THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL: HOLLYWOOD IN THE FIFTIES

THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL: Hollywood in the Fifties. Sam Kashner and Jennifer MacNair. W. W. Norton; 2002.

This is a very entertaining and readable account of Hollywood trends, important movies, and notable performers, writers and directors during the very end of the film capitol's golden age. The Bad and the Beautiful has chapters on the scandals both in and surrounding the controversial publication Confidential; the troubled offspring of certain movie stars (such as Edward G. Robinson and his son Manny); James Dean and Rebel Without a Cause; Rock Hudson, Douglas Sirk and Ross Hunter; Charles Laughton's Night of the Hunter; Kim Novak and Sammy Davis Jr.; Sweet Smell of Success, Burt Lancaster and Walter Winchell; rival Hollywood "news hens" Hedda Hopper, Louella Parsons and Sheila Graham; the life and plays (Picnic; Come Back, Little Sheba) of William Inge and the film versions thereof; and Gloria Swanson and Sunset Boulevard. The book also details how Hollywood was completely changing in this decade, what with the inroads of television, the breakdown of the studio system, and the increasing use of location filming over shooting strictly on sound stages. Some of this material may be familiar to the film enthusiast, but there is much that is new and interesting as well, all told in compelling prose that keeps the pages turning.

Verdict: Excellent look at the foibles and triumphs of 1950's Hollywood. ***1/2.

SWMMING WITH SHARKS

SWIMMING WITH SHARKS (1994). Director: George Huang.

Guy (Frank Whaley) wants so badly to make it in the movie business that he becomes an assistant to an egomaniacal asshole named Buddy Ackerman (Kevin Spacey) and puts up with his mood swings, nastiness, and abusiveness until something finally pushes him over the edge. Most of the movie consists of flashbacks as Guy makes Buddy a prisoner in his own home. Intriguing suspense-drama holds the attention, but what really puts it over is the acting, especially by an amazing Spacey. Whaley is also excellent, as is Michelle Forbes as a producer named Dawn with whom Guy has an affair. Benicio Del Toro also scores as Buddy's last assistant, who tries to teach Guy the ropes. The ending is unrealistic but cynical. This is no Citizen Kane but there's a character named "Foster Kane." Whaley and Forbes have done mostly TV work since this film was released.

Verdict: Quite entertaining with a marvelous Spacey. ***.

BABY BOOMERS BACK IN THE MOVIE THEATER?

For those of you who despair that Hollywood films generally seem geared towards a 12-year-old mentality -- or something worse -- there's good news. Apparently Hollywood is becoming aware [finally!] that older people like to go to the movies too but want films that are just a little more -- shall we say -- challenging. Here's the piece for your edification [Now if we can only do something about those text-messaging teenagers!]:

From The New York Times:

By BROOKS BARNES and MICHAEL CIEPLY
LOS ANGELES ­ "Hollywood and older Americans have never had much use for each other. The 50-plus crowd doesn’t go to opening weekends or buy popcorn; a youth-obsessed Hollywood has happily ignored them.

But in the last few months an older audience has made a startling reassertion of its multiplex power. “True Grit,” “The King’s Speech,” “The Fighter,” “Black Swan” ­ all movies in contention for a clutch of Oscars on Sunday ­ have all been surprise hits at the box office.

And they have all been powered by people for whom 3-D means wearing glasses over glasses, and “Twilight” sounds vaguely threatening.

Hollywood, slower than almost any other industry to market to baby boomers, may be getting a glimpse of its graying future. While the percentage of moviegoers in the older population remains relatively small, the actual number of older moviegoers is growing explosively ­ up 67 percent since 1995, according to GfK MRI, a media research firm.

And the first of the 78 million baby boomers are hitting retirement age with some leisure hours to fill and a long-dormant love affair with movies.

“There is an older audience that is growing, and it’s an underserved audience, which makes for an obvious and important opportunity,” said Nancy Utley, co-president of Fox Searchlight, whose “Black Swan” has sold over $100 million at the North American box office. If the core audience for a particular film is over 50, she noted, “that’s now a gigantic core.”

There are glimmers of a shift. Aging action stars; theaters with adult fare, like better food; reserved seating; and, most important, movies like “The Social Network” and “The King’s Speech” that have become hits based on wit and storytelling, not special effects.

Theaters have long favored younger consumers in part because older moviegoers tend to skip the concession counter, where theaters make most of their money. The imbalance between young and old grew more pronounced over the last decade as theater chains, suffering the after-effects of overbuilding, cut back on maintenance.

Sticky floors and popcorn-strewn aisles have kept even more older people at home. That, and all those texting teenagers, “which is something that adult audiences really find irritating,” said Patrick Corcoran, director of media and research for the National Association of Theater Owners.

