My Last Movie Star : A Novel

Rating:
Summary: An elite paparrazo gets a taste of her own medicine...
Review: ...and it turns out it goes down a little too smoothly. If you've ever wondered what it might be like to suddenly have the world's celebrity spotlight searching you relentlessly out, My Last Movie Star is a must read.

This book, about a cynical celebrity journalist who accidentally crosses over to become a celebrity in her own right, gives hilarious insight into the seductive but ephemeral allure of sudden fame.

My favorite sub-theme is the author's biting description of the self-important self-adulation of movieland's beautiful elite. The story's protagonist, Clementine James, ends up making some surprising choices when she is thrust into the glare of Hollywood's klieg lights.

One of the inventions that makes this book an original and a great read is the way the writer effortlessly weaves in appearances from the spirits of formerly-exalted-but-now-forgotten movie divas. You'll find out why Demi Moore named her unfortunate daughter Tallulah, among other tidbits.

MLMS will appeal to the serious movie buff, as well as anyone who has wondered about the ridiculous--and lucrative-- conniving that goes on behind the fame-making machine.

Hilarious. Entertaining. Soon to be made into a major motion picture, no doubt directed by Robert Altman, with Renee Zellweger cast as Clementine and Tim Robbins as the manipulative publisher Ed.

Rating:
Summary: interesting enough
Review: Clementine James is a journalist about to retire to her boyfriend's horse farm in Virginia when her magazine editor Ed (with whom she has more than a passing fancy) convinces her to do one last stoary on Allegra Coleman, the newest It Girl. While on assignment, there is a car accident, with Allegra leaving the injured Clem behind.

The rest of the story is about Clem -- who has lost an eye in the accident, and becomes a cult figure in teh Allegra disappearance. She starts seeing movie stars from the past -- even those deceased -- all actresses -- who advise and counsel her as she awaits a Bio-eye to be put in place of the old one.

She must also decide what to do re: Virginia vs New York, Ed vs. her boyfriend Ned. And whether she cares if the now-fabled Allegra ever comes back.

Rating:
Summary: A clever, well written novel about the cult of celebrity
Review: Clementine James, journalist to the stars, embarks on her last celebrity interview with up-and-comer Allegra Coleman. After the interview, Clementine has plans to retire from movie star journalism and live with her stable, steady boyfriend Ned on his farm in Virginia.

But her plans go awry when Allegra crashes the car they're driving in - Clementine winds up in the hospital minus an eye, and Allegra disappears. Instead of going to Virginia to mend, Clementine becomes wrapped up in Allegra's disappearance and southern California culture, attending vigils and having one night stands with TV sitcom stars. Meanwhile, she's getting visits from yesterday's silver screen sirens - Myrna Loy, Loretta Young and Gloria Swanson, just to name a few.

Sherrill really seems to know this territory - stars and the culture of fame - and she writes very believably and farcically about it. Mostly, I found this to be an enjoyable read about the cult of celebrity, but after a while I grew tired of her "encounters" with dead movie stars; it was just kind of annoying quirk that didn't really move the story along. And if you're not familiar with old movies, you may have no idea who most of these women are. But the back of the book does include a cheeky "filmography" that offers a brief synopsis and critique of the movies mentioned throughout.

Rating:
Summary: How to Save Your Life by Reading
Review: I am a graduate student in New York who is trying desperatly to gain a better understanding on the works of the great 20th Century novelists: Virgina Woolf, James Joyce, E.M. Forrester, Ernest Hemingway and Vladimir Nabokov. Ms. Sherrill's latest book has saved my life from such stress and released me from the burdensome, academic cliche (i.e. snobbery) that dictates I must understand and apprectiate who came before todays best contemporariy writers in order to have a more mature apprecitaiton of what literature really is. Sherrill take us on a rip roaring, parody of a road trip where the journey is the destination. I may never think of literature in the same way.

Clemintine, the jaded celebrity journalist who loses an eye in an auto accident while profiling Allegra Coleman, her absoulutley last movie star (And when Allegra goes missing, Clementine herself briefly falls prey to the seduction of the kind of Hollywood fame she says detests) may perhaps be the most important fictional character since Holly Golightly.

Allegra, the spoiled, ethereal celebrity Clemintine is suppose to be profiling, and whose sudden disappears causes a near melt down in Hollywood, is a hip-hop...ghetto-fabulous Greta Garbo. And the world is desperate, desperate to find her.

