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Title: VideoHound's War Movies: Classic Conflict on Film by Mike Mayo ISBN: 1-57859-089-2 Publisher: Visible Ink Pr Pub. Date: September, 1999 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.25 (4 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: Hit and Miss Book
Comment: This book is really a hit and miss when it comes to the quality and understanding of the reviews.
On one hand, there are some good reviews that put insight into the background of a film as well as the meaning behind it. I particularly enjoyed the review of "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" as well as the review of "Yojimbo," and I commend Mike Mayo for speaking against the racism and bland nature of "Gone With the Wind."
On the other hand, some of the reviews make me raise an eyebrow. For example, in the review of "Hamburger Hill" Mike Mayo puts down the film because seemingly it wants to put handsome men on the screen with out their shirts off. Yeah, OK Mike...that was like five minutes of the film. It sounds like you're hiding some repressed feelings. I didn't walk away from "Hamburger Hill" with the same feelings I did when I left "Wild America."
The very fact he includes some films like "Yojimbo" makes me wonder what he considers a war film. There is nothing war-like about "Yojimbo," except for the fact it is a "war" between two rival merchants. But then if he considers that to be a war film, why not include the movie "The St. Valentine's Day Massacre," which was about the war between two rival gangs in Chicago. Including Yojimbo and not a film like "Heaven and Earth," a great Japanese film and one of the best for the Sengoku Jidai period, confuses me and frankly disappoints.
So in the end, I wouldn't say this is an aweful book, but I don't rate it too highly.
Rating: 5
Summary: VideoHound's WAR MOVIES:
Comment: Growing up as a teenager during World War II, I thought I had seen every war movie ever made. Not only did I miss a lot of movies, I was flabbergasted at the number and variety of the films of that genre. WAR MOVIES: CLASSIC CONFLICT ON FILM is undoubtedly the finest and most complete book ever published about such a far-reaching subject.
Yet, WAR MOVIES is really not a book to read, but a volume to refer to, time and again. Still, it is not merely a reference book because of the way in which the movies are categorized. This publication is a must for any student of film or for that matter, anyone with an interest in armed conflict.
One of the many interesting aspects of this volume is the authors excellent commentary on every movie and the side bars that contain extremely interesting and mostly unknown trivia about each film, its director, its stars, the story line and the political atmosphere of the times. Writers and researchers of the future will use this as a compendium to help explain the horrors of war, its psychological effect on the participants and the socio-ecomonics behind the story.
There is no doubt that WAR MOVIES: CLASSIC CONFLICT ON FILM will be required reading for film and history students of the future.
Rating: 5
Summary: A video guide with a sense of humility - wow!
Comment: A good portion of the author's introduction is spent preparing faithful war movie fans for the shock of finding out their personal favorite(s) have gone missing. Sacrifices were made to leave room for the requirements of a new kind of omnibus video guide, one with a sense of historical accuracy. Sidebars in this book don't just celebrate the stars or throw out 'didjaknow' trivia. Some of these war films were made in *wartime*, with inevitable effects otherwise unnoticeable to the average civilian. There's a reason why both versions of Henry V are included; so you can appreciate the textual differences between Ken Branagh's 1989 portrait of a young man who grows up fast and Olivier's hand-made (of papier-mache and metal paint no less) epic, photographed throughout the worst of the Nazi's 'Gott strafe England' campaign. International sections cover British, French, Japanese and Russian war stories, while times between the World Wars, during the Korean and Vietnam conflicts, and postwar adjustment periods are also given unique treatments.
It's a good idea to read even the sections you usually skip in a reference book. The video resource section will tip you off to the Belle and Blade, a really specialized war/action/conflict tape dealer. Captain Dale Dye's foreword breaks with the dry standard of an academic overview or the typical celebrity's bout of name-dropping and in-jokes. It's a free-standing autobiography that retells, in a self-deprecating but unaffected style, his journey from disillusioned early retirement (as, he says, 'a man without a plan') to the Oscar-caliber experience of Saving Private Ryan by way of an intense collaboration with fellow Viet Vet, Oliver Stone.
Breaks in the tension (of realistic films like Zulu, or stories about hardened vets like Sam Fuller, who filmed his platoon's liberation of a Czech concentration camp) allow for humor, too. Chuckle at the title cards from silent dogfight film Wings. Note how Waterloo is like a spaghetti western. Find out why John Wayne's directorial oddity, The Alamo, prefigured Blazing Saddles! Mayo's personally compiled list of war genre cliches is a Cook's Tour of international stereotypes... It's a small world, after all!
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Title: Brassey's Guide to War Films by Alun Evans ISBN: 1574882635 Publisher: Brasseys, Inc. Pub. Date: July, 2000 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: Guts and Glory: The Making of the American Military Image in Film by Lawrence H. Suid ISBN: 0813190185 Publisher: University Press of Kentucky Pub. Date: June, 2002 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: VideoHound's Horror Show: 999 Hair-Raising, Hellish and Humorous Movies by Mike Mayo, William Lustig ISBN: 1578590477 Publisher: Visible Ink Pr Pub. Date: July, 1998 List Price(USD): $21.95 |
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Title: Videohound's Golden Movie Retriever 2004 (Videohound's Golden Movie Retriever, 2004) by Jim Craddock ISBN: 0787673129 Publisher: Gale Group Pub. Date: July, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: VideoHound's Cult Flicks & Trash Pics by Carol A. Schwartz, Jim Olenski ISBN: 1578591139 Publisher: Visible Ink Pr Pub. Date: November, 2001 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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