Tediously written and sloppy—barely an also-ran for any film buff's shelf. (49 film stills)
A revised and updated version of And the Winner Is . . . (1987) provides a decidedly less-than-stellar overview of Hollywood’s annual exercise in tackiness and self-congratulation.
Levy (Cinema of Outsiders, 1999, etc.), senior film critic for Variety, identifies the motive behind the founding of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences in 1927 as a desire to establish the film industry “as a respectable, legitimate institution,” an ambition that has borne fruit in the Academy Awards: “part variety show, part news event, part horse race, part fashion display—and all promotion.” In theory, he has a subject of such intrinsic interest that simply presenting nuggets of trivia (e.g., that Ben-Hur was the first remake ever to win Best Picture) is a sure-fire winner. Unfortunately, his narrative reads like a collection of index cards endlessly reshuffled into different topics, such as early and late recognition of nominees, types of roles most associated with Oscar winners, and the award’s impact on winners. Much of this information will not surprise Oscar junkies. What will surprise them are some of Levy’s “facts” about nominated films: that Anatomy of a Murder hinges on the alleged rape of Lee Remick by a black tavern owner; that Blanche DuBois of A Streetcar Named Desire is a “repressed” Southern belle; and that Forrest Whitaker (rather than Stephen Rea) is shocked by Jaye Davidson’s real gender in The Crying Game. Levy also displays a tin ear for such nuances of language as correct word usage, noting for example that Nurse Ratched of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is “indoctrinary” when he means “doctrinaire.” At times, he produces what can only be viewed as unintentional howlers. Does he really think that Mildred Pierce gave Joan Crawford “a perfect role that captured the essence of her offscreen life”? Christina Crawford might beg to differ.
Tediously written and sloppy—barely an also-ran for any film buff's shelf. (49 film stills)Pub Date: Feb. 23, 2001
ISBN: 0-8264-1284-X
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Continuum
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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