A comprehensive guide to both a classic film and the era that created it.
Courage under the gun, in both art and life.
In this history, Pulitzer Prize winner Frankel (The Searchers: The Making of an American Legend, 2013, etc.) tells the story of the well-known 1952 Western that became virtually an allegory of its own making. High Noon, in which Gary Cooper plays a lawman who has to face a gang of killers alone after he is deserted by his friends and town folk, was made in the thick of the Hollywood blacklisting era, when former or current Communists were dragged before the House Un-American Activities Committee and forced to choose between naming names or kissing their careers goodbye. High Noon entered this fray as kind of an ideological Trojan horse, a story of integrity under assault, written, produced, and directed by a team of socially committed liberals and starring the staunchly Republican Cooper. The book’s key figure is writer Carl Foreman, who at the time of production was under fire for his refusal to play ball with HUAC, a standoff that would last until well after the film was finished. At its heart, the book is the story, through one man’s experience, of how HUAC shaped destinies, as Foreman’s contretemps with HUAC threatened production and fractured his relationships with director Fred Zinnemann, producer Stanley Kramer, and numerous associates. (Cooper, to his credit, rarely let politics get in the way of his friendship with Foreman or with making a good movie.) Besides the macro picture of Hollywood in its darkest era, Frankel is excellent at capturing the micro aspects as well, fascinatingly weaving in multiple and competing accounts of how the film was pieced together in the editing room. The author is occasionally overly worshipful, as well as repetitious, in his appraisal of the film, but he can’t be faulted for lack of thoroughness or research.
A comprehensive guide to both a classic film and the era that created it.Pub Date: Feb. 21, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-62040-948-0
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Chronology, photographs and personal knowledge combine to make a memorable commemorative presentation.
Jackie Kennedy's secret service agent Hill and co-author McCubbin team up for a follow-up to Mrs. Kennedy and Me (2012) in this well-illustrated narrative of those five days 50 years ago when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.
Since Hill was part of the secret service detail assigned to protect the president and his wife, his firsthand account of those days is unique. The chronological approach, beginning before the presidential party even left the nation's capital on Nov. 21, shows Kennedy promoting his “New Frontier” policy and how he was received by Texans in San Antonio, Houston and Fort Worth before his arrival in Dallas. A crowd of more than 8,000 greeted him in Houston, and thousands more waited until 11 p.m. to greet the president at his stop in Fort Worth. Photographs highlight the enthusiasm of those who came to the airports and the routes the motorcades followed on that first day. At the Houston Coliseum, Kennedy addressed the leaders who were building NASA for the planned moon landing he had initiated. Hostile ads and flyers circulated in Dallas, but the president and his wife stopped their motorcade to respond to schoolchildren who held up a banner asking the president to stop and shake their hands. Hill recounts how, after Lee Harvey Oswald fired his fatal shots, he jumped onto the back of the presidential limousine. He was present at Parkland Hospital, where the president was declared dead, and on the plane when Lyndon Johnson was sworn in. Hill also reports the funeral procession and the ceremony in Arlington National Cemetery. “[Kennedy] would have not wanted his legacy, fifty years later, to be a debate about the details of his death,” writes the author. “Rather, he would want people to focus on the values and ideals in which he so passionately believed.”
Chronology, photographs and personal knowledge combine to make a memorable commemorative presentation.Pub Date: Nov. 19, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4767-3149-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A timely contribution to the discussion of a crucial issue.
A history of the right to vote in America.
Since the nation’s founding, many Americans have been uneasy about democracy. Law and policy expert Waldman (The Second Amendment: A Biography, 2014, etc.), president of New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice, offers a compelling—and disheartening—history of voting in America, from provisions of the Constitution to current debates about voting rights and campaign financing. In the Colonies, only white male property holders could vote and did so in public, by voice. With bribery and intimidation rampant, few made the effort. After the Revolution, many states eliminated property requirements so that men over 21 who had served in the militia could vote. But leaving voting rules to the states disturbed some lawmakers, inciting a clash between those who wanted to restrict voting and those “who sought greater democracy.” That clash fueled future debates about allowing freed slaves, immigrants, and, eventually, women to vote. In 1878, one leading intellectual railed against universal suffrage, fearing rule by “an ignorant proletariat and a half-taught plutocracy.” Voting corruption persisted in the 19th century, when adoption of the secret ballot “made it easier to stuff the ballot box” by adding “as many new votes as proved necessary.” Southern states enacted disenfranchising measures, undermining the 15th Amendment. Waldman traces the campaign for women’s suffrage; the Supreme Court’s dismal record on voting issues (including Citizens United); and the contentious fight to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which “became a touchstone of consensus between Democrats and Republicans” and was reauthorized four times before the Supreme Court “eviscerated it in 2013.” Despite increased access to voting, over the years, turnout has fallen precipitously, and “entrenched groups, fearing change, have…tried to reduce the opportunity for political participation and power.” Waldman urges citizens to find a way to celebrate democracy and reinvigorate political engagement for all.
A timely contribution to the discussion of a crucial issue.Pub Date: Feb. 23, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5011-1648-3
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Nov. 28, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2015
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