Customer Reviews

Disco Years

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"[Galella's] strongest period was the 1970's when his reality-based photography style was in perfect sync with that decade's gritty approach to filmmaking, a time when Hollywood had largely discarded the sugar-coated schmaltz of 50's and 60's artifice....Here is a startled Bette Midler looking behind her shoulder at the Grammy Awards, her askew tiara making her look like a lost, overgrown trick-or-treater. Alfred Hitchcock at the premiere of his film Family Plot wearing a stony, zombie-like expression that recalls Tor Johnson's performance in Plan 9 From Outer Space. A pre-Saturday Night Fever John Travolta already basking in fame, a crowd of fans restrained mere inches away and behaving as if Travolta's then unadulterated charisma had driven them to fits of ecstasy. And a miniscule Herve Villechaize ducking under a velvet rope at the Golden Globe awards like a mischievous gremlin hell-bent on carrying out acts of sabotage on the glamorous proceedings. Despite Galella's cinema verite hand, there is a persistent dream-like quality that emerges throughout the book. There are moments when the images almost threaten to tumble into a vortex where reality and fantasy merge - like the spiraling narrative of the amnesiac actress in Mulholland Drive, David Lynch's savagely surreal commentary on Tinseltown. Of all the visions in Galella's work, however, the most sobering seems to be the reminder of the ephemeral nature of fame and flesh."

-From my essay on Galella's work that accompanied an exhibition of his photos

Great book. Amazing phots of all the beautiful people when they were beautiful indeed.

I love this book...outrageous photos and lots of current celebs in their younger days. Its great for anyone who wants to have a disco party- good idea to get costume looks. In fact, its kind of it's own party. Sit down...have a cocktail and page through it. You'll feel like you were there- and why not, everyone in the tri-state area of a "certain age" claims to have been a regular at 54.

Amazing pictures. They say if you remember Studio 54 you really weren't there. This book captures those moments perfectly.
Worth the money.

I only just flipped through this book today in a store and I am already asking for it as a gift. The photography is amazing and being that I am too young to have experienced the 1970s, I am absolutely fascinated by the decade and wish I could have lived through it myself. Looking through the photos makes me feel as if I was there, and gives me a different glimpse of what really went on inside Studio 54, other than watching the movie, 54. :) The book is organized wonderfully and I cannot wait to have it to myself!