Max Ophuls in the Hollywood Studios [Hardcover]

Lutz Bacher (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 1996

Max Ophuls, who is consideredone of the greatest film directors of all time, has long been seen as an "auteur"--the artist in complete control of his work. Lutz Bacher's examination of his American career gives us a unique perspective on the struggle on the workings of the Hollywood system and the struggle of a visionary to function within it. He thus establishes clear connections between the production contexts of Ophuls's American films and their idiosyncratic style. Drawing on documents in many archives and on interviews with more than sixty of Ophuls's contemporaries, Bacher traces the European director's struggle to find a niche in the U.S. film industry. He describes how Ophuls ran the gamut from ghost writing to substitute directing, to a debilitating association with Preston Sturges and Howard Hughes, to making four films--Letter from and Unknown Woman and Caught among them--in thirty months, and then returning to Europe with a runaway production that was to have starred Greta Garbo. Throughout, Bacher demonstrates that Ophuls's bending of conventional Hollywood methods to his own will through compromise and subversion allowed him to achieve a style that was both uniquely American and a point of departure from his later work. A rare synthesis of production history, stylistic analysis, and biography, this book is essential reading for serious film scholars and fans of the director's work.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

After his arrival in Hollywood in the midst of World War II, German-born director Ophuls made The Exile, Letter from an Unknown Woman, Caught, and The Reckless Moment. Generally regarded as critical failures at the time, the films nevertheless are proof of a unique vision that became more apparent in Ophuls's French films of the 1950s that are the center of contemporary auteurists' rediscovery of Ophuls. The director was once dismissed for his long-take aesthetic and elaborate camera fluidity, stylistic hallmarks for which he is now lionized. Similarly, the "women's films" on which Ophuls worked were then disparaged for their sentimentality but are well regarded now for their ideological ironies and insurgence of romantic notions. Bacher's (communications, Robert Morris Coll., Pittsburgh) work rests on interviews with the director's colleagues, production research, and comparisons of scripts with the final filmed products. Ophuls's impact in Hollywood was not that of other European emigres, but this transitional period in his career is much deserving of Bacher's thorough documentation, and the current climate is ripe for a concentrated look at Ophuls's work during the period. Recommended for informed lay readers.?Jayne Kate Plymale-Jackson, Univ. of Georgia Libs., Athens
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 392 pages
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press; First Edition edition (August 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813522919
• ISBN-13: 978-0813522913
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,540,245 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What is Behind the Films of Max Ophuls?, December 17, 2001

By 

Michael I. Chaplan (Kohoku-ku, Yokohama Japan) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Max Ophuls in the Hollywood Studios (Hardcover)

Unlike some of the other books about Ophuls, Bacher's book goes into what lay behind some of Ophuls' directorial decisions, the personalities of producers, editors, stars, etc. It is the book of scholarship that needs to be written about every director worth studying. This is the book you read BEFORE you start to consider what Ophuls is trying to communicate, what the meaning is of Ophuls films. The only drawback of the book is that it only goes into detail about Ophuls' four American films!
The biggest surprise was that the book was a pleasure to read. The personalities presented are real people. It is, despite the scholarly intention of the book, very fast reading. I found it too fast.... I will have to go back and read it again in order to write my own paper on Ophuls films!

MIchael Ian Chaplan