Pictures at a Revolution: Five Movies and the Birth of the New Hollywood By Mark Harris
Product Description
An epic account of how the revolution hit Hollywood, told through the stories of the five films nominated for the 1967 Academy Awards The year is 1963. The studios are churning out westerns, war movies, prudish sex comedies and overblown historical epics, but audiences whose interests have been piqued by an influx of innovative films from abroad are hungering for something more, something new. At Esquire, two young writers hatch a plan to create a movie treatment that they hope will attract the director Franois Truffaut: the story of the gangsters Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. Mike Nichols, an improvisatory comedian turned neophyte theater director, gets his hands on an obscure first novel called The Graduate and wonders if he's ready to make the jump to Hollywood. Warren Beatty, just 26 years old and struggling through a series of flops after the success of Splendor in the Grass, decides to take his career into his own hands, but can't seem to settle on his next move. Dustin Hoffman, sleeping on friends' floors and scrounging for temp work in New York, struggles just to get an off-Broadway audition. Sidney Poitier, after two dozen movies, still yearns for something that seems completely unattainable: a good role. And 20th Century Fox, on the brink of financial catastrophe, puts all its hopes in a genre-the family musical-that will revitalize the company and then nearly destroy it again. Pictures at a Revolution tracks five movies-the milestones Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate, the popular hits Guess Who's Coming To Dinner and In the Heat of the Night, and the big-budget disaster Doctor Dolittle-on their five-year journey to Oscar night in the spring of 1968. It follows their fortunes through the last days of the studio system and the first sparks of a cultural upheaval that would launch maverick new stars and directors, topple more than one industry titan from his pedestal, and redefine what American movies could be. In 1967, moviegoers witnessed the arrival of taboo-shattering sex and violence on screen, the debuts of Dustin Hoffman and Faye Dunaway, the return of Katharine Hepburn and the poignant farewell of Spencer Tracy, the audacious risks taken by Warren Beatty, Arthur Penn, Mike Nichols and Norman Jewison, and Hollywood's agonized attempt to grapple with an incendiary moment in American race relations, with results that would change Sidney Poitier's career forever. By tracing the gambles, the stumbles, the clashes and the creative partnerships that produced these films, Mark Harris captures both the twilight of old Hollywood and the dawn of a new golden age in studio filmmaking. Based on unprecedented access to the actors, directors, screenwriters, producers and executives whose movies defined the era, as well a wealth of previously unexplored archival material, Pictures at a Revolution is an utterly original, revealing, and entertaining history of a true cultural watershed.
Product Details
Amazon Sales Rank: #204 in Books
Published on: 2008-02-14
Released on: 2008-02-14
Number of items: 1
Binding: Hardcover
496 pages .
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly Starred Review. While one might think that the films discussed in this book have been thoroughly plumbed (The Graduate; Bonnie and Clyde; In the Heat of the Night; Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?), Entertainment Weekly writer Harris offers his take in this thorough and engaging narrative. Instead of simply retelling old war stories about the production of these five Best Picture nominees at the 1968 Oscars, Harris tells a much wider story. Hollywood was on the brink of obsolescence throughout the 1960s as it faced artistic competition from European art films and financial implosion due to an outdated production system and rising budgets. Harris doesn't shy away from complexity in favor of easy answers, and the personalities that he profiles—among them Sidney Poitier, Mike Nichols, Warren Beatty and Richard Zanuck—are certainly worthy of the three dimensional approach. Harris also peppers his narrative with moments that capture the rising cultural tide that broke in the late '60s: chipping away at the moralistic Production Code, and Hollywood's inconsistent engagement with the Civil Rights movement are continuous sources of interest throughout this fascinating book. (Feb.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review A madly ambitious marriage of revelatory cultural history and great storytelling, Pictures at a Revolution is every bit as smart and radical and sexy as the movies it brings to life."--David Hajdu, author of Lush Life and Positively 4th Street "Mark Harris has pulled off brilliantly what many of us only attempt. He has used a narrowly focused subject-five movies competing for Best Picture in 1967-to tell the larger, richly textured story of that tumultuous time. He traces the making of each of the movies-among them, Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate-with the kind of detailed, dramatic narrative that makes the book a page-turner, even for someone who is not a movie buff. And his profiles of the major characters (my favorites were Dustin Hoffman, Warren Beatty, and Mike Nichols) are the most interesting I've seen."