Never Coming To A Theater Near You [Hardcover]

Kenneth Turan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 28, 2004

It is in the nature of today's movie business that while Hollywood blockbusters invade every megaplex, smaller, quality films often don't get screen time. Fans of finer films have to count on catching up with them on video and DVD, but even the most hard-core devotees have trouble remembering what sounded good when a film was originally released. Never Coming to a Theater Near You will remedy that situation.

This selection of renowned film critic Kenneth Turan's absorbing and illuminating reviews, now revised and updated to factor in the tests of time, point viewers toward the films they can't quite remember, but should not miss.

Moviegoers know they can trust Turan's impeccable taste. His eclectic selection represents the kind of sophisticated, adult, and entertaining films intelligent viewers are hungry for. More importantly, Turan shows readers what makes these unusual films so great, revealing how talented filmmakers and actors have managed to create the wonderful highs we experience in front of the silver screen.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The title of this book, a collection of Turan's daily newspaper reviews from the Los Angeles Times, promises the unearthing of deeply obscure material or a truly revolutionary take on old favorites. Turan, who is also a contributor to NPR's Morning Edition, sets the book up more modestly in his introduction as a guide to unsung films now on DVD and video. He's a lovely reviewer, able to encapsulate a film's charms in a few phrases, and he has a particular knack for opening sentences, an important tool for any newspaper writer. But the section on English-language films contains reviews of movies like Election, Dead Man Walking and Muriel's Wedding—i.e., multiple Oscar nominees and winners, many that benefited from mass-market publicity campaigns. In essence, Turan's favorite flicks are already sung. His section on foreign films is far more useful, since many of them had very limited releases. Turan saves the best for last: nine longer essays he calls "Retrospectives." These pieces treat topics we don't hear much about: the great directors Max Ophuls and Frank Borzage, the delectable treats that came from "pre-code" Hollywood, and Yiddish film. And Turan's funny gloss on the familiar conventions of Chinese martial arts films shows how perceptive and winning he can be.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Turan, Los Angeles Times and National Public Radio film critic, collects reviews of more than 140 films that may have slipped under most filmgoers' radar. While such films as Dirty Pretty Things, Yi Yi, crumb, and Eyes without a Face did not get the distribution of The Lord of the Rings, they have, according to Turan, made his "professional life richly rewarding." His readily apparent enthusiasm comes without hyperbole, although he is prone to saying such things as "Nigel Hawthorne's work as the deranged monarch . . . enlarges our understanding of what acting can accomplish"--which can be taken as a bit grand. Reviews have been updated and revised--some include brief notes about what certain actors have gone on to do--but the one on Mike Leigh's Naked makes no reference to his Secrets & Lies and the one on The Commitments does not refer to The Snapper, also based on a Roddy Doyle novel. A section on retrospectives is a nice bonus, as are articles on such filmmakers as Anthony Mann and Frank Borzage. Benjamin Segedin
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: PublicAffairs; 1ST edition (September 28, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1586482319
• ISBN-13: 978-1586482312
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #743,086 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

128 of 128 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent guide to quality films, September 28, 2004

By 

Dennis Littrell (SoCal) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Never Coming To A Theater Near You (Hardcover)

The kind of movies that Los Angeles Times film critic Kenneth Turan is talking about in this fine collection of his reviews are those that are "sophisticated, mature, [and] always entertaining." (p. xiv) His point in the title about such films "never coming to a theater near you" is a good one since most of the films reviewed here had either a short life on the large screen or went directly to video and DVD. (The exceptions are classics like The Third Man (1949), A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), and others which were produced before the advent of video and DVD.) The reason, as every veteran film viewer knows, is that most movies shown in theaters today are aimed at a relatively young and unsophisticated mass audience, an audience that demands (producers believe) the sort of film that most of us have grown out of.

