American Zoetrope is the name of the studios founded by Francis Ford Coppola, named after a collection of zoetropes he was given in the late 1960s by filmmaker and collector of early motion picture making equipment, Mogens Skot-Hansen. Francis Ford Coppola (born April 7, 1939 in Detroit, Michigan) is an American film director, screenwriter, vintner, magazine publisher, and hotelier. ... A modern replica of a Victorian zoetrope. ... Events and trends The 1960s was a turbulent decade of change around the world. ...

Originally housed in a warehouse in San Francisco in 1969, the studio has released not only the films of Coppola (The Godfather Trilogy, Apocalypse Now, The Black Stallion, etc.) but George Lucas's pre-Star Wars films, THX-1138 and American Graffiti, as well as many others by cutting edge directors, including Koyaanisqatsi, Powaqqatsi and Naqoyqatsi by Godfrey Reggio. 1969 was a common year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1969 calendar). ... The Godfather is a novel written by Mario Puzo about a fictitious Italian Mafia family. ... Apocalypse Now is a 1979 American film by Francis Ford Coppola, inspired by Joseph Conrads classic novella Heart of Darkness. ... The Black Stallion is a 1979 film which tells the story of a boy who is shipwrecked on a desert island with a wild Arab stallion. ... George Lucas George Walton Lucas, Jr. ... THX 1138 was George Lucas first full length movie. ... American Graffiti is a 1973 film directed by George Lucas that is set in California during 1962 against the backdrop of commentary and music created by disc jockey Wolfman Jack from his US broadcasting studio that is linked to the transmitter of border-blaster XERB in Mexico. ... Koyaanisqatsi: Life out of balance is a documentary film directed by Godfrey Reggio which consists mostly of slow motion and time-lapse (fast motion) footage, starting with a cave painting, progressing to footage of various natural environmental phenomena such as waves and cloud formations, and then to footage of man... Powaqqatsi: Life in Transformation is the 1988 sequel to the experimental 1983 documentary film Koyaanisqatsi, by Godfrey Reggio. ... Naqoyqatsi: Life as war is a documentary film released in 2002; it is the third and final film of the Qatsi trilogy by Godfrey Reggio. ... Godfrey Reggio (born March 29, 1940) is a United States director of experimental documentary films. ...

The studios today offer many production and post-production services, including Telecine, sound mixing, editing and screening rooms. Its most recent production was Lost in Translation, written and directed by Sofia Coppola, Francis's daughter, for which she won 2003's Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay. Telecine is the process of transferring motion picture film to a video format, such as television, or a machine used to complete this process. ... Lost in Translation is a (2003) motion picture. ... Sofia Coppola Sofia Coppola (born May 14, 1971) is an American film director, actress, producer, and writer and is the daughter of director Francis Ford Coppola. ... 2003 is a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay is the Academy Award for the best script not based upon previously published material. ...

"Zoetrope" is also the name by which Coppola's quarterly fiction magazine, Zoetrope All-Story (http://www.all-story.com/), is popularly referred.

External links

• Zoetrope Virtual Studio (http://www.zoetrope.com/index.cgi) American Zoetrope's official website