The New Biographical Dictionary of Film
Really? I don't feel the least bit bad taking shots at Thomson, not only because I have no warm personal relationship to this book and not only because I genuinely think he is wrong (wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong!), but because he seems like a critic impervious to criticism. All right, I do feel a little bad, as indicated by leading my first post with whatever nice I had to say about his book. Nevertheless, I don't think it's necessarily true that if he edited himself more thoroughly it would take him a lifetime to finish one edition of it. He could, for one thing, let someone else edit him more thoroughly.
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StumbleUponI suppose to a certain degree the viability of this option would depend on whether or not he were indeed an astonishing asshole. Writing can take a lifetime. Thomson's writing does not give the impression of being greatly labored over, but who knows what his first passes at these entries looked like, assuming that those published are not they. Fact-checking on a work of this kind would be a nightmare. But being edited is part of the muddle and peril that goes with wanting to be a comprehensive essayist on pictures.
I did not intend what I said about Thomson's intelligence overwhelming his prose as a compliment. That I didn't is not unrelated to his inability to edit himself. Nor is it unrelated to David's observation that the book might be more accurately described as "autobiographical," which I swear to God was in my notes also. Intelligence is no more of a virtue, per se, than a willingness to embarrass oneself. Thomson's intelligence, like his amusement at pairing Frances Farmer with Sharon Stone, may be fun for him. But what's fun for him still isn't for me.
Any further examples I cited of either Thomson's sloppy thought or his sloppy writing would be, like Thomson's rhetorical questions, superfluous, especially now that David (who is right!) has weighed in with a number of them. To be something of a showoff, as well as stylistically self-indulgent, and if this 83-word sentence is still here, also demonstrably unwilling to recognize the necessity of corrective editorial action, I don't really even feel more than a tiny little bit bad that many of the qualities I disparage in Thomson's work—that he is a showoff, that he is stylistically self-indulgent, and that he does not recognize the necessity of corrective editorial action—are practically the hallmarks of my work. People slap me around on message boards all the time, and while not exactly turning cartwheels when running across their posts (and in fact sometimes responding to them in a blind rage), I don't think they're wrong as often as I think Thomson is.
Rolling around in the muck of this book isn't torture. I would even go as far as to say that it isn't unenjoyable. But the Internet Movie Database is an even more up-to-date source of factual information, it's a click or two away, and it weighs nothing. Pauline Kael's books are around the house, and if I suddenly took a notion to read some movie criticism for pleasure, clichéd as it is, that's to whom I'd go. If I needed a second (or first) critical opinion that was neither available to me through research nor covered by someone whose writing I admire, I might turn to The New Biographical Dictionary of Film. After all, it's here.
But barring that, having concluded this line, Thomson didn't give me much of a reason ever to pick it up again.
Dan and David—still flattered to be in your company.
Best,
Mim
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Remarks From The Fray:
I quite enjoyed all the bitchiness and cattiness in Book Club this week about David Thomson's Biographical Film Dictionary. A discussion where everyone dislikes the subject is much more fun than a love-in.
But leave it to Mim Udovitch to bring it all down to earth with her closing benediction on Friday. Why would anyone want to own a large brick of subjective musings in a world where the IMDB puts you 3 clicks away from answering any idle curiosity a film buff could have?
In retrospect, I'm surprised this notion didn't resonate throughout the discussion. This is indeed the sort of book I might have had on my nightstand... six years ago! But frankly since then the IMDB has entered my life and proved itself to be much more useful, reliable, convenient and enjoyable than Thomson's work or similar works from Halliwell and Leonard Maltin which now gather dust in a forgotten corner of my house. (Correction: Maltin's book occasionally shows up in my bathroom, the one area where the IMDB comes up short.)
Actually, I'm surprised film critics don't talk about the IMDB more often. It's occasionally referred to but seldom acknowleged as the overwhelming omniscient reference it has become. It's changed the way we approach film and it's changed what we expect from film critics. Why do I need David Thomson to give me a guided tour of his cluttered office floor when I have uncluttered gigabytes of facts and opinions at my fingertips?
I'm not saying I don't want or need film criticism anymore. But I really don't need Thomson's big old book and from the sounds of this week's Book Club I don't think I want it either.
-- Lorne Hanks
(To reply, click here.)
Hey, does somebody want to alert David Thomson that there's this big continent called Asia and they still make movies there? Save for a new entry on Hou Hsiao-hsien, he seems to have skipped it over altogether. Where's Wong Kar-wai and his Hong Kong compatriots (John Woo, et al.)? Where are the two other Taiwanese giants, Edward Yang and Tsai Ming-liang? What about the up-and-coming Japanese stars like Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Hirokazu Kore-eda, or, dare I say it, Takashi Miike? Why does the diminishing Chen Kaige get an entry while his Fifth Generation superior Xhang Yimou and Tian Zhuangzhuang get snubbed?
For that matter, what about Iran? His entry on Kiarostami suggests that he's only seen one film (TASTE OF CHERRY), which is not necessarily representative of the man's enormous body of work. Why no Makhmalbaf? He's the patriarch of an entire *family* of interesting filmmakers.
The book is still a formidable achievement, addictive as everyone has mentioned, and full of blood-boiling provocations and omissions. (What's with the three-sentence snort in Wes Anderson's direction?) But might I suggest that Thomson has lost touch with the contemporary scene? As far as international cinema is concerned, Europe is no longer the center of the universe. There's a much broader expanse out there, just waiting to be canonized.
-- Scott Tobias
(To reply, click here.)
(10/14)