--Connie Bruck, author of The Predator's Ball, Masters of the Game, and When Hollywood Was King "Pictures at a Revolution is exactly what its title promises: an in-depth, up-close view of the films and filmmakers that transformed American cinema during an extraordinary period of innovation and insurrection. What we have here is a clash of the titans-Old Hollywood versus the New-with the entire enterprise of American filmmaking hanging in the balance. Like a skilled novelist, Mark Harris keeps us turning the pages, with heroes to root for, villains to hiss, and plenty of intrigue along the way-all set against the psychedelic backdrop of the turbulent 1960s. A remarkable reconstruction of perhaps the most significant artistic moment in the history of American film."--William J. Mann, author of Kate: The Woman Who Was Hepburn and Edge of Midnight: The Life of John Schlesinger "I've been waiting a long time for someone to explain to me exactly what happened to the movies during the 1960s-and someone finally has. Luckily he's witty, nervy, original, widely knowledgeable from the board room to the back room, and has no trouble putting Dr. Dolittle and Bonnie and Clyde in the same critical universe. That's the 1960s for you...all movie history books should be written by Mark Harris."--Jeanine Basinger, author of The Star Machine "An exhilarating read for anyone who cares about the myriad ways movies can shape popular and political culture. I loved it."--Christine Vachon, producer, author of Shooting to Kill
About the Author For fifteen years, Mark Harris worked as a writer and editor covering movies, television and books for Entertainment Weekly, where he now writes the "Final Cut" back-page column. He has written about pop culture for several other magazines as well. A graduate of Yale University, he lives in New York City with his husband, Tony Kushner.
Customer Reviews
"The giraffe stepped on his c**k." The ungraceful giraffe held up production of Doctor Dolittle with Rex Harrison, but it wasn't the reason Doctor Dolittle lost the Oscar for Best Picture in 1967. Neither was Harrison's drinking nor going over budget. It lost because America and Hollywood changed that year. Mark Harris's Pictures at a Revolution is the best film book since Seeing Is Believing: How Hollywood Taught Us to Stop Worrying and Love the Fifties. Peter Biskind explained the interaction between Hollywood movies and American society in the fifties. Harris does it for the sixties. Bonnie and Clyde changed movie style. The Graduate (40th Anniversary Collector's Edition) and In the Heat of the Night (40th Anniversary Collector's Edition) focused on the subject matter of two different revolutions - - youth and civil rights. Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (40th Anniversary Edition) was the last time old liberal America (in the person of liberal director Stanley Kramer) congratulated itself on how socially advanced it was. It was appropriate that the president of the Academy that year was Gregory Peck - - Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird (Collector's Edition) and the investigative journalist who exposes anti-Semitism in Gentleman's Agreement. What surprised Stanley Kramer was that younger filmmakers didn't give him credit for having his heart in the right place. Instead he was mocked for being behind the times both in style and subject. Kramer "was now certain he wouldn't be accused of irrelevance." But Richard Schickel of Life magazine said, "Kramer is earnestly preaching away on matters that have long since ceased to be true issues." Most critics (and audiences) thought that in making Poitier's character "a regular Albert Schweitzer" that Kramer was stacking the deck in his movie. There was no real conflict between the parents and their daughter, because Poitier's character was so perfect. To be fair, no one ever took Guess Who's Coming to Dinner seriously as a study of race in America; it was just the last chance to see Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn together. What moved me the most in Mark Harris's book was the story of Sidney Poitier, the human being and actor. Harry Bellafonte (who had criticized Poitier's professional choices) said it wasn't Poitier's fault he was Cary Grant and not Humphrey Bogart. (In other words, smooth and comforting on screen, instead of edgy and challenging.) While In the Heat of the Night might not have gone far enough in telling the truth about America, it went farther than Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. When Poitier as Virgil Tibbs slapped a rich white man, the country recognized that it had already changed in an important way. Katharine Hepburn comes off as something of a hypocrite. She lived with Tracy for decades while Tracy wouldn't get a divorce from his wife (that itself shows how times had changed), but made sure newspapers hinted at Hepburn and Tracy's relationship. "Her behavior represented an act of self-denial and dignified restraint that still managed to be conspicuous and public." I haven't even mentioned many of the writers, actors, and directors Mark Harris writes about.
