Synopses & Reviews
The Big Screen tells the enthralling story of the movies: their rise and spread, their remarkable influence over us, and the technology that made the screen—smaller now, but ever more ubiquitous—as important as the images it carries.
The Big Screen is not another history of the movies. Rather, it is a wide-ranging narrative about the movies and their signal role in modern life. At first, film was a waking dream, the gift of appearance delivered for a nickel to huddled masses sitting in the dark. But soon, and abruptly, movies began transforming our societies and our perceptions of the world. The celebrated film authority David Thomson takes us around the globe, through time, and across many media—moving from Eadweard Muybridge to Steve Jobs, from Sunrise to I Love Lucy, from John Wayne to George Clooney, from television commercials to streaming video—to tell the complex, gripping, paradoxical story of the movies. He tracks the ways we were initially enchanted by movies as imitations of life—the stories, the stars, the look—and how we allowed them to show us how to live. At the same time, movies, offering a seductive escape from everyday reality and its responsibilities, have made it possible for us to evade life altogether. The entranced audience has become a model for powerless and anxiety-ridden citizens trying to pursue happiness and dodge terror by sitting quietly in a dark room.
Does the big screen take us out into the world, or merely mesmerize us? That is Thomsons question in this grand adventure of a book. Books about the movies are often aimed at film buffs, but this passionate and provocative feat of storytelling is vital to anyone trying to make sense of the age of screens—the age that, more than ever, we are living in.
Review
“David Thomson is, I think, the best writer on film in our time. If ‘Have You Seen . . . ? was his most succinct and entertaining book, The Big Screen is a large and vivacious map of ‘the screen: beginning with Muybridge and tracing careers ranging from Korda to Renoir to Hawkes to Mizoguchi, to David Lynch and Tarantino, then swerving over to television shows such as I Love Lucy and The Sopranos. Thomson has found and created a marvelous plot for the history of film, with insights and revelations on every page—as well as a few MacGuffins. He is our most argumentative and trustworthy historian of the screen.” —Michael Ondaatje, author of The Cats Table
“David Thomson has composed a grand aesthetic, spiritual, and moral account of cinema history assembled around the movies and artists that have meant the most to him. As Thomson reconstructs film history, movies bring us close to reality and deliver us into ecstatic dreams. A pungently written, brilliant book.” —David Denby, author of Snark and film critic at The New Yorker
“A great critic cuts both ways—he nudges you into reconsidering the films you love, as well as the ones you dislike. David Thomsons sensual prose has always amplified the imagination of a great critic. In broad outline, The Big Screen is a history of the movies, a wide-ranging task that usually carries with it a certain amount of connect-the-dots tedium. But Thomsons emphases are typically fresh and often ecstatic, even when hes disparaging a film you love. Nobody does it better.” —Scott Eyman, author of Empire of Dreams and Lion of Hollywood
Review
"Gossip and insight go hand in hand in this witty, exuberant essay on the acting greats by one of our most imaginative writers on film. Backstage, off-stage and what might have been infuse Thomson’s compelling examination of the storied performances of our time. He brings a fresh eye to Olivier, Kazan, the evolution and demise of Method acting. But he also speculates. After all, what are actual memories but an invitation to new, hypothetical ones? Brando as Archie Rice? Olivier as Stanley Kowalski? Read it and wonder (or argue) with Thomson."—MOLLY HASKELL
Review
"Entertaining and thought-provoking . . . This is a book for appreciators of film and theater; for actors, whether aspiring or established; and for anyone who wants to know why acting has fascinated and enlightened us for centuries."—Sarah Grant, Booklist
Review
"A very thoughtful and serious essay on an elusive and illusory art."—Library Journal
Review
“Characteristically elegant . . . Riddling, sophisticated, whimsical, Mr. Thomson commands an affecting lyricism that sweetly betrays his love for his subject."—Simon Callow, Wall Street Journal
Review
“The ridiculously prolific and perceptive film critic, film historian, and film biographer does some serious mulling about the art and craft of acting. . . . The perfect book to read in the wake of all that congratulatory hoo-ha at the Academy Awards.”—Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer
Review
“In this consideration of the actor’s craft, a noted film historian anatomizes favorite performances and speculates on ones that might have been (such as a Philip Seymour Hoffman Hamlet). Thomson demonstrates a subtle understanding of the mind-set of the actor, adept at storytelling, spying, lying, and secrecy.”—New Yorker
Review
‘David Thomson is one of the funniest and most insightful writers on cinema.’—Kate Muir, the Times,
Review
‘...this book has a nugget of interest on almost every page.’—Anthony Quinn,
the Guardian.
