Though well-written and engaging, this is basically a book-length aphorism, something discharged by Paddy Chayefsky in a...
Novelist and nonfiction author Ison (Rockaway, 2013) unspools a montage of images that illustrate how her thoughts and feelings were channeled through lives on the big screen.
Despite seven years as a screenwriter (Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead), the author freely admits she has little background in film studies, and she eschews an analytical bent, preferring the legerdemain of smoke and mirrors. True, artistic merit is not a prerequisite for a movie to exert influence, especially on the impressionable young mind, and movies did erect a platform for how Ison saw the world. The early chapters are rooted in her reactions to movies as seen through the eyes of a child or adolescent, which occasionally becomes a catalog of varied child-of-the-affluent neuroses. Readers may not be convinced that she was so precocious as a 6- or 12-year-old that she grasped the nuances of these movies at the time. Later chapters offer adult interpretations of films that shaped her, though it is not always clear when she is looking back or in the here and now. It may be churlish to label as “self-absorbed” a book based solely on the author and her experiences, but the confessional and navel-gazing aspects are very much a matter of taste and can get tiresome when contrasted with powerful recollections of her parents and perceptive takes on awakening female sexuality and romanticizing the writing life. Even sympathetic readers may weary of all the travails and catharses. By contrast, Ison is at her best when her self-awareness is administered from a slight remove. There are wonderful movies revisited here, as well as some dreary ones that blunt our pleasure. But all are mainstream entertainments (emphasis on melodrama) that tend to amplify and distort real life, risking superficial treatment.
Though well-written and engaging, this is basically a book-length aphorism, something discharged by Paddy Chayefsky in a single passage from Network.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2015
ISBN: 978-1619024816
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Soft Skull Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2014
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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