Customer Reviews

Stanley Kubrick: A Biography

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I found Baxter's book an enjoyable read, lively and somewhat informative, though apparently not the work of awesome scholarship that Lubrutto's book is. I haven't read that tome yet, but will soon, fascinated as I am by all things Kubrick. I didn't have the reaction that others have had concerning Baxter's feelings toward Kubrick. As far as I could tell, he seemed to have an appropriate level of respect. Baxter is obviously not a film scholar or someone too well versed in the technical side of filmmaking, but he keeps the book moving along briskly. This certainly a good start-up for someone new to Kubrick's films.

John Baxter's biography of Stanley Kubrick rings essentially true and many facts and quotations are confirmed in Vincent LoBrutto's biography and elsewhere, but certain minor though obvious errors make one wonder how careful the author has been. Fans of Kubrick's films will cringe when they encounter mistakes that any repeat viewer would catch. Combined with a tendency towards the unflattering, it makes the reader wonder whether Baxter is merely cynically exploiting his subject rather than illuminating it, as others seem to have done, especially since Kubrick's death.

LoBrutto's biography, the only other one currently available, is so tediously written and poorly edited that this reader couldn't bear to finish it. Perhaps excellent biographers avoid so difficult a subject as Stanley Kubrick.

Helps you realize why you love Kubrick, if you can read between the lines and if you don't get fixated on the tales of Kubrickophobism. While entertaining, they are not all that the book is about. The author does not present Kubricks work in 5-syllable Aestheto-socio-philosophical terms, nor does he fuss about the geometrical aspects of panning and scanning, yet he encourages you to re-visit Kubrick, and multiply your viewing experince!

Not a text book, for sure!

Not being a Kubrick fundi and not knowing all that much about the man behind the (enormous) myth, I found this book readable and interesting. I have to agree that it does not contain much in the way of analysis of Kubrick's movies, but that is probably not what the author had set out to do. It would have been a colossal and much less accessible work had he dealt at length with each of the movies.

What I cannot understand is the reaction of some of the reviewers, saying that the author was intent on crucifying Kubrick. That was certainly not my impression when I read the book, but then I do not regard Kubrick as per se a wonderful person becasue he made acclaimed movies. He comes across as a much warmer and more human person than I expected, give his reclusive lifestyle, but also as someone who had some flaws, like an inability to start and finish projects. And that is also what was said about him after his death, so I think Baxter is maybe not that far off the mark in his portrayal.

There's no doubt somewhere down the line, someone might write the definitive biography of the great film maker, Stanley Kubrick. Mr Baxter's book isn't quite it, just as several other Kubrick bios aren't either. Kubrick was an enigma and writing about not just an enigma but an intensely private person is always a problem. Mr Baxter's book looks at Kubrick's life and film's ina an entertaing and readable fashion without getting much past the surface.Combined with several other books on Kubrick (most notably the out of print book by Michel Ciment)John Baxter's book compiles some of the most famous Kubrick "stories" and some lesser-known ones. Given the author's long-standing credentials as a film historian as well as popular biographer of film identities, it would have made the book a more valuable addition to film culture had Mr Baxter included some more analysis of the films themselves. If this review seems a little at odds with a four star rating it's because ANY book which contributes in any way to help understand the artist who created a small but extraordinary body of work is worthy of that.

This book is greatly researched, and an extremely interesting read. For all of Baxter's effort's though, the man Kubrick remains an enigma, as he has to all authors, journalists and the general public. Insight is offered however into his mind by Baxter's excellent 'essay' writing ability, and from quotes by those who have worked with stanley.

Because Stanley Kubrick is such an intelluctual, this book seems to come under flak becasue it is not written in this style. Shame on Baxter for trying to broaden public knowledge on Kubrik! How dare he not use big words all the time! I have read 3 books on Kubrick, and while this is not the best, it is still a good read.

Most importantly though, is it shows Kubrick for what he really is, modern cinema's greatest intellectual, mastermind, and genius. A sad, black day for the cinema world with his passing.

While providing the occasional interesting insight and backstage tidbit, one gets to wondering what this book really has to offer. Baxter seems set on focusing on every alleged obsession, eccentricity, shortcoming, peeve of Stanley Kubrick. And to what purpose? In the end, we know some particulars about Kubrick, but the filmmaker remains as much a mystery to us as when we began reading. And perhaps that is the way it should be.

Throughout this book, Baxter makes references to Kubrick's "genius", though he rarely specifies or qualifies the epithet. Instead, he uses it as a periodic scrap of praise while he attacks Stanley Kubrick as a ruthless power-player, obsessive hermit, and breast-fetishist. He critizes Kubrick for insisting that his films be shot near his house -- as it is a great strain on the cast and crew -- but he never makes a case for it weakening his films (which, of course, it doesn't). He just uses it as a locus for people to complain about Kubrick, who has very personal (and ultimately aesthetically justifiable) reasons for doing what he does. For the most part, this book is a catalogue of complaints, crudely strung together and never presented with any empathy or insight. Baxter records the cruel manipulation Kubrick suffered at the hands of Kirk Douglas and Marlon Brando, and then goes on to record Kubrick's stop-at-nothing insistence on personal artistic control, but fails to see the obvious lesson Kubrick learned in his first few years in Hollywood. Instead, he narrow-mindedly lambasts the whole lot of them. There are no critical insights into any of Kubrick's films in this book, only anecdotes about script-construction, contract negotiation, and arguments over lighting procedures. Not unlike Donald Spoto's Hitchcock biography, "The Dark Side of Genius", this book aims to crucify its subject for the way he set about creating his masterpieces, but unlike Spoto's definitive book, this one has nothing to say about the quality, subtlety, delicacy, or power of those masterpieces -- nothing about what makes the "genius" a genius.

It is a beautiful looking hardcover book with wonderful photographs. Baxter has done a great deal of background research (albeit heresay a lot of it) that garners some valuable insights into Kubrick's life. Baxter has, however, failed to penetrate into Kubrick's creative process as a filmmaker. Baxter lacks the academic film knowledge to substantially interpret what Kubrick's stylistic concerns and thematic preoccupations are. He fails to get to the heart of Kubrick's muse, so to speak, and wastes far to much energy on attempting to counter the myths that surround Kubrick as a filmmaker. For example, Baxter spends a great deal of time destroying the myth that Kubrick is a consumate film technician by including isolated incidents of mistakes he apparently makes during shooting. These examples are few and far between but Baxter seems intent on deconstructing Kubrick's mystique to the extent where he misses the point of what such a work is about. Baxter fails to make the necessary connections between Kubrick's ouevre and his background - whether one likes Kubrick is irrelevant, or cares if he has human failings after all, it should be about what events transpired in Kubrick's life that influenced him into creating the works that he has.

This book is nothing more than a sorry attempt at trying to make the life of man who shys away from the limelight seem sensationalistic. Throughout the book the writer seems to be dieing to reveal some bit of scandal, some skeleton in the closet of Stanley Kubrick, and he fails at it repeatedly. Baxter writes like a smug, holier-than-though iconoclast who deeply resents the success of the man he writes about. This book is fit only for the grocery store tabloid rack and even then it wouldn't sell because Kubrick has led a sober and quiet life only surfacing every ten years or so to deliver a quality film to quality-strarved audiences. If you want to read a decent biography of Kubrick, check out Vincent Lobrutto's book...