Bambi vs. Godzilla: On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business (Vintage) [Paperback]

David Mamet (Author)

Book Description

Release date: February 12, 2008 | ISBN-10: 1400034442 | ISBN-13: 978-1400034444

From the Academy Award-nominated screenwriter and playwright: an exhilaratingly subversive inside look at Hollywood from a filmmaker who’s always played by his own rules. Who really reads the scripts at the film studios? How is a screenplay like a personals ad? Why are there so many producers listed in movie credits? And what on earth do those producers do anyway? Refreshingly unafraid to offend, Mamet provides hilarious, surprising, and refreshingly forthright answers to these and other questions about every aspect of filmmaking from concept to script to screen. A bracing, no-holds-barred examination of the strange contradictions of Tinseltown, Bambi vs. Godzilla dissects the movies with Mamet’s signature style and wit.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Mamet's a veteran screenwriter and director (currently producing The Unit for CBS), but that doesn't mean he has any great love for the industry—his Hollywood is the stereotypically corrupt and cutthroat world where screenwriters willingly change their stories to accommodate every stupid suggestion from producers, who are blatantly lining their own pockets, while stars bicker over who has the bigger trailer. But his stories are entertaining even when they're unsurprising, and though loosely organized, a few broad themes emerge. He expounds at length, for example, upon his well-known penchant for straightforward storytelling, where drama boils down to "the creation and deferment of hope," and every scene should be able to answer three questions: "Who wants what from whom? What happens if they don't get it? Why now?" At other times, he's happy simply to explain why he thinks Laurence Olivier was a terrible film actor or to test out a theory that the early film industry owes its development to Eastern European Jews with Asperger's syndrome. As usual with Mamet, each word is precisely chosen for maximum effect, and nearly all hit their mark. (Feb.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

By anyone's measure, Mamet is a prodigious writer, somehow finding time for the occasional essay amid his ever-expanding repertoire of plays, screenplays, and novels. His latest essay collection focuses on the movie industry, and his stance is that of someone who has seen Hollywood's facelift scars and whose advice to eager novices just off the bus can be summarized thusly: "Go back." This might appear self-serving, for a man who has found success in a cutthroat industry may want to discourage potential competition. But Mamet's cynicism comes off as genuinely hard-won. He outlines the Hollywood caste system with a precision that reflects the bitter experience of the person at the bottom--the screenwriter. Scorn, betrayal, and subjugation--this is the lot of the writer, who, according to Mamet, is resented by nearly everyone in the business. Miraculously, though, great drama is occasionally realized on the screen, and Mamet offers writers some guidelines on how to approach it. However, be warned that those seeking a screenwriting method will be greatly disappointed--but, then again, that is perhaps ideal training for the job. Jerry Eberle
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (February 12, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400034442
• ISBN-13: 978-1400034444
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.6 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #208,218 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #93 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Movies > Industry

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 49 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Art Versus $$$ February 24, 2007

By C. Hutton

Format:Hardcover

David Mamet is a playwright who won the Pulitzer Prize for "Glengarry Glen Ross" and an Oscar nominated screenwriter for "The Verdict" and "Wag The Dog." It is no wonder that, as a wordsmith, "Bambi vs. Godzilla" is a delight to read. This book is a series of opinated essays by a Hollywood insider who attacks the industry for favoring profits over art. There are times that the author overwrites a simple thought into a complex paragraph that leaves one shaking their head. It is still an entertaining read.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Disappointed July 24, 2007

By B. Hayes

Format:Hardcover

I love David Mamet's plays. He's an excellent writer. So I was enthusiastic about getting the chance to read his personal views of Hollywood. And while I agree with him that the studio machinery is all about profits and very little about art or craft - when was it ever different? - I was ultimately disappointed by his book. There were times when I just didn't know what he was talking about. I think his writing here is often inaccessible. I may not be the most erudite reader, but Mamet left me cold. I just couldn't get into the style of his writing. I felt distanced rather than drawn in. When I read a book like this, I want to devour it, not pick at its little pieces. You may feel differently, that's fine. The book didn't pull me in the way I'd hoped it would.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Packed With Ideas - Worth reading twice! February 28, 2007

By E. Shepard

Format:Hardcover

David Mamet is an excellent writer, one of our best. The prose in this book gleams. There's not a word out of place. Every aspiring essay writer should read it.

There's much outrage in "Bambi vs. Godzilla," primarily about the state of the homogenized, dumbed-down modern film industry, but the book never feels like a rant. Mamet's reflections on the movie industry allow him to touch on many, many other subjects - such the state of the unions in America, the importance of craft, Jewish identity in America, and so on. I don't think Mamet expects readers will agree with everything in the book. Likewise, I don't think he is being controversial for the sake of controversy.

His provocative ideas will stimulate some truly interesting discussions, as well as reflections on America, our big movie industry, and what is says about us.

