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Title: Complicated Women : Sex and Power in Pre-Code Hollywood by Mick LaSalle ISBN: 0-312-28431-4 Publisher: Griffin Trade Paperback Pub. Date: 19 December, 2001 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.86 (36 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Welcome Back, Ladies!
Comment: As a lover of movie books about the classic era, I instantly fell in love with Mick LaSalle's book about the screen goddesses of the pre-code era. All of my favorite stars came jumping out at me from the printed page in all their beauty and glamour and reminded me that the era of filmmaking talked about was one of great change, changes that pretty accurately reflected real life, as women especially were evolving from the repression of many centuries. Mick LaSalle writes a very entertaining as well as a very informative story about those marvelous ladies and their films, and it's obvious that he likes and appreciates his subjects. Let's have more film books like this one. Could not put it down!
Rating: 5
Summary: A Piercing Look at Pre-Codes
Comment: "The Code came in to prevent women from having fun. It was designed to put the genie back in the bottle-and the wife back in the kitchen," says Mick LaSalle, film critic for the San Francisco Chronicle and professor of film studies at University of California at Berkeley, in his excellent book of film criticism, "Complicated Women: Power and Sex in Pre-Code Hollywood." Before reading this page-turner, I had assumed that "women's pictures" came into existence during the '40s, featuring the femmes fatales of films noirs. Now I know that not to be the case because actors of the Pre-Code era, such as Greta Garbo, Norma Shearer, Jean Harlow, Constance Bennett, Ruth Chatterton, and Ann Harding, were modern and daring women who made some great films like "Queen Christina," "The Divorcee," "Red Dust," "The Easiest Way," "Madame X," and "The Animal Kingdom."
"The best era for women's pictures," according to Mr. LaSalle, "was the pre-Code era, the five years between the point that talkies became widely accepted in 1929 through July 1934, when the dread and draconian Production Code became the law of Hollywoodland." Moreover, in pre-1940 American films, actors were showcased through innovative close-ups, and directors took second seats to film stars and producers. In those days, "image-the public's idea of personality-was everything." Greta Garbo and Norma Shearer were two stars whose images were packaged and polished by the production studios. Before their time, in the silent era and in the first talkies, women were cast into two film roles: vamp and ingénue. "Garbo, by nature aloof and mysterious, was forced to play the vamp, a role she hated. Shearer, who radiated integrity, was forced to play the innocent ingénue, which frustrated her. So they rebelled."
Fans of Garbo and Shearer will love Mr. LaSalle's book. He uses his insider's knowledge to contrast their respective vamp-turned-martyr and ingénue-turned-modern-woman roles. Now I can re-view these favorite films, from the time when there was no censorship, with this book as companion and guide to understanding and appreciating the challenges that were faced by these "complicated women."
Rating: 5
Summary: DAZZLING -- IT READS LIKE A PAGE-TURNER
Comment: Mick LaSalle's COMPLICATED WOMEN is a fantastic film history that reads like a page-turner novel. From this era and these marvelous women, he has fashioned a compelling story that makes you long for more -- and more is available -- more being the films themselves -- for which this book is the most extraordinary and helpful introduction. Not just an introduction, because an introduction introduces and then walks away. Make that, a guide. Read it first, and then keep it by the television.
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Title: Dangerous Men: Pre-Code Hollywood and the Birth of the Modern Man by Mick Lasalle ISBN: 0312283113 Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books Pub. Date: 01 November, 2002 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Sin in Soft Focus: Pre-Code Hollywood by Mark A. Vieira ISBN: 0810982285 Publisher: Abradale Press Pub. Date: 01 March, 2003 List Price(USD): $19.98 |
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Title: Pre-Code Hollywood by Thomas Doherty ISBN: 0231110952 Publisher: Columbia University Press Pub. Date: 15 August, 1999 List Price(USD): $22.00 |
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Title:The Divorcée ASIN: 6302004446 Publisher: Warner Studios Pub. Date: 20 February, 1991 List Price(USD): $14.95 Comparison N/A, buy it from Amazon for $14.95 |
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Title: American Silent Film by William K. Everson ISBN: 0306808765 Publisher: DaCapo Press Pub. Date: September, 1998 List Price(USD): $18.50 |
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