THE HOLLYWOOD EXILES

The author of Science Fiction in the Cinema and Stunt: The Story of the Great Movie Stuntmen takes a look at another Hollywood phenomenon, the influx of foreign artists in the Twenties and Thirties. For political, financial, or personal reasons a good number of European actors and directors converged on the moviemaking mecca. The German vanguard included Ernst Lubitsch, Emil Jannings, Marlene Dietrich, F. W. Murnau, and Max Reinhardt. Erich von Stroheim, Billy Wilder, Otto Preminger, and Hedy Lamarr emigrated from Austria, while Alexander Korda, Michael Curtiz, and Peter Lorre came from Hungary. Also featured are the members of the large British colony and, in the Forties, the refugee French. Baxter introduces the newcomers without, however, exploring the importance of their coming; and the lack of a central focus makes this little more than a catalogue.