Madly, hectically following my summary of 2017 in books comes this handy fun-sized my year in movies, which, frankly, and I probably shouldn’t say this out loud, have, pound for pound, given me more actual fun than books this year. I know, it’s mildly shocking. 24 BEST MOVIES OF THE YEARNEW(ISH) MOVIESYour Name – Japanese anime, how cutting edge I am, but actually, everybody will de dazzled and emotionally wrought up with the beauty and time trippy body switching complexities. Most beautiful fil...

This is the most personal work on cinema yet written by David Thomson, a movie historian and critic whose originality of insight is matched only by Manny Farber, whose elegant style is unrivaled by all but James Agee and Dwight MacDonald, and whose comprehensive and detailed knowledge of the field is unsurpassed by anyone. His The New Biographical Dictionary of Film (Fourth Edition) is the only 1000 page reference work I have ever read with complete delight from cover-to-cover, and I hope to do

As good as a book that causes you to read about 400 pages over a single day without even really noticing it could be.. ..especially when you finish it the next day. Wow. So I love David Thomson anyway, having picked up on him awhile back and I was pleased to see his relatively high position in my 'most read authors' taxonomy here on GR. It's the way he writes- informed, passionate, witty and not afraid to get dirty or poetic. There's that British thing (born in London just after the war, remem

Loved this book. It's a bit dense ("meaty and challenging" said the friend who gave it to me) but also very entertaining, at least in part. David Thompson is a longtime film critic--one who actually loves movies but also very sophisticated and intellectual. The book is roughly chronological in the first half, then goes all over the place (all good places) in the second half, from "I Love Lucy" to porn to Tarantino and a discussion of how screens of various sorts and sizes are part of our lives a...

"the history of cinema, from its origins to the present, with hardly a female in sight" - bookslut

This is more than "just" a history of Film -- or "Movie," as the author prefers (more formal than calling it "the movies;" not as formal as the academic-sounding "Film"). It attempts to be a philosophical discourse on how we watch the movies, and how that has changed in the past 120 years, and continues to evolve in the era of streaming as screens go from room-sized to hand-held, and from a social activity to a private one. As the latter, it's too long. As a history of Film (sorry, old habits di...

Starts out being a brilliant introduction to how the contemplation of big flickering shadows and light has changed our parallel realities starting with silent movies and proceeding through the current fascination with the tiny screens on our smart phones. Gets lost in the muddle of trying to include too many influential films and then recovers some of its initial strength toward the end. Some of the cinematic steps were of real consequence and deserve the loving coverage that they are given, but...

Breezy, brief, and delightfully opinionated, while also remaining scholarly, expansive, and smart as hell. The book is serious at times and silly at others, and though the author obviously reveres movies and their makers, he is also deeply skeptical of the whole trashy and (occasionally) artful enterprise. To love movies is to love great trash, as Pauline Kael would say, and in that spirit, this book feels like a casual chat with the most garrulous and generous cinephile. The book made film hist...

There are very few writers who can write interestingly and accessibly about film history so I can put up with Thomson's occasional habit of talking down to his reader's. Yes, Mr. Thomson we get your references, that's why we have chosen to read your book.

You are not watching life. You are watching a movie. And if, maybe, the movie feels better than life, then that is a vast, revolutionary possibility, and no one knows yet whether it is for good or ill, because the insinuation of dreams does so much to alter or threaten our respect for life. Dissatisfaction and doubt grew in step with film's projection of happiness. My emotional detachment to this book remained constant, even as bliss gave way to my own doubtful dissatisfaction. This isn't a hist...

Over the years we have had many good writers tell the story of cinema. One of my favourites has always been Mark Cousins’ ‘The Story of Film’ (2004). Mark Cousins does the big, broad sweep of cinema history, and tells its global story. David Thomson, in his new book ‘The Big Screen: The Story of the Movies and What They Did to Us’ wants to tackle this story too. Thomson, though, does not have the range that Cousins has – this book has very little on Asian cinema, for instance, and I cannot recal...

David Thomson’s riffy, trippy style is not for everyone, but he manages to do something really difficult, namely, explain how the phenomenon he calls “movie” was conceived, was born, grew up, grew old, and (my phrase) turned cold--without relying on strict chronology. Each chapter, dedicated to a key building block of film history, reads like a trip down a rabbit hole populated by real-life characters (e.g., Howard Hawkes, Jean-Luc Godard, Steven Spielberg) whose stories are told in fresh, start...

Perhaps the best book on film I've read (and I've been reading about film and teaching it for many years). Crisp, perceptive and witty, Thomson gives us an admittedly subjective journey through the history of cinema and the philosophy of how and why we watch. And he does it all without a single bit of jargon or pretension. If you love movies, you need to read this book. You might not agree with everything he says, but you'll come away loving the art form even more. I wish all of my students had

Midway through David Thomson’s meandering and (self-) reflective history of world cinema, The Big Screen: The Story of the Movies and What They Did to Us, he discusses British director David Lean’s classic film Brief Encounter, a “woman’s film” about an adulterous affair. Thomson is mystified by the film’s “tacit admission of women’s tragic position, whereas in Lean’s best-loved films (The Bridge on the River Kwai and Lawrence Of Arabia), the world is dominated by active men doing big things to

It should surprise nobody who knows Thomson's work that this grand statement on film is as idiosyncratic as it is authoritative, the work of a mystic as much as a scholar. Everyone's going to be puzzled by some of his inclusions and annoyed at some of his omissions; perhaps he would be himself if he read it back now. Though the criticism I've seen that it erases women from the story does seem unfair. Leni Riefenstahl gets treated at length; Slim Keith pretty much takes over Howard Hawks' chapter...

An examination of the screen as storytelling device. How it separates and draws us in as the same time. And all made palpable by the best philosopher/essayist-as-film journalist in the world. David Thomson is one of the most infuriatingly ponderous writers and yet, God help me, I love his work so.You never get the idea that he is phoning it in when he writes about cinema. He never does anything by rote. This book, like his best work, was not an easy read, but so well-worth it for the leaps he ma...

Wonderful. It's a critical history lesson. So well thought out and written that it is easily one of my favorite books I have read this year.

Another sprawling, knowledgeable and idiosyncratic book on film from the critic David Thomson. Highly enjoyable reading, though moviegoers looking for a more orthodox treatment of the history of cinema should still probably look elsewhere. Thomson's ideas about the 'Big Screen', particularly its early history, have a Freudian undercurrent running through them. The public flocks to cinema, he says, because they want 'to be voyeurs in the dark, beholding an orgy of their own desires burning on the...

Reading this was a labor of love. David Thomson makes us realize how much we love the movies and everything about them. I took the better part of a year to read this, as I savored each era he covered; I read it more like a series of essays than a book, and I think I enjoyed it all the more by spreading it out. It's a big, ambitious book that goes deep (history, starting from the late 19th century) and wide (separate chapters on English, French, Italian and Swedish cinema). I especially liked rea...

One of the best books of criticism I've read. Thomson doesn't pick bits and pieces to hold up as the good, nor does he quickly dismiss poor works; he enthuses over the graceful dread and obscure desire of movies. On that, the best of movies isn't just historic, international, and limited; but must be seen as the use of a screen--what television, facebook, and youtube have done to us; what video games and digital movies can do. We're lucky, though, to have things like 'The Godfather'. That's not