Book description
'This book is both more and less than history, a work of imagination in
its own right, a piece of movie literature that turns fact into
romance.' Gavin Lambert was reviewing the first edition of David
Thomson's monumental work in 1975. In the eight years since the third
edition was published, careers have waxed and waned, reputations been
made and lost, great movies produced, trends set and scorned. This
fourth edition has 200 entirely new entries and every original entry has
been re-examined. Thus the roster of directors, actors, producers,
screenwriters and cameramen is both historical and contemporary, with
old masters reappraised in terms of how their work has lasted. Each of
the 1,000 profiles is a keenly perceptive, provocative critical essay.
Striking the perfect balance between personal bias and factual
reliability, David Thomson - novelist, critic, biographer and unabashed
film addict - has given us an enormously rich reference book, a
brilliant reflection on the art and artists of the cinema. David
Thomson is London-born but has lived and worked in California for over
twenty years. He writes and reviews films regularly for major press
publications.