The best reading though may be the visitions Clemintine experinces from starlets of yesteryear. These are mostly dead, alcoholic, used-up gone-to-hell-in-a-hand-basket old movie stars (Myrna Loy, Gloria Sanson, Dorothy Lamour, Marion Davies, Natalie Wood) who haunt Clemintine and at the same time inform her of the price of fame. This book is smart, silly, ridiculously funny, well thought out, insanely researched and the best read I've had since David Sedaris' Me Talk Pretty One Day.

Rating:
Summary: So much potential lost under dull plot...
Review: Martha Sherrill's book 'My Last Movie Star' has a plot that simply sings with a lot of potential, being able to provide a well earned look at sudden celebritism while also taking a look at some classic actresses and and giving the authors opinion about Hollywood.

Clemintine James, a Hollywood reporter for 'Flame'(a vanity fair type magazine) is assigned to do (her very last) piece on up and coming actress Allegra Coleman, just before she retires from journalism to live a quiet country life . What was supposed to be a few page interview turns out into a week long road trip where, the two women inevitably get into a car accident. Clem surivives manages to survive but Allegra, oddly enough seems to dissapear into thin air while the nation goes into a mad frenzy to find the girl, while raising her fame to sudden messiah like status, with candle lit vigils and magazine spreads. Also Clemintine is also suddenly elevated to celebrity like status, as being the last person to see the girl alive as well as people (oddly enough) assuming that Clemintine was her best friend and there for seems to be in constant contact with her. Too add weight to recovery, Clemintine also gets "visits" from the ghosts of Allegra's "actress" grandmothers all while the nation and Clemintine await for Allegra to return...if she ever does.

The book is lost not under the authors pretension but the lack of real plot. As well as a marvelous way of adding in some clever scenes with some old time actress to add a bit of real wonderful mystery and life to the otherwise lukewarm novel. Sherill boggs down the book with useless scences from the protagoinist (Clemintine's) point of view and memories of her own exprieneces that really dont' seem to have anything to do with the main plot of the book. The 'praise' that the reader is pummeled with about the missing actress (Allegra), don't manage to make this reader pine away for the missing girl any more but instead make for feelings of discomfort as one would feel if they wandered into the funeral or calling hours of the death of someone who was close to a close friend of yours but other wise had no meaning to you.

This is another classic case of "telling" and not "showing" which is what Sherrill does. Adding masses upon masses of useless scenes and dialogue that seem to have no real connection to Hollywood or the true message of the story. There were times I felt she would have forced her opinion of Hollywood on me like some other authors mistakeningly do. Instead of barely mentioning it so as not to overwhelm us. This is one time I wish "preaching" would have commensed just to get some meaning to the mindless drivel she was telling. While she does have in quantity scence where the protagonist hears stories about Allegra and how 'wonderful' and how 'special' and 'unique' she is and any other praising adjectives you can get in there. To the point where I almost put down the book in disgust if it wasn't for the fact I have to force myself to finish it for a library reading club.

Sherrills book has massives of potential to be a real life altering book and look at Hollywood, but her rather clunky and sometimes (poor) writing style just dont' manage to get across the true plot of the book. As well as not enough scences with the main character and the famed "Allegra" to get us really into their character and their head so we can see why we should even care about this woman and why we would want her back. I wish I wish, this book's plot could have been handled by an author with a set unique writing style that could have properly conveyd the message Sherrill was trying to deliver (which by the way I never did figure out thanks to some poor writing as was mentioned before). Perhaps Chuck Palhunick or even James Ellory could have handled this better. For a first time novel Sherill had a marvelous idea that simply flopped.

Rating:
Summary: A Very Fun Read
Review: My Last Movie Star by Martha Sherrill is a clever, funny send-up of Hollywood that will suit those who've succumbed the glamour of Tinseltown, as well those cynics that view Hollywood Fame as a force wholly independent of the deserts of its victims.

Elements of the book read as truth. Sherrill presents an authentic insider's view of the star-making machinery that occasionally turns interesting, quirky personalities into genuine Hollywood Stars. The story line and characters are as real as anything you might find in the magazine racks at the grocery store checkout line. Lest the reader confuse Hollywood truth with reality, however, the book is punctuated with supernatural visits from Stars of the past, providing an effective and comical vehicle for examining the nature of Fame.

For those that revel in the fiction of the real Movie Star world, Sherrill is respectful of history, and pays homage to the oeuvres of forgotten Stars. For those who choose to laugh at the self-importance of Hollywood, the story is told through the jaded eyes of an outsider journalist that cuts through sycophantic phoniness like a laser. And provides plenty of belly laughs along the way!

Truth or fiction, Hollywood idol or idiot, My Last Movie Star will appeal to just about anyone the relishes a good story well-told.