The very young still go to the movies more than anyone else ­ especially on those all-important opening weekends ­ but distribution executives say they are getting harder to lure in huge numbers. Social networking has sped up word of mouth, turning teenagers and young adults into more discerning moviegoers ­ a phenomenon pushed along by rising prices. People age 18 to 24 bought an average of seven tickets per person in 2010, down from eight in 2009.

And the industry is battling a generational quirk. When you can legally stream movies on laptops or order them from video-on-demand services soon after their release ­ or easily pirate them with high-speed Internet connections, often while they are still in theaters ­ it makes you less likely to buy a ticket.

Fewer teenagers, then, present an opening. Baby boomers are not their Depression-era parents, who grew up on radio and were very conscious of the price of a ticket. Baby boomers were weaned on movies.

“Our generation really had a love affair with the movies in a profound way,” said Nicholas Kazan, a screenwriter whose credits include “Reversal of Fortune,” which was nominated for an Oscar in 1991. “It was not a fling, not a casual relationship, but a real love affair.”

For many baby boomers, the relationship blossomed in 1969, as the movies belatedly caught up with the counterculture in a wave of films that included “Easy Rider,” “Medium Cool” and “Midnight Cowboy.” College film societies and an art-house circuit made generational heroes of foreign directors like Ingmar Bergman, whose “Cries and Whispers” had its New York debut in 1972. The “Godfather” series, from Francis Ford Coppola, forged the lexicon for a generation.

But then a younger, more fantasy-oriented generation asserted itself with “Star Wars” in 1977. Hollywood adjusted its output accordingly.

“For me, the ’80s is a dead zone,” said Peter Biskind, a film historian who sees the baby boomers as having been “betrayed and abandoned” by Hollywood in the era of “E.T.,” “Sixteen Candles” and “Top Gun.”

The baby boomers were taking their children to the movies, however, helping to make megahits of films like the “Home Alone” series. Mr. Biskind, himself a baby boomer, said he believed that as the generation’s love affair with movies ended, television stepped in.

“ ‘The Sopranos’ really nailed the boomer generation,” he said. It offered 50-ish viewers all the moody action of a Coppola film without the bother of a trip to the theater.

Slowly, the movie industry is trying to get baby boomers back in seats. You can see it in the bets studios are taking on scripts. Last year, there were two movies, “RED” and “The Expendables,” that featured older actors in action roles. Helen Mirren, who is 65, was a machine gun-toting assassin in “RED,” which stands for “retired and extremely dangerous.” Sylvester Stallone, who is 64, was a mercenary in “The Expendables.” Both movies were hits.

Just last weekend, “Unknown,” with a 58-year-old Liam Neeson as its action star, was No. 1 at the box office, beating a heavily promoted teenage science fiction movie. More than half of the audience was over 50.

Almost every studio has a movie aimed at an older audience on its current schedule or in development, whether it’s “Dirty Old Men” at Warner Brothers or “Larry Crowne” at Universal Pictures. Fox Searchlight has high hopes for “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel,” about a group a British retirees who go to India. It stars Judi Dench and Maggie Smith, who are both 76.

Movie theaters have begun to do their part. At ArcLight Cinemas you can now have a grilled ahi tuna sandwich or red pepper Gorgonzola dip.

At AMC Entertainment, the second-largest theater chain in North America after Regal Cinemas, older moviegoers are becoming “an increasingly important part of our plan,” said Stephen A. Colanero, chief marketing officer. He points to efforts to improve adult offerings even if Hollywood doesn’t provide them ­ Metropolitan Opera simulcasts, for instance.

AMC is also experimenting with seat-side food and cocktail service. The company now operates seven AMC Dine-In Theaters, including three new ones in New Jersey. More are planned.

Studios will continue to tailor the bulk of their releases to younger audiences, and for good reason. In 2010, North Americans ages 12 to 24 made up only 18 percent of the population, but bought 32 percent of the 1.34 billion tickets sold, according to the annual industry snapshot by the Motion Picture Association of America, released on Wednesday.

By contrast, people over 50 made up 32 percent of the population, but bought only 21 percent of the tickets. That is a slight uptick from 2009, when the over-50 audience bought 19 percent of the total tickets sold.

But the actual number of older moviegoers has grown enormously since 1995, the year before boomers started hitting the midcentury mark. Then about 26.8 million people over the age of 50 went to the movies, according to GfK MRI. That number grew to 44.9 million in 2010.

Studios used to deride older viewers as “the once-a-year audience.” They came out once a year, on Christmas Day, to see a movie. Columbia Pictures gave them “Prince of Tides” on Christmas Day in 1991.

It is an attitude, and a reality, that is shifting. “One of the most urgent issues we face as an industry is to figure out how to lure the boomers back to the movie theaters,” said Bob Pisano, president and interim chief executive of the M.P.A.A.

Nancy Perry Graham, editor of AARP The Magazine, says it's about time. “There is a huge demand that needs to be satisfied, and we've been trying to make that point to Hollywood for years,” she said. “I truly believe that Hollywood is finally listening."

