Movie Love in the 50s [Paperback]

James Harvey (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 17, 2002

"What I set out to do is to help you see movies better, to experience them more deeply and sharply and richly," says James Harvey. And his critical method-reading a movie moment by moment, scene by scene-reveals new layers of meaning in even the most familiar films. See how 1940s film noir evolves into 1950s melodrama; how the femme fatale of the 1940s (think Barbara Stanwyck) becomes blander and blonder (think Doris Day) and then younger and sexier (yes, Marilyn); and how the new boy-men-Clift, Brando, Dean-finally steal the show. Harvey also discusses the directors: Hitchcock, Ophuls, Kazan, Welles. Comprehensive, vivid, and charismatic, Movie Love in the Fifties is a fresh look at the films, directors, and actors of a dynamic decade. "Whether he's escorting us through Nicholas Ray's Bitter Victory, Douglas Sirk's Imitation of Life, Orson Welles's Magnificent Ambersons, or any one of a dozen other great films from the period, Harvey lends us an astuteness of analysis and a power of observation that we couldn't have had on our own."-Wendy Lesser, The American Prospect

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This impressionistic, illuminating and sometimes infuriating analysis of '50s films is an exquisite oddity: an investigation of popular culture that is as personal in its vision as it is scholarly in its range, as compulsively readable as it is detailed and exhaustive. Harvey's wide-ranging knowledge of films of the era dovetails beautifully with his ability to pinpoint "epiphanies" the recurring "fleeting scene of detail that carries such a sudden pressure of meaning and beauty... it could implode the movie screen." Rather then simply cataloguing films by themes or genre, Harvey (Romantic Comedy) takes on the far more difficult task of examining them through a prism of conflated, often conflicted views to attempt to understand their myriad sources and meanings. This ambitious project is at times enormously successful, as when he moves seamlessly through a discussion of the role of "the blonde" in '50s films, noting not only performances by Doris Day, Marilyn Monroe, Judy Holliday, Grace Kelly, Gloria Graham and Kim Novak, but also the contexts in which their films were made, their personal lives and their public images. Other times as when he provocatively suggests that Marlon Brando, James Dean and Montgomery Clift projected a "homoerotic charge" he seems overwhelmed by the complexity and implications of his arguments, leaving the reader feeling shortchanged. Though ostensibly about "love," much of the book is actually about "gender"; Harvey draws on (but rarely mentions) a history and tradition of feminist film criticism. Yet when he spends a sustained amount of time on a film usually cult favorites like Nicholas Ray's Johnny Guitar or Robert Siodmack's Phantom Lady his analytic method produces extraordinary results.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

For every "sanitized" movie that came out of the Fifties, there were others that shook up old formulas. Critic and essayist Harvey explores and ultimately eulogizes Hollywood films of this era, a time of transition when the Production Code was being scrapped and the studio system abandoned. His "loves" include archetypal blonde actresses (Kim Novak, Janet Leigh), Method actors (Brando, Dean, Clift), and directors who were either subtle craftsmen (Robert Siodmak, Max Ophuls, Douglas Sirk), master technicians (Hitchcock and Welles), or mavericks (Nicholas Ray). Harvey's close, sensitive readings of films as texts and his analyses of shots and characterization mean that the reader does not need to have seen the films to appreciate this work. Harvey affectionately delineates important nuances of the films he chooses to discuss even those he disdains and provides enough context to keep the discussions tight. His movie love is inspired and infectious. Recommended for academic libraries. Jayne Plymale, Univ. of Georgia, Athens
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 464 pages
• Publisher: Da Capo Press (September 17, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0306811774
• ISBN-13: 978-0306811777
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,498,111 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Like overhearing a wonderful monologue on Fifties films, November 15, 2001

By 

Michael Samerdyke (Big Stone Gap, VA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Movie Love in the Fifties (Hardcover)

I think Harvey's "Romantic Comedy" is one of the best books ever written on Hollywood films, so I really looked forward to reading "Movie Love." I was not disappointed. The new book is as thoughtful and well-written as the previous book. My only complaint is that "Movie Love" is not chronologically organized.

Harvey sets up an opposition between traditional Hollywood cinema and the "new realism" of the Fifties. He comes down in favor of the traditional filmmaking of Douglas Sirk, Alfred Hitchcock and Robert Siodmak, as opposed to the emotionalism of, say, "East of Eden" or other movies influenced by "Method" actors.

Reading "Movie Love in the Fifties" is like listening to a wonderfully informed person talk about the movies he is enthusiastic about. Harvey's style is free of academic jargon, and he makes you remember that people went to movies because they were fun. I found myself dying to see "Vertigo" and "Written on the Wind" again after reading this book, and Harvey has persuaded me that I've got to track down and see "Christmas Holiday," "Lured," and "Imitation of Life" now.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting, if only to browse through, June 3, 2003

By 

Tom Moran (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Movie Love in the 50s (Paperback)

Sandwiched uneasily between the 1940s, when Hollywood reached its wartime peak, and the 1960s, when the studio system finally collapsed, the 1950s was an odd transitional decade in American filmmaking, whose oddity James Harvey explores at length (if not always in depth) in his new book, "Movie Love in the Fifties."

He discusses not only films that cinephiles will be sure to have seen, but a few they're likely never to have heard of (among them the Deanna Durbin vehicle "Christmas Holiday," which Harvey makes sound so perversely engaging you'll regret it's not available on video). His view of the period, however, is both idiosyncratic and incomplete - you'd be hard pressed to realize from Harvey's account, for example, that directors as disparate as Samuel Fuller and Vincente Minnelli were doing some of their best work in the 50s. Some great films of the era -- Minnelli's "Some Came Running," for example -- go unmentioned here.

When Harvey is intrigued by a director, such as Nicholas Ray, Robert Siodmak or the currently trendy Douglas Sirk, his analysis can be enthralling (his take on Sirk's "Imitation of Life" alone is worth the price of the book). But as well as being a little uncertain factually (he has Marilyn Monroe and James Dean dying, respectively, a year earlier and later than they actually did), too many pages are devoted to meandering plot summaries of films all-too-readily available on video.

All told, the book is worth checking out, but you might want to do some judicious skimming.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, May 27, 2005

By 

SEB "wurvous" (Austin, TX) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Movie Love in the 50s (Paperback)

Although I agree that, for some film fans, Harvey's analysis can be infuriating, this text is one of the more engrossing studies I've come across in recent years. But you should pick it up and browse the chapters to see if the actors, films, and directors he selects are ones that you'd like to read about. Being a huge fan of the majority of the works he does choose to focus on, I find this book to be a valuable companion. His chapter on Out of the Past is entertaining and informative and I love all the attention he gives to Nicholas Ray and Douglas Sirk.