The American Film Musical

Rating:
Summary: scholarly masterpiece
Review: This book may not be what the average fan of film musicals is after, but there are plenty of picture books and reference works on the musical for such readers. This is the most significant and wide-ranging study of the musical as a narrative and cinematic form anyone has yet attempted. No other serious work on the musical comes close, and despite another reviewer's complaint about academic writing, Altman's prose is in fact clear and witty -- which is not to say that he doesn't work through some sophisticated ideas: indeed, half of the book is a consideration of the notion of genre itself, with the musical the specific example for the book's deeper investigation. But for all the "serious" thought and research that went into this work, one always senses Altman's enthusiasm about the musical. Academic writing gets a bad rap: this is what academic writing is supposed to do -- explore, expand, and force the reader to grapple with, rather than just accept, ideas.

Rating:
Summary: More matter with less blabber please!
Review: This is a classic example of a writer letting the constructs of academic verbage get in the way of his message. Altman has some solid original ideas about the history and construction of American screen musicals, but he lets the language get in the way. He also gets too many little facts wrong -- for example, he refers several times to Shirley Jones having a little sister Amarylis in THE MUSIC MAN, but Amarylis was only her piano student and NOT a relative! Its hard to respect someone who is so sloppy about research.