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars David Mamet Takes on the Movie Business May 14, 2007

By Alan L. Chase VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

David Mamet knows how to write - for the stage, for the screen and for reading audiences. His grasp of how to construct dialogue is second to none. "Glengarry Glen Ross," won the Pulitzer Prize - and deservedly so. It is brilliant! I can't remember how many times I have seen "The Spanish Prisoner," and been astonished with each viewing at the way in which Mamet constructed the story. His play, "The Boston Marriage," contains two hours of delicious verbal ripostes and counter-thrusts. I happened to catch an evening performance of the play at the Hasty Pudding Theater in Cambridge on a night when Mamet himself was in the audience.

Mamet's latest literary project is his commentary on the current state of the movie industry: "Bambi vs. Godzilla - On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business."

Steve Martin's blurb on the dust jacket of the book, with tongue firmly planted in cheek, sums up beautifully the impact that this book will have among Hollywood insiders: "David Mamet is supremely talented. He is a gifted writer and observer of society and its characters. I'm sure he will be able to find work somewhere, somehow, just no longer in the movie business."

Mamet takes the reader behind the scenes of how a movie gets written, shot, edited, marketed and distributed. He gives his unvarnished personal opinion about actors, directors, producers and films he has appreciated - and those he disdains. The book contains a wonderful Appendix that is a compendium of thumbnail descriptions of each of the movies he mentions in the body of the book....

In the course of commenting about the status of the movie industry as business and as art, he offers some illuminating insights into the state of our society:

"The absence of a historical and universally acknowledged authority to which one may pledge fealty and against which one may rebel creates factionalism: the right moves toward fascism, the left toward chaos. Democracy - in extremis - seems capable of devolving to either tyranny or civil war, and America, maddened by unimaginable prosperity and safety, incomprehensibly powerful, and bereft of threats, splits down the middle on the issue of definition.

Is the good person one who will not tolerate a president's lies about sex or one who will not tolerate a president's lies about war? (Pages 33-34)

Touché! Mamet does not pull his punches, and both ends of the political spectrum are fair game for his analysis. The same goes for his deconstruction of the movie business. I walked away from reading this book with a deeper appreciation for the best films and film makers - and a better understanding of what makes/made them so good. The fact that Mamet is - to employ a technical sociological term - a participant/observer in moviedom, adds weight, texture, immediacy and intrigue to his commentary about the industry that both feeds him and frustrates him.

We are blessed to have Mamet - still in his prime - and still shining the light of his observation and analysis upon dark corners of our world that need to be brought out of the shadows.

Enjoy!

Al Read more ›

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Try to see the cartoon March 24, 2007

By John Matlock

Format:Hardcover

Perhaps the best way to understand this book is to go see the cartoon Bambi Meets Godzilla. But if you haven't seen it. It opens with Bambi prancing and dancing through the forest. Then Godzilla big foot comes down right on top of Bambi. Bambi's legs twitch a couple of times and the credits roll -- that's the whole cartoon.

If this kind of humor suits you, or maybe the kind that's in 'Wag the Dog' you'll love this book. It's full of irreverence about the biggest names in the industry. Don't take the book too seriously, it's a romp through little stories about movies, people, and the industry. It's a light read, and isn't going to fill you with deep serious thoughs. But it is a fun read.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Very good social commenary May 9, 2011

By A Reader

Format:Paperback

This book is great. It is basically a scathing critique of Hollywood and perhaps of modern America in general. The book is funny, sometimes profound, and full of surprises (just like a David Mamet movie). This book could also be called "David v. Goliath" with David as in Mamet and Goliath as in Universal Studios or something like that. Or perhaps, Mamet v. the contemporary cultural mainstream.

So, the basic theme of the book is that the ever-precious creative impulse constantly has to fight for its life, constantly under threats of suffocation by the shrinking boundaries of social propriety. Anyone can write about this; that's just common knowledge. What makes the book interesting is that Mamet has experienced it first-hand, since he belongs to the deep inner circle of Hollywood screenwriters in direct contact with the production machine of the studios.

Mr. Mamet is an interesting character. He presents the very rare combination of being a nerd while at the same time being blessed, or cursed, with a tremendous warrior mentality and an absolute disgust for modern conformism. I am left with the impression that he wanted to be an actor. What kept him from being a Marlon Brando? The lack of a good nature. Mamet calls the good nature an unnamed "idiosyncrasy" and does not identify it as the main trait of the true movie star. It is good nature that allows the stars to audition to studio people who know nothing about art, and to express things that are forever inaccessible to the masses, while never taking any offense in the misunderstandings that make or break their careers.

And of course a Frenchman like me was touched by his frequent, if short, incursions in the territory of the langue de Voltaire, always with remarkable timing and a-propos. But your style, Mr.... Mamet: simplifiez, simplifiez! Read more ›