Tag Archives: David Thomson

David Thomson: Woody Allen

“Allen’s development in the eighties, his rate of work, and the sophistication of narrative were all seemingly devoted to ideas and attitudes against the grain of that decade. Yet Allen’s audience relied on urban yuppies, and his films only fostered … Continue reading

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David Thomson: Robert Aldrich

Aldrich hails from Cranston, Rhode Island, by the way! Here is a bit from Thomson’s essay on him: “Kiss Me Deadly is still one of the best, and most surprising American films of the 1950s, a lucid transformation of pulp … Continue reading

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David Thomson: Anouk Aimee

“Lola (60, Jacques Demy) came as a surprise and a relief: at last she was allowed to giggle, flutter, to be animated, and to breathe a cryptic song into the camera — “C’est moi. C’est Lola.” The most magical of … Continue reading

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David Thomson: James Agee

“He was far from reliable — he could write off Kane as a reservoir of hackneyed tricks, and he was of the opinion that Chaplin and Huston were without equal in America. But he wrote like someone who had not … Continue reading

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David Thomson: Isabelle Adjani

“There is something so frank, so modern in her feelings, yet so classical in her aura, so passionate and so wounded, that Isabelle Adjani seems made to play Sarah Bernhardt one day. Why not? She is a natural wearer of … Continue reading

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David Thomson: Abbott and Costello

I have been reading one or two entries a day in David Thomson’s incomparable The New Biographical Dictionary of Film: Expanded and Updated. It’s a treasure-trove. In his opinion, the three greatest film actors were Cary Grant, James Stewart and … Continue reading

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Vacation Books

Here are the books coming with me on my journey: — a Georgette Heyer – I can’t even remember the name of it. That’ll be the first book I read. — Time and Again, by Jack Finney. Believe it or … Continue reading

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