Turan's book is in five parts, English Language Films, Foreign Language Films, Documentaries, Classics, and Retrospectives. Characteristic English language films are, Election (1999), Heavenly Creatures (1994), Manny and Lo (1996), Proof (1991), 12 Monkeys (1995), to name some that I have seen and reviewed myself, and 66 more. Some foreign language films are, Autumn Tale (1998), Un Coeur en Hiver (1992), The Dreamlife of Angels (1998), Red (Trois Couleurs: Rouge) (1994), and 39 others. There are 20 documentaries including, Black Harvest (1994), Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control (1997), The Saltmen of Tibet (1998), etc. The classics include Das Boot (1981), Once Upon a Time in America (1984), Vertigo (1958), and nine others. What the selections in this eclectic assemblage have in common is that they are all very much worth seeing--at least the ones that I have seen. Indeed several of them--Un Coeur en Hiver, Red, Das Boot, A Streetcar Named Desire, etc.--are among the best movies I have ever seen.

Turan's reviews are mostly appreciations (which is not surprising since these are his favorite films) written in a clear, informative style infused with the sort of background information and historical perspective that only an expert on film can provide. Reading this volume is a film education in itself and a pleasure. And for most people I think the value of the book is consistent with Turan's intent: that is, to point to films that the serious film-goer may have missed and to demonstrate why those films are very much worth seeing.

The "Retrospectives" are essays inspired by "a specific film event" centered around individual film makers like Anthony Mann or the largely forgotten Frank Borzage, and others; or they are about genres or movements in cinema that Turan wanted to learn more about such as the Yiddish film or the Chinese martial arts film. There is an essay on "Pre-Code Hollywood."

Bottom line: if you are like me and have to screen three or four films (i.e., actually rent them or buy them) to find one worth watching, then this book is a godsend. Turan knows quality in film and he tells you why the film is worth watching, and his enthusiasm is contagious.

39 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best guide to movies for grownups . . ., November 26, 2004

By 

Ronald Scheer "rockysquirrel" (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Never Coming To A Theater Near You (Hardcover)

What a wonderful idea for a book! Kenneth Turan has brought together 150 reviews representing the top 5% of the films he sees as film critic for the Los Angeles Times. The result is a collection of movie reviews for (a) little-known and under-sung films that are (b) for grownup audiences instead of teenagers and (c) available on VHS and DVD.

Altogether there are reviews of movies from 39 countries, most of them released over the last dozen or so years, half of them English-language films. The other half are foreign language and documentaries. Turan also includes reviews of 12 classic movies and nine short essays on subjects ranging from Chinese martial arts to pre-code Hollywood films. There are no blockbusters here and very few films you're likely to have seen on HBO. They are instead the movies made with a nod to the inner adult - original, entertaining and wise, while touching on real emotions.

While I'd seen most of the English-language films Turan includes, and said "yes!" to each choice (like "A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries" and "Uncle Vanya on 42nd Street"), it was the foreign films and documentaries I knew far less about. And with a short list quickly picked from those sections, I went straight to Vidiots in Santa Monica, which had all of them. Starting with two French comedies, "The Dinner Game" and "Un Air de Famille," we were greatly entertained on a lazy Thanksgiving afternoon.

Turan has his sensibilities and his film sense all finely tuned. You can trust him to pick the good ones. And you can wonder at the other 95% of not-so-great fare he had to wade through to get to these gems.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful resource, December 14, 2005

By 

dephal (California) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Never Coming to A Theater Near You (Paperback)

I live sort of in the sticks--nothing plays at the local theaters except the big blockbusters. So this books serves as a great resource to all the movies I missed: independent films, foreign films, and (my personal favorite) documentaries. After reading this book, I now have many more movies to add to my Netflix queue. I have already seen quite a few of the films Turan reviews in this book, and I enjoyed them all, so I feel I can trust the other reviews in this book.

The "retorespectives" section at the end of the book is also valuable, and will serve as a good introduction for me to several genres and oevres.

I do have one complaint about the book, in that it is already a couple of years out of date. I hope Turan comes out with an updated edition soon.