Peter Bogdanovich's Movie of the Week

Rating:
Summary: A Provocative Look at Classic Cinema
Review: As a critic and historian, Peter Bogdanovich has written about the talents behind the screen, including memorable studies on Orson Welles, Fritz Lang and Frank Tashlin. "Movie of the Week" is a fascinating series of critical and historic essays, ranging from masterworks ("Citizen Kane" and "Grand Illusion") to cult favorites ("Artists and Models" and "The Merry Widow"). His telling observations on influential silents such as "The Crowd" and "Steamboat Bill Jr." -- and lesser-known filmmakers like King Vidor and Allan Dwan -- make it a book worth having. In fact, one would be hard-pressed to disagree with Bogdanovich's 52 selections.

Rating:
Summary: A Provocative Look at Classic Cinema
Review: As a critic and historian, Peter Bogdanovich has written about the talents behind the screen, including memorable studies on Orson Welles, Fritz Lang and Frank Tashlin. "Movie of the Week" is a fascinating series of critical and historic essays, ranging from masterworks ("Citizen Kane" and "Grand Illusion") to cult favorites ("Artists and Models" and "The Merry Widow"). His telling observations on influential silents such as "The Crowd" and "Steamboat Bill Jr." -- and lesser-known filmmakers like King Vidor and Allan Dwan -- make it a book worth having. In fact, one would be hard-pressed to disagree with Bogdanovich's 52 selections.

Rating:
Summary: A Labor of Love
Review: This book was certainly a labor of love for filmmaker, historian and critic Peter Bogdanovich. The book is built around 52 articles, each concentrating on a single film of the week but also containing other suggestions of films by the same director or actor, so that really we are given several hundred film suggestions. The articles are extremely well written by a man who knew most of the directors and actors personally as a member of the club. 42 of the 52 articles are for films from the period 1930-1959, years very dear to a film historian's heart and to mine. Out of modesty, I'm sure, Bogdanovich didn't include two great films which he himself directed, namely "The Last Picture Show" (1971) and "Paper Moon" (1973), both available now on DVD. Don't neglect these.

This is obviously not a book for someone allergic to black and white or who judges films mostly on the special effects. But if you have a heart half as big as Bogdanovich's, it is likely the book for you. It was for me.