The Big Picture: Who Killed Hollywood? and Other Essays (Applause Books) - Softcover

Goldman, William

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1557834601 ISBN 13: 9781557834607

Publisher: Applause, 2001

Synopsis

William Goldman, who holds two Academy Awards for his screenwriting (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and All the President's Men), and is author of the perennial best seller Adventures in the Screen Trade, scrutinizes the Hollywood movie scene of the past decade in this engaging collection. With the film-world-savvy and razor-sharp commentary for which he is known, he provides an insider's take on today's movie world as he takes a look at “the big picture” on Hollywood, screenwriting, and the future of American cinema. Paperback.

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Review

"The trouble with the Oscar show is that it's too short," William Goldman writes more than once in these infectiously droll essays about Hollywood stars, box office roulette, vintage movie years, and the illogic of Saving Private Ryan. Any other writer would be in deep ironical mode saying that, but the great screenwriter (All the President's Men, The Princess Bride) and giddy movie enthusiast is hardly a "prevailing view" kind of guy. Wouldn't we have gotten Brando himself at the 1973 Oscars, he argues, if he had unlimited time to defend Indian rights to a billion viewers? Would anything have been better than that? Writing irregularly for New York magazine between 1991 and 1999, Goldman promised to explain "the Hollywood mind" to the rest of us--with the mantra always in front of him that "nobody knows anything." Which leaves him open to occasional free association. Gungha Din is "the most important movie ever made," he writes not once but twice. If Miramax is successful it's because the Weinsteins "live above the store." What do you do with Universal giving Sylvester Stallone $60 million after thirteen duds like Tango and Cash? "How long do you think you'd hold if you had those thirteen movies played over and over in a locked room?" Goldman asks. But while there's ephemera galore here, and nothing so very lofty, the guy speed-typing his interior monologues loves movies, and when he runs through the dumb things in Good Will Hunting or the great things about (his "all-time favorite") Cary Grant, just try putting the book down. --Lyall Bush

From Publishers Weekly

The title of Goldman's newest collection of essays is deceptive. Unlike his expansive reflections in Adventures in the Screen Trade, these selections (most of which originally appeared in Premiere, the New York Daily News and New York magazine) narrowly focus on Goldman's once timely film reviews and his commentaries on the 1990-1999 Academy Awards. With two screenwriting Oscars under his belt (for Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid and All the President's Men), Goldman is a knowledgeable Hollywood tour guide. On the rare occasions when his predictions are off-target, he's still entertaining. However, this slight and somewhat repetitive collection could have benefited from annotations to make it more accessible to Hollywood outsiders who might be wondering which film finally won the Oscar and how much those projected hits ultimately grossed. Most pleasurable are Goldman's assured opinions ("Giving the Best ActorAactor is the word folksAto Roberto Benigni for his mugging in Life Is Beautiful is, for me, a sin, a disgrace and removes forever the argument from those who felt DeMille's Greatest Show on Earth was the worst Oscar winner ever.") and his contrarianisms ("The trouble with the Oscar show is that it is too short."). Goldman hits his stride with "You Go, Girls!," taking on executives who delude themselves into thinking that every successful movie about women is a fluke, and the "The Emperor's New Fatigues," which lambastes Saving Private Ryan. (Nov.) FYI: Goldman's royalties from this book will be donated to the Motion Picture and Television Fund.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Applause
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 1557834601
• ISBN 13: 9781557834607
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 290