PARTY ANIMALS

PARTY ANIMALS: A Hollywood Tale of Sex, Drugs, and Rock 'n' Roll starring the fabulous Allan Carr. Robert Hofler. Da Capo Press; 2010.

Although the title barely seems to acknowledge it -- probably because his name was never exactly a household word -- this is the story of producer Allan Carr, and his involvement with everything from the Village People group to La Cage Aux Folles the musical, the abysmal film version of Tommy, Can't Stop the Music, Grease, and a disastrous Oscar telecast with a singing Rob Lowe. Flamboyantly and openly gay, Carr conversely seemed to be full of self-hatred, something Hofler briefly touches upon as he looks into the behind-the scenes details of Carr's various projects -- including parties/orgies/drug fests at his home and gargantuan movie premieres set in the subways and elsewhere -- and traces his rise and fall on Broadway and in Hollywood. Very well-done and readable biography with an interesting cast of characters and many quotes from those who both loved and hated the subject or both.

Verdict: An interesting little slice of Broadway and Hollywood history. ***.

GHOULS, GIMMICKS, AND GOLD

GHOULS, GIMMICKS, AND GOLD: Horror Films and the American Movie Business, 1953 - 1968. Kevin Heffernan. Duke University Press; 2004.

During the 1950's film studios were afraid all of their business would be lost to television, so they tried all sorts of gimmicks from expanding the screen [CinemaScope] to 3-D to new sound and color systems while inventive producers like William Castle came up with other gimmicks [such as wiring certain chairs during showings of The Tingler] in an effort to bring patrons into the movie theater. During this era [and afterward] it was realized that the audience consisted mostly of young people, teenagers, and many films – such as horror and sci fi items – were geared to their tastes and mentalities. In this atmosphere it’s no wonder that so many films in these genres were released. [Nowadays sci-fi/fantasy/horror items are no longer necessarily considered “kiddie fodder.”] With engaging prose that rarely descends into dull ‘academic-speak,’ Heffernan traces the changes in the film industry, especially as it pertains to genre/exploitation films, encompassing everything from 3-D and “hypnovision” to the emergence of Hammer Horror films (and their new bloodier take on Universal’s monsters) and the horror stardom of the florid, often hammy Vincent Price in Roger Corman’s “Poe” pictures and others. There are also chapters on Italian horror films, other foreign films dubbed into English that made great profits for American producers, British horror, Rosemary’s Baby and Night of the Living Dead.

Verdict: Quite entertaining and informative. ***.

IF CHINS COULD KILL: CONFESSIONS OF A B MOVIE ACTOR

IF CHINS COULD KILL: CONFESSIONS OF A B MOVIE ACTOR. Bruce Campbell. St Martin's Press; 2001.

A combo autobiography/Hollywood insider book by the likable star of The Evil Dead, Evil Dead 2, etc., a typical working actor who gets big roles in "B" [or less prestigious] productions and small roles in "A's -- one chapter is titled "The Higher the Budget, the Lower the Part." The early pages about his childhood are kind of tedious, but the book gets more interesting when Campbell starts making movies, and later stars in a television series. While much of his inside stuff about Hollywood is familiar, young actors who haven't been this way before may get a certain value from Campbell's experiences. Campbell had leading man charisma and talent, but it's a shame that the very movies that put him on the map -- the Evil Dead series -- also insured that he perhaps wasn't taken seriously enough by Hollywood. But weep not for him for he's had a continuing career, unlike many another actor who winds up waiting tables or in real estate. [He is now a regular on Burn Notice.]

Verdict: Not essential reading, but informative and of value to young people interested in a career in acting. **1/2.

DOWN AND DIRTY PICTURES

DOWN AND DIRTY PICTURES: Miramax, Sundance and the Rise of Independent Film. Peter Biskind. Simon and Schuster. 2004.

This mostly absorbing book looks at how the business of making independent films grew from small change operations to multi-million dollar deal-making mostly because of the efforts of Miramax, headed by the brother team of Bob and Harvey Weinstein. [Biskind recounts how Nathan Lane joked that he thought the film Monsters Inc. was about the Weinsteins.] Pulp Fiction was the indie that changed the way the world viewed independent films, which once were small and personal and grainy and now became slick, huge, star-driven items with budgets almost as big as a film from the major studios. Biskind also looks at the other independent distributors and producers as well as the independent arms of the big studios, but mostly he focuses on the Sundance Festival, which presented many of these movies and became their first port of call, and on Harvey Weinstein, a colorful, horrible character who seems determined to make people see him like Harry Cohen or Daryl Zanuck or one of the other famous movie moguls of times gone by. The book goes behind the scenes to show how deals are made and discarded, lies are told, fortunes won, careers destroyed, and movies chopped up and ruined by careless distributors and Harvey “Scissorhