Customer Reviews

Action!: A Novel

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

My brother is an executive at a production company in Hollywood and he always regales us with great stories when he's home for the holidays. His stories are just like the ones in this book - which he bought for me because everyone out there in Lalaland is apparently reading it and I'm a bit of a moviegeek myself. My brother's met the author once or twice on business and thought the guy was cool so he bought his book. The book is really excellent. It's got great stories about some of the old school Hollywood dudes plying their trade in their old school ways but also gets totally up to date ending in the Hollywood of the late 90's. The details are totally sweet - better than a weekend of E! television and an Access Hollywood marathon put together. I have to say, the further the hero gets in his career, the more exciting the book is. If you thought people got ahead by being talented, you've got a lot to learn. AJ's smart, but quite the player, as well. But the politics in his family are seriously worse than Hollywood and ultimately, that's why I give the book a thumbs up - the author gets past all that Hollywood stuff and really looks at who his characters are and creates a compelling story out of what he finds.

Robert Cort has written a one-of-a-kind book of behind the scenes Hollywood action. Sure, it's fiction but no one could make up stuff this interesting. A must read for anyone who is interested in how the movie business REALLY works.

This is a wild ride, a page turner. I read it in two days and it only took me that long because my eyes were unaccustomed to the workout. The last act is dynamite. Superbly crafted. Can't wait for the movie to come out.

Cort definitely knows Hollywood, I'll give him that. However, I found the stories outside this one to be more interesting than the actual book. The use of Steve McQueen as a supporting character was interesting, but it made me want to read a biography of the guy to find out more about him than this fictionalized account. The main thing that stuck out for me was the author's complete lack of realism in terms of the women he is paired with. Would a not-all-that-attractive producer *really* attract the attentions of a hot mysterious Austrian babe to the point that he's the only one she ever loved? Or apparently every hot young (always younger than he is) woman from Hollywood to Thailand? Please. And he justifies all his infidelities by saying his wife doesn't fulfill him. Had he ever thought of maybe *talking* to his wife instead of rationalizing away his affairs? What a schmuck. This was totally one of those male fantasy books where the author fulfills all of his dreams in fiction if not in reality. There were also a couple jarring moments of almost-racism that bugged me. Stephanie, the wife, says beef jerky is the reason the Algonquins didn't survive. Uh, not really (because, for one thing, they're not dead!). The best part was the beginning with Harry. AJ is a putz.

Robert Cort has all the credentials necessary to write a compelling book about the movie business and he has done so. He has been to the mountain top and seen it all from the heights, and also from the depths--and among the world's businesses, the movie industry has depths that will never truly be plumbed. When power, money and emotion get together, bodies start to pile up.
Cort set out to write an insider's page turner, and that's what ACTION! is. The book drives on, irresistibly, at times delivering for the reader a fascinated horror at what it reveals about the men and women who make movies, but always achieving a level of credibility attainable only from experience.
The plot is a fictional, three-generation family saga, peppered with the names and histories of many known industry individuals and their factual pasts--actors, producers, studio heads, agents, agency heads, with the additional relish of invented characters, some of whose behavior is dreadful, amoral, vicious. Most of them are difficult to like or respect at any level, except for the dead patriarch who believed in truth, decency and integrity--and much good it did him. For the most part the protagonists are driven by the need for power, money, sex and drugs, in large amounts and in no particular order.
It's tempting to try to read between the lines, to discover the facts lurking behind the fiction, put real names and faces to the fictional characters, to imagine where the author is sending messages and settling scores--in an industry of unimaginable personal vindictiveness and associated bad behavior. But Cort moves the story along so fast and covers most of the characters so superficially that it's difficult or impossible for an outsider to draw valid conclusions. In the end one just lies back and enjoys the ride, while wishing at times that a few of the myriad trails into the pit would lead somewhere. He does manage, however, to explain the current MBA-driven, bottom-line-at-all-costs attitude that has ruined film as a story-telling medium, describing a director: "The secret of his success was recognizing that young audiences didn't care about being moved or improved--they wanted action. So (he) dealt them a visual rush with visceral state-of-the-art spectacles." Ugh.
Cort is a workmanlike writer, focusing on delivering information and results rather than literature or poetry, and the approach is undoubtedly correct for the book. Despite occasional mistakes (launch from an aircraft carrier, p351, presses one back in the seat and does not "slam the body forward against the harness"), the words flow at a pleasing pace.
Near the end of the book, Cort delivers the perfect analysis of the industry in which he has spent much of his professional life, when one character observes: "Who cares about the movie business? I don't like these people or the films they make."
All generalizations are false, a paradox. But Cort nails it, right there.

I happened to be in a bookstore where Robert Cort was reading and decided "what the hell" and listened to him read. He was so funny I figured I'd buy the book, even though I'm not a big movie person. The cool thing about the book is that it's not really for film geeks, per se, or at least I don't think so. It's got a lot of stuff that would appeal to them but a lot more than that, too. A great sense of history and a great sense of entrepreneurial enterprise. That's what I liked about the book - I liked the way that AJ builds his companies. Some of the stuff in the first section didn't really do it for me, but keep reading, it gets really good and the ending is very cool. (better ending then a few other books I've read this summer.)

This is a fun read but not a very well told tale. The characters aren't very emotionally fleshed out. For instance, the lead character's mother despises him, but his actions don't seem to warrant it. Likewise, the son hates the lead character but the lead's behavior didn't seem to warrant that either. And, the lead character is described as ruthless by others, but the author doesn't really paint him that way. The end is also less than believable. I bought the book on the discount table at Borders but I definitely wouldn't pay full price for it.

The main thing this book has going for it is the gimmick of inserting famous characters, like Steve McQueen, as characters. This is a readable, if sprawling tale of filmdom cattiness. The prose has no particular style, and it reads like one of those quickie Hollywood bios written from old newspaper clips. It's a pleasant time-waster -- the type of book that you can enjoy reading on an airplane but can toss aside at any point and not care if you get back to it.

Action is a story of Hollywood and movie-making told through three generations of the Jastrow family. Cort tells his story in an entertaining, fast-moving style and weaves in many real-life, well-known figures (e.g. Steve McQueen, Romy Schneider, Sam Kinnison,etc.), which creates interest. While the book starts off strong, I found my interest consistently declining as the story moved through "the years." Although I was never bored with the story, by the time I finished Action my main reaction was "So what!" If you have an interest in books about Hollywood and movie-making, you'll probably find Action to be "up your alley." However, if you are considering reading this book because of a desire for a good, compelling plot, I think you should look elsewhere.

If you like following the history of Hollywood, this is a novel by a well-known producer who rather than write a history of Hollywood, invents a family through three generations that lives through the different stages of Hollywood business growth, the studios in control, the producers/actors/directors in the late 70s through the current history of corporate ownership. Significant Hollywood players who are mentioned include Steve McQueen and Mike Ovitz who once again is portrayed negatively. I suspect he's used to that by now.

I found this to be a very fast enjoyable read if you like nonfiction and Hollywood history. My only complaint is the ending seemed to be thrown together and seemed to leave a few unresolved issues to explore like the father's former girlfriend who is now pregnant. Overall, I would highly recommend this book and thoroughly enjoyed it.