Playboy: Fifty Years : The Photographs [Bargain Price] [Hardcover]

James R. Petersen (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2003

Playboy celebrates its 50th anniversary with this lavish collection of the very best of the magazine's photography. More than 250 full-color photographs, chosen from the ten million images preserved in the Playboy archive, chronicle five decades of brilliant, life-affirming art. Playboy: 50 Years revisits the girl next door, the sex symbols, and the gods and goddesses who shaped our culture. It visually tracks the changing politics, fashions, and mores through the frenzied peak of the sexual revolution and beyond - from the almost nostalgic eroticism of the 50s bachelor, a martini his secret of seduction, to the highly charged images of modern sexuality. Celebrity models such as Raquel Welch and Cindy Crawford, along with interview subjects such as Mohammed Ali and Salvador Dali, and infamous bunnies such as Anna Nicole Smith and Pamela Anderson reveal all. Portfolios devoted to the bachelor pad, the perfect cocktail, fashion, and sports cars celebrate Playboy as the ultimate wish book. From the history-making red velvet shot of Marilyn Monroe, "posed with nothing on except the radio," to the highly charged images of such masters as Herb Ritts and Helmut Newton, this book is a breath-taking photographic tour de force. The definitive gift of the season, Playboy: 50 Years is also the only book being published in the fall to coincide with the launch of the magazine's 50th anniversary.

--This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

You mean people don't read Playboy for the Nabokov stories and hard-hitting reportage? Sturdily produced, this is a candy-colored, unpretentious gaze over a half-century of nudity, fun, sex and the most absurd fashions this side of Cukor's The Women. Playboy was genuinely shocking in its youth, but these 250 color pictures, compared to what's out there now, emphasize control and stardom. Here's the first centerfold, Marilyn Monroe, as the "Golden Dream." Here are Ursula Andress, bent in half like a cupid's bow; Pamela Anderson and Dorothy Stratten; the sensational Russ Meyer "actress" Edy Williams floating across the sinuous blue of the perfect swimming pool. Herb Ritts's photographs of the models Stephanie Seymour, Cindy Crawford and Elle Macpherson are suitably iconic, as are David Bailey's tawny Catherine Deneuve and Chris Von Wangenheim's Raquel Welch in blue, black and white. The text is a second thought indeed, but it's serviceable, the work of longtime Playboy staffer Peterson. Playboy lured some great artists into its pages, including Warhol, Antonioni, Helmut Newton and Brett Weston, but judging from what's here, none seem to have done their best work for the magazine. On the whole, 50 Years is largely unpretentious-with one exception, trying to persuade us that the "triptych" of black-and-white head shots that lines the bottom of the opening page to each Playboy Interview is somehow some new kind of art form. In truth Playboy's major innovation was the centerfold, unfolding out of the book as though too big for its britches.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 239 pages
• ISBN-10: 0811839788
• ASIN: B0007PB1XI
• Product Dimensions: 12.1 x 9.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,128,656 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant but less than I anticipated..., January 2, 2004

By 

Alan B. Scholl (Antigua, West Indies) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Playboy: 50 Years: The Photographs (Hardcover)

Although it is a well put together book, I was a bit disappointed moreso from some of my own expectations. If you are a PLAYBOY fan, buy this book! I was, however, expecting to see all the playmates which did not happen :-(

The photography is first class as they had selected the best of the best from its archive of over 10 million images. It is a brilliant review of 50 years of not only PLAYBOY but the history of that past era and it is well worth it.

24 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book, November 14, 2003

By 

Freakzilla (Las Vegas, NV) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Playboy: 50 Years: The Photographs (Hardcover)

This is a wonderful 240 page photography book of the 50 years of Playboy photography. It opens with the Playboy story, and how it grew into the great company it is today. The book then shifts over to the importance of the centerfold. I was nowhere near born when a lot of the beautiful women such as Ellen Stratton, Liv Lindeland, and Eve Meyer were posing, but I can see why the magazine was so successful. There is also a nice frontal and backside poster of Nancy Cameron included.

The next chapter includes just a few of the many people that have contributed to the Playboy interview over the many years, talking about various controversial issues.

There are more pictures included, this time of some beautiful celebrities, such as Cindy Crawford, Kim Basinger, Pamela Anderson, and Stephanie Seymour among a sea of others.

The lifestyles section was very intriguing, to say the least. There are a lot of great photography shots in this section that absolutely stunned me. I cannot put into words what this is like, so go see for yourself!

There is an artwork gallery of some fascinating and very detailed pictures. A lot of beautiful work that will leave you breathless, as well as a very disturbing piece of art that has scarred my mind forever. Finally, there is the covers section that they have included. I liked some of the old school covers that they had, some were very unique and others, while simple, still caught your attention.

Overall I found this book very enjoyable. For younger fans of Playboy, such as myself, this gives only a small sense of what Playboy was, and how it has grew since then. For the older fans, I guess it will be nothing new, but it will be a nice trip down memory lane.

34 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Trip Down Mammary Lane..., October 6, 2003

By 

George L Littlefield (Glen Ellyn, Illinois United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Playboy: 50 Years: The Photographs (Hardcover)

This book is a fine review of Playboy magazine's 50-year history of ground-breaking photography. Not just the Playmates--though there are plenty here, but also the cars, the clothes, the music and the lifestyle that were part and parcel of the Playboy mythos are well-represented. The farther back you yourself go in Playboy's history, the more you will enjoy this book. My only regret is that it should have been a much longer book. There were millions of photographic images considered for publication; many more of them would have been even more welcome.