Customer Reviews

Scare Tactic: The Life & Films of William Castle

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4 star:		(4)
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1 star:		(3)

 

 

I picked up "Scare Tactic" after finishing William Castle's very engaging memoirs, "Step Right Up! I'm Gonna Scare the Pants off America." There is very little original material in John Law's book... most of it is just a rehash of Castle's memoirs, in which Law re-tells Castle's anecdotes, sometimes refuting them. (Mostly on minor details like dates.) Law offers a few terse observations and insights of the man's life, but not really until the very last 10 pages of the book. The most glaring and offensive thing about this book is how poorly it is edited: simple mistakes (like spelling "Ursula" "Ursual" or "their" instead of "there") dot almost every single page, making this book seem even more amateurish. I suggest picking up Castle's memoirs instead... they're much more entertaining and better written.

"Scare Tactic" cannot help but be somewhat interesting simply because the life and work of its subject William Castle were so unique and inspiring.

But the book itself is ineptly written and executed. Spelling and grammatical errors abound (the kind of mistakes that word processors miss, such as the use of "their" in place of "there"). Run-on sentences and repetition render even the simplest information confusing and incoherent. And the author's own attempts to analyze Mr. Castle's life and work amount to grade-school-quality assessments (yes, we all agree that many of Castle's films were scary).

In short, "Scare Tactic" is nearly unreadable. Books such as this one demonstrate why traditional book editors and publishers need never feel threatened by the growing self-publication movement ("Scare Tactic" was self-published by its author through iUniverse.com).

If a reader is truly curious about Mr. Castle's life and work, they are encouraged to seek out a copy of his autobiography "I'm Gonna Scare the Pants Off America" which is currently out of print but which they may be able to find at their local library.

The author's obvious love of Castle's horror work comes through. While the book doesnt offer great detail of Castle's other works, his horror classics are well detailed. There is some overlap with Castle's own autobiography, but there's some great touches with some of the lousy film reviews the director got which Castle himself rarely admitted to and some item Castle never discussed in his own book, like the fact that Joan Crawford was not the original star of Strait-Jacket. The book also has some rare photos and is a great option since Castle's own autobiography hasnt been in print for years. In fact, this is actually the only biography ever done on Castle.

First of all I will point out that the author's affection for his subject is obvious. That is the plus. However, he negates any positives by his awful, sloppy writing. I would think that if you are writing about a subject you enjoy and care about, you would not do it in such a sloppy manner and you would take the time to research the most basic things such as spelling...Citizen CANE, anyone????? Memo to Mr. Law: Don't rely solely on a spell checker in a word processing program. You should print out a hard copy and go over it line by line and word for word.
The minuses are numerous, thus making for an entertaining read. However, I am sure the author did not intend for the entertainment factor to come from the reader finding the errors in the book.
Technically, this is probably the worst written book I have ever read. It is full of errors in grammar and spelling, many of them rendered even more foolish because the author could have checked these so easily and avoided looking ridiculous. The blurb on the back of the book (written by the author himself?) calls it "clearly written" which makes it even funnier.
If the author is an editor as the back cover claims, I feel sorry for any author getting stuck with Mr. Law as their editor; he can't even do a good job on his own book. And if he did not edit his own book, who did? An "editor" worse than the author?
This guy's work is so incredibly sloppy it is actually amusing to read this book just to find the errors. It seems as if there is something on just about every page that is spelled incorrectly or incoherently written. He might want to consider finding another line of work because he cannot write or edit very well.
Most of the material is re-hashed information from Castle's own autobiography, so the author does not present much in the way of new material or deliver any new insight on his subject. The "analysis" of the Castle films at the end is also rather silly.
To point out just a few of the errors that jumped out at me: Passed instead of past; bares instead of bears; look instead of looked; their instead of they're; grizzly instead of grisly; and two of my favorites: "finance" instead of "fiance" and "tailcoats" instead of "coattails"
Other errors that are hilarious simply because they would have been so easy to check are: "Ruth Gordan" "A Streetcar Names Desire" and "Doctor Shivago" to name just a few.
It's too bad this book is so horribly written and edited because just about any kid growing up in the late fifties or early to mid sixties was probably a fan of the cheesy William Castle horror films, and would probably enjoy reading about Castle if for nothing else than to bring back those memories.
Aside from his own autobiography, it would be fun to have a really good, entertaining book about Castle and his films. Unfortunately, this is not the book.
Other blurbs on the back call it "articulate and insightful" and "the only book of its kind" to which I have to disagree with the first statement and heartily agree with the second. It is certainly a one-of-a-kind book!
As I said earlier, it is unfortunate that the entertainment value of this book is derived from finding glaring errors everywhere, because this is a subject I was looking forward to reading about. There really is no excuse for such a sloppily written and edited book. An allegedly experienced "editor" really should turn out work of a higher caliber.
To echo another reviewer, the publishing industry need not worry about the proliferation of "print on demand" or self published types of books. If this "iuniverse" book is any example, the publishing industry has nothing to fear.

I liked it. Nice to see a bio on Castle - he's an underrated filmmaker and not much has been done on him. His autobiography was a bit of a joke itself. This is a little more balanced with some of his bad reviews included. Has some typos, but has a lot of info I had not seen before and unlike Castle's own book, this one has a bunch of pictures.

While certainly not the complete word on William Castle, there's so little written about the filmmaker that this book is a welcome addition. Castle's own book is filled with stories that are half-true, so it's nice to have another look. Book offers details behind many of his classic B-horrors and is a pretty easy read. It even offers some new and unusual bits of info and photos that were seriously lacking from the republished version of Castle's autobiography. There's still room for a really good biography on William Castle, but until it's done this is worth a read for any Castle fan.

This book has been well-researched about filmmaker William Castle & his long-list of films. However, the author recites the passages from William Castle's 'out-of-print' auto-biography. If you have read "I'm Gonna Scare the Pants Off America," you may be disappointed in Mr. Law's book. I do applaud John Law for his critical analysis of William Castle's movies including how Mr. Castle in his own auto-biography uses gimmickry & self-promotion as a means of storytelling (hence, William Castle extends & over-dramatizes the facts of his own life). The pictures in the book are excellent! Great facts revealed. John Law's book is the only up-to-date biography on William Castle. I wish the author would have gone into more detail about the current remakes of William Castle's movies.

This new book "Scare Tactic - The Life & Films of William Castle takes readers on an exciting romp through the life and work of legendary filmmaker William Castle. Castle, best known for campy horror classics like "House on Haunted Hill," "The Tingler," "Homicidal" and "Strait-Jacket" earned fame for his elaborate gimmicks to promote his films. Shock buzzers beneath movie seats, punishment polls, ghost viewers and flying skeletons helped draw fans to his films. Castle was also the producer of "Rosemary's Baby" and his work is being revived these days after the successful remake of "House on Haunted Hill." Word is that Hollywood is already preparing for remakes of Castle's "Macabre" and "13 Ghosts." Full of photos of Castle, his stars like Joan Crawford and Vincent Price, as well as his movies and gimmicks, it's a must for anyone who's a fan of the director/producer.