The best non-fiction entertainment industry book I've read. This book reads like a thriller with hairpin twists and turns, and has an ever-broadening epic scope, a huge cast of sharply realized characters with surprising key appearances by, for example, Godard, Truffaut and Robert Kennedy, scintillating episodes of wicked humor and true pathos, and a relentless urgency earned by its contemporary political and cultural relevance. Yes, there was an American film revolution in the sixties; these pages capture all its glories and its ironies. Let's hope another comes soon, if only so Mark Harris can write about it as well.
A cultural and film making revolution dissected I am a bit of Hollywood history buff and it is wonderful having a number of books on the subject out right now (check out Misfits Country). In this well written and excellently researched book the author takes the reader back to 1967 and analyzes the five nominees for best picture and there reflection and effects on society in at that momentous time of change. The Movies are: "The Graduate (40th Anniversary Collector's Edition)," "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (40th Anniversary Edition)," "Bonnie and Clyde," "In the Heat of the Night (40th Anniversary Collector's Edition)" and "Doctor Dolittle." Aside from being a great walk down memory lane it is also full of insightful social commentary. The sixties were a special time of social change and the movies and the movies of that decade reflected and effected this change on so many levels. I would love to see the author expand on this in another book that might take on the best movies of the decade.
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Product Description
An epic account of how the revolution hit Hollywood, told through the stories of the five films nominated for the 1967 Academy Awards The year is 1963. The studios are churning out westerns, war movies, prudish sex comedies and overblown historical epics, but audiences whose interests have been piqued by an influx of innovative films from abroad are hungering for something more, something new. At Esquire, two young writers hatch a plan to create a movie treatment that they hope will attract the director Franois Truffaut: the story of the gangsters Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. Mike Nichols, an improvisatory comedian turned neophyte theater director, gets his hands on an obscure first novel called The Graduate and wonders if he's ready to make the jump to Hollywood. Warren Beatty, just 26 years old and struggling through a series of flops after the success of Splendor in the Grass, decides to take his career into his own hands, but can't seem to settle on his next move. Dustin Hoffman, sleeping on friends' floors and scrounging for temp work in New York, struggles just to get an off-Broadway audition. Sidney Poitier, after two dozen movies, still yearns for something that seems completely unattainable: a good role. And 20th Century Fox, on the brink of financial catastrophe, puts all its hopes in a genre-the family musical-that will revitalize the company and then nearly destroy it again. Pictures at a Revolution tracks five movies-the milestones Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate, the popular hits Guess Who's Coming To Dinner and In the Heat of the Night, and the big-budget disaster Doctor Dolittle-on their five-year journey to Oscar night in the spring of 1968. It follows their fortunes through the last days of the studio system and the first sparks of a cultural upheaval that would launch maverick new stars and directors, topple more than one industry titan from his pedestal, and redefine what American movies could be. In 1967, moviegoers witnessed the arrival of taboo-shattering sex and violence on screen, the debuts of Dustin Hoffman and Faye Dunaway, the return of Katharine Hepburn and the poignant farewell of Spencer Tracy, the audacious risks taken by Warren Beatty, Arthur Penn, Mike Nichols and Norman Jewison, and Hollywood's agonized attempt to grapple with an incendiary moment in American race relations, with results that would change Sidney Poitier's career forever. By tracing the gambles, the stumbles, the clashes and the creative partnerships that produced these films, Mark Harris captures both the twilight of old Hollywood and the dawn of a new golden age in studio filmmaking. Based on unprecedented access to the actors, directors, screenwriters, producers and executives whose movies defined the era, as well a wealth of previously unexplored archival material, Pictures at a Revolution is an utterly original, revealing, and entertaining history of a true cultural watershed.