Review
“Thomson’s book is rich with insight not only on the general topic of acting but also on particular performers — he is particularly good at comparing and contrasting Brando and Sir Laurence Olivier, the most celebrated actors of recent times.”—Washington Post
Review
“The book’s jacket notes describe Why Acting Matters as both a meditation and a celebration of acting, an accurate assessment of these witty reflections on an elusive topic presented by one of Britain’s foremost film experts . . . [Thomson] equally understands the entertainment industry, actors and acting, and the way to tell a good story about them. Among these fascinating tales, he weaves salient points about why people care so much about acting.”—Popmatters
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“Erudite and entertaining.”—San Francisco Chronicle
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“An eloquent, vivid, irritating book full of sharp nuggets of facts and bright jewels of opinionated air.”—Sydney Morning Herald
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“Thomson’s strengths are many, and his writing overflows with compassion, wide experience of life, and cultivation. Those traits are all on display here.”—Weekly Standard
Review
“Why Acting Matters is, in its improvisational freedom and depth of thought, one of the great and original books about its subject in recent days . . . It is, page by page, brilliant.”—Jeff Simon, Buffalo News
Review
“Drunk on pretense, stabbing the vein of the craft’s wildest ambitions and anxieties, Thomson writes as the thespian’s greatest advocate, the critic as idea engine who launches a thousand arguments.”—Tim Riley, National Memo
Synopsis
The definitive story of the medium that defines our timesThe Big Screen tells the enthralling story of the movies: their rise and spread, their remarkable influence over us, and the technology that made the screen as important as the images it carries.
But The Big Screen is not another history of the movies. Rather, it is a wide-ranging narrative about the movies and their signal role in modern life. The celebrated film authority David Thomson takes us around the globe, through time, and across many media to tell the complex, gripping, paradoxical story of the movies. He tracks the ways we were initially enchanted by movies as imitations of life—the stories, the stars, the look—and how we allowed them to show us how to live. At the same time, movies, offering a seductive escape from everyday reality and its responsibilities, have made it possible for us to evade life altogether. The entranced audience has become a model for powerless and anxiety-ridden citizens trying to pursue happiness and dodge terror by sitting quietly in a dark room.
Does the big screen take us out into the world or merely mesmerize us? That is Thomsons question in this grand adventure of a book, vital to anyone trying to make sense of the age of screens—the age that, more than ever, we are living in.
Synopsis
A provocative, highly engaging essay on the art of pretending on the stage, on screen, and in daily life
Synopsis
Does acting matter? David Thomson, one of our most respected and insightful writers on movies and theater, answers this question with intelligence and wit. In this fresh and thought-provoking essay, Thomson tackles this most elusive of subjects, examining the allure of the performing arts for both the artist and the audience member while addressing the paradoxes inherent in acting itself. He reflects on the casting process, on stage versus film acting, and on the cult of celebrity. The art and considerable craft of such gifted artists as Meryl Streep, Laurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh, Marlon Brando, Daniel Day-Lewis, and others are scrupulously appraised here, as are notions of “good” and “bad” acting.
Thomson’s exploration is at once a meditation on and a celebration of a unique and much beloved, often misunderstood, and occasionally derided art form. He argues that acting not only “matters” but is essential and inescapable, as well as dangerous, chronic, transformative, and exhilarating, be it on the theatrical stage, on the movie screen, or as part of our everyday lives.
About the Author
David Thomson, renowned as one of the great living authorities on the movies, is the author of The New Biographical Dictionary of Film, now in its fifth edition. His recent books include a biography of Nicole Kidman and The Whole Equation: A History of Hollywood. Thomsons latest work is the acclaimed “Have You Seen . . . ?”: A Personal Introduction to 1,000 Films. Born in London in 1941, he now lives in San Francisco.