittersweet farewell" (Boston Globe).
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
The only one of Jan Morris's books I ever loved. Such a beautiful book.
TV Shows from Neil Gaiman

Wellington Paranormal

New Zealand's capital is a hotbed of supernatural activity... so Officers Minogue and O'Leary, who featured in the vampire documentary What We Do In The Shadows, take to the streets to investigate all manner of paranormal phenomena.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Currently my favourite show, and a benefit of finding myself accidentally in New Zealand. But I'm doling the episodes out as slowly as I can bear to. Two left to go...
TV Shows from Neil Gaiman

The Good Place

Eleanor Shellstrop, an ordinary woman who, through an extraordinary string of events, enters the afterlife where she comes to realize that she hasn't been a very good person. With the help of her wise afterlife mentor, she's determined to shed her old way of living and discover the awesome (or at least the pretty good) person within.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I finished it. I'd been saving the last half dozen episodes until I really needed them. I loved it.
TV Shows from Neil Gaiman

The Big Bang Theory

The sitcom is centered on five characters living in Pasadena, California: roommates Leonard Hofstadter and Sheldon Cooper; Penny, a waitress and aspiring actress who lives across the hall; and Leonard and Sheldon's equally geeky and socially awkward friends and co-workers, mechanical engineer Howard Wolowitz and astrophysicist Raj Koothrappali. The geekiness and intellect of the four guys is contrasted for comic effect with Penny's social skills and common sense.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Oddly, I started watching Big Bang Theory because @DrTempleGrandin mentioned to me how good it was, and how it made Asperger's something neurotypical people could love and understand.
TV Shows from Neil Gaiman

"The Twilight Zone" The After Hours

Directed by Douglas Heyes. With Rod Serling, Anne Francis, Elizabeth Allen, James Millhollin. A woman is treated badly by some odd salespeople on an otherwise empty department store floor.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
One of the things that I love most about this episode is that creeping feeling that the world is not the world you think you're living in."
TV Shows from Neil Gaiman

The Muppet Show

Go behind the curtains as Kermit the Frog and his muppet friends struggle to put on a weekly variety show.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
"The 1970s Muppet Show was one of the comedic glories of the human race," Gaiman says.
Music recommended by Neil Gaiman
6 songs

Nail Gaiman Favorite Music - 6 Musicians

Bands Neil Gaiman used to listen to when he was writing books. Now he doesn't listen to that while writing, because he is easily distracted by words, but he still really loves this music. Enjoy!
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Bands Neil Gaiman used to listen to when he was writing books. Now he doesn't listen to that while writing, because he is easily distracted by words, but he still really loves this music. Enjoy!
Music recommended by Neil Gaiman
3 songs

Neil Gaiman Sandman Inspiration - 3 Artists

Neil Gaiman named 3 musical influences that helped him write his famous comics "Sandman" for DC.
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Neil Gaiman named 3 musical influences that helped him write his famous comics "Sandman" for DC.
Music from Neil Gaiman

The Waitress — Tori Amos

Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
It is a direct quotation from and tribute to @toriamos's song "The Waitress". In my head, Pepper's mum plays a lot of Tori.
Music from Neil Gaiman

Joe Hisaishi

Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Tonight I took Ash (4) to see Joe Hisaishi conduct @MelbSymphony Studio Ghibli music. Ash was joyfully entranced and first to clap.
Music from Neil Gaiman

Memorial — Michael Nyman

Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I can play those over and over again.
Music from Neil Gaiman

50 Song Memoir

Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Merritt is one of our great songwriters. Until now he’s made a point of saying: these songs are not about me. And suddenly, having done that, he writes one song for year of his life,” Gaiman said, “The first 25 years are funny, and the second 25 years keep breaking your heart, over and over again
Music from Neil Gaiman

The Musical World of Neil Gaiman, a playlist by The Dowsers

Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
Indeed, Gaiman claims that one of his great sorrows in life was learning that his father had tickets for the final Ziggy Stardust show but didn’t take him because it was a school night. And don’t get him started on Tori Amos, whose devotion to The Sandman led to a close friendship, or The Magnetic Fields, a.k.a. “My favorite live band.” Gaiman even bought 69 Love Songs in bulk so he could give it away to friends.
Music from Neil Gaiman

The Cost of Living

Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I was sent a link to a video, maybe about 2007, of a Jason Webley song called 'Eleven Saints'. And I loved it, and I put up the video. And Jason suddenly found himself with many thousands more people seeing his video than before. He got in touch and he sent me some of his CDs. And this one broke my heart. It's an incredibly powerful album.
Music from Neil Gaiman

Drowning By Numbers: Music From The Motion Picture

Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
As I get older, I'm finding it harder and harder to write with stuff with lyrics in the background, because I listen to them more and more. In the old days I would happily write and write fiction, with stuff that had good words. And if it didn't have good words, it kind of bored me. And Nyman was the first stuff that I found where I could just do it. It was great.
Music from Neil Gaiman

Imperial Bedroom

Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I picked this one because I love it lyrically, and I remember sitting there trying to decipher the lyrics. I would have been 16, 17, maybe even 18. Definitely an Elvis Costello fan. I'd bought and loved the first three albums.
Goods from Neil Gaiman

Cultures for Health Rye Sourdough Starter

Cultures for Health Rye Sourdough Starter
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I’m in Scotland, on Skye, and every couple of days I make either a loaf of bread or seven bagels with rye flour and the sourdough starter I bought when I got here. I’ve actually gotten really good at sourdough bagels and loaves.
Goods from Neil Gaiman

Leuchtturm1917 Hardcover Notebook

Leuchtturm1917 Hardcover Notebook
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
It’s just a better notebook. I used to use Moleskines, and then the Moleskine paper got thinner, so I switched over to the Leuchtturm. Its first pages include a contents list, so you can put down your page numbers and the topics they cover. It feels really well-designed.
Goods from Neil Gaiman

Pilot Custom 823 Fountain Pen

Pilot Custom 823 Fountain Pen
Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
My favorite fountain pen for the past decade has been a Pilot 823. My favorite ink is Mont Blanc Bordeaux, but they’ve discontinued that, so I’m hunting for a new one.
Goods from Neil Gaiman

Marmite Yeast Extract (500g)



Neil Gaiman
Writer, Screenwriter
I love Marmite.