THE IMAGE INDUSTRIES

by S.J. William F. Lynch ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

**""A Constructive Analysis of Films and Television,"" this book is really a pioneer work of great originality and immense practical value. The former editor of Thought (Fordham University Quarterly) here criticizes negatively, in concrete terms and with incisive examples, the current fare generally offered to movie and television audiences in America. He finds the ""image industries"" failing to distinguish between fantasy and reality, ""weakening and flattening out...the area of feeling and sensibility"", restricting freedom of the imagination by techniques of fixation and substituting the spectacular for the true dimensions of human life. He appeals to ""the people"" (as against ""the masses""), to creative theologians (rather than to moralists and censors), to creative artists, responsible critics and the universities to take the film media seriously because they have the power to ""shape the soul"" via the images, feelings and styles of life they project before the nation's audiences. He offers suggestions for creative theologians and creative artists in particular to collaborate in the name of ""good workmanship,"" which has its theological as much as its artistic implications, in an attempt to prevent the film industries, for purely commercial reasons, from pretending to be giving the people what they really want. Fr. Lynch knows whereof he speaks, since he is a highly gifted Catholic theologian, a literary critic, philosopher, artist and instinctive psychologist, who has not lost touch with ""the people"" and has made a serious and exhaustive study of films and television shows. The moralistic note is absent. What he has to say should be of the greatest interest to all concerned, and that should include everyone with a sense of responsibility.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Sheed & Ward

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1959

Categories: NONFICTION