Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The best quick reference, September 1, 2004
I only agree with the reviews about 55% of the time, but the team that assembles this guide does a superb job of writing brief capsule descriptions of a wide variety of films. The reference information --- stars, directors, dates, widescreen processes --- may all be available elsewhere, but it's often a lot easier to pick up the book then it is to get up out of your easy chair, boot up the computer, go to the imdb, type in the info you're looking for...
It's true that this edition, formatted to fit into a mass-market paperback, has very small print. As an AARP member who needs trifocals, this can sometimes be an issue. However, Maltin's does publish the book in a larger-type edition (a "trade" paperback) which is published about three months after this smaller sized version. (Why don't they publish both simultaneously? Who knows...)
P.S. This book is also very handy for working crossword puzzles.
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37 of 41 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Print and book size, August 26, 2004
If you buy this book be sure you have a very good magnifying glass. The pages have been reduced in size and the print is extremely small. They have also reduced the number of entries by thousands. The price has been reduced so that is a plus. Keep your old book.
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23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Not as complete as I'd like, September 4, 2004
I have been buying Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide for nearly twenty years now. It remains a vital and enjoyable purchase and is a great reference for major Hollywood features, breakthrough independents and widely-distributed foreign films. However, Maltin admittedly is a film historian who wastes a lot of space in this book on obscure, decades-old Hollywood films that are seldom, if ever, shown on television and have been unavailable on VHS or DVD for years. In this volume, he says he is going to divide the guide into different volumes, one focusing on classics, others on more recent releases. This is a good idea. I really do think Maltin needs to devote one guide to DVD and video releases and another to his beloved classics, both of which I would buy. That way, the smaller films (such as "Local Boys", for instance) that receive direct-to-video release and obscure titles that are not featured in this volume will be covered and Maltin's impeccable taste and invaluable advice will prove more useful.
As for his reviews, the only fault I find (and it's really more a difference in personal taste) is that Maltin tends to prefer classic-style filmmaking, which explains why a mediocre film like "Cider House Rules" ranks **** while Clint Eastwood's masterwork "Unforgiven" only gets ***. Also, his constant carping about "overlength" in any movie over two hours gets old, especially since few of the films he complains about truly are overlong. But that's what makes this book so much fun--complaining about and disagreeing with the somewhat odd rankings he and his staff come up with, along with the occasional surprise of knowing he also liked that badly-reviewed film you have a fondness for. And a special kudo to Leonard for finally admitting he blew it with his original review of Ridley Scott's brilliant "Alien" and upping that pathetic **1/2 rating by a *. It's nice to see critics admitting when they're wrong.
As I said, this is a fine collection of reviews that needs to be divided into volumes in order to provide a more complete collection of relevant reviews. Regardless, it's still the best guide out there. **** (out of *****)
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