Product Details
Amazon Sales Rank: #204 in Books
Published on: 2008-02-14
Released on: 2008-02-14
Number of items: 1
Binding: Hardcover
496 pages .
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly Starred Review. While one might think that the films discussed in this book have been thoroughly plumbed (The Graduate; Bonnie and Clyde; In the Heat of the Night; Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?), Entertainment Weekly writer Harris offers his take in this thorough and engaging narrative. Instead of simply retelling old war stories about the production of these five Best Picture nominees at the 1968 Oscars, Harris tells a much wider story. Hollywood was on the brink of obsolescence throughout the 1960s as it faced artistic competition from European art films and financial implosion due to an outdated production system and rising budgets. Harris doesn't shy away from complexity in favor of easy answers, and the personalities that he profiles—among them Sidney Poitier, Mike Nichols, Warren Beatty and Richard Zanuck—are certainly worthy of the three dimensional approach. Harris also peppers his narrative with moments that capture the rising cultural tide that broke in the late '60s: chipping away at the moralistic Production Code, and Hollywood's inconsistent engagement with the Civil Rights movement are continuous sources of interest throughout this fascinating book. (Feb.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review A madly ambitious marriage of revelatory cultural history and great storytelling, Pictures at a Revolution is every bit as smart and radical and sexy as the movies it brings to life."--David Hajdu, author of Lush Life and Positively 4th Street "Mark Harris has pulled off brilliantly what many of us only attempt. He has used a narrowly focused subject-five movies competing for Best Picture in 1967-to tell the larger, richly textured story of that tumultuous time. He traces the making of each of the movies-among them, Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate-with the kind of detailed, dramatic narrative that makes the book a page-turner, even for someone who is not a movie buff. And his profiles of the major characters (my favorites were Dustin Hoffman, Warren Beatty, and Mike Nichols) are the most interesting I've seen."--Connie Bruck, author of The Predator's Ball, Masters of the Game, and When Hollywood Was King "Pictures at a Revolution is exactly what its title promises: an in-depth, up-close view of the films and filmmakers that transformed American cinema during an extraordinary period of innovation and insurrection. What we have here is a clash of the titans-Old Hollywood versus the New-with the entire enterprise of American filmmaking hanging in the balance. Like a skilled novelist, Mark Harris keeps us turning the pages, with heroes to root for, villains to hiss, and plenty of intrigue along the way-all set against the psychedelic backdrop of the turbulent 1960s. A remarkable reconstruction of perhaps the most significant artistic moment in the history of American film."--William J. Mann, author of Kate: The Woman Who Was Hepburn and Edge of Midnight: The Life of John Schlesinger "I've been waiting a long time for someone to explain to me exactly what happened to the movies during the 1960s-and someone finally has. Luckily he's witty, nervy, original, widely knowledgeable from the board room to the back room, and has no trouble putting Dr. Dolittle and Bonnie and Clyde in the same critical universe. That's the 1960s for you...all movie history books should be written by Mark Harris."--Jeanine Basinger, author of The Star Machine "An exhilarating read for anyone who cares about the myriad ways movies can shape popular and political culture. I loved it."--Christine Vachon, producer, author of Shooting to Kill
About the Author For fifteen years, Mark Harris worked as a writer and editor covering movies, television and books for Entertainment Weekly, where he now writes the "Final Cut" back-page column. He has written about pop culture for several other magazines as well. A graduate of Yale University, he lives in New York City with his husband, Tony Kushner.
Customer Reviews
"The giraffe stepped on his c**k." The ungraceful giraffe held up production of Doctor Dolittle with Rex Harrison, but it wasn't the reason Doctor Dolittle lost the Oscar for Best Picture in 1967. Neither was Harrison's drinking nor going over budget. It lost because America and Hollywood changed that year. Mark Harris's Pictures at a Revolution is the best film book since Seeing Is Believing: How Hollywood Taught Us to Stop Worrying and Love the Fifties. Peter Biskind explained the interaction between Hollywood movies and American society in the fifties. Harris does it for the sixties. Bonnie and Clyde changed movie style. The Graduate (40th Anniversary Collector's Edition) and In the Heat of the Night (40th Anniversary Collector's Edition) focused on the subject matter of two different revolutions - - youth and civil rights. Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (40th Anniversary Edition) was the last time old liberal America (in the person of liberal director Stanley Kramer) congratulated itself on how socially advanced it was. It was appropriate that the president of the Academy that year was Gregory Peck - - Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird (Collector's Edition) and the investigative journalist who exposes anti-Semitism in Gentleman's Agreement. What surprised Stanley Kramer was that younger filmmakers didn't give him credit for having his heart in the right place. Instead he was mocked for being behind the times both in style and subject. Kramer "was now certain he wouldn't be accused of irrelevance." But Richard Schickel of Life magazine said, "Kramer is earnestly preaching away on matters that have long since ceased to be true issues." Most critics (and audiences) thought that in making Poitier's character "a regular Albert Schweitzer" that Kramer was stacking the deck in his movie. There was no real conflict between the parents and their daughter, because Poitier's character was so perfect. To be fair, no one ever took Guess Who's Coming to Dinner seriously as a study of race in America; it was just the last chance to see Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn together. What moved me the most in Mark Harris's book was the story of Sidney Poitier, the human being and actor. Harry Bellafonte (who had criticized Poitier's professional choices) said it wasn't Poitier's fault he was Cary Grant and not Humphrey Bogart. (In other words, smooth and comforting on screen, instead of edgy and challenging.) While In the Heat of the Night might not have gone far enough in telling the truth about America, it went farther than Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. When Poitier as Virgil Tibbs slapped a rich white man, the country recognized that it had already changed in an important way. Katharine Hepburn comes off as something of a hypocrite. She lived with Tracy for decades while Tracy wouldn't get a divorce from his wife (that itself shows how times had changed), but made sure newspapers hinted at Hepburn and Tracy's relationship. "Her behavior represented an act of self-denial and dignified restraint that still managed to be conspicuous and public." I haven't even mentioned many of the writers, actors, and directors Mark Harris writes about.
The best non-fiction entertainment industry book I've read. This book reads like a thriller with hairpin twists and turns, and has an ever-broadening epic scope, a huge cast of sharply realized characters with surprising key appearances by, for example, Godard, Truffaut and Robert Kennedy, scintillating episodes of wicked humor and true pathos, and a relentless urgency earned by its contemporary political and cultural relevance. Yes, there was an American film revolution in the sixties; these pages capture all its glories and its ironies. Let's hope another comes soon, if only so Mark Harris can write about it as well.
A cultural and film making revolution dissected I am a bit of Hollywood history buff and it is wonderful having a number of books on the subject out right now (check out Misfits Country). In this well written and excellently researched book the author takes the reader back to 1967 and analyzes the five nominees for best picture and there reflection and effects on society in at that momentous time of change. The Movies are: "The Graduate (40th Anniversary Collector's Edition)," "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (40th Anniversary Edition)," "Bonnie and Clyde," "In the Heat of the Night (40th Anniversary Collector's Edition)" and "Doctor Dolittle." Aside from being a great walk down memory lane it is also full of insightful social commentary. The sixties were a special time of social change and the movies and the movies of that decade reflected and effected this change on so many levels. I would love to see the author expand on this in another book that might take on the best movies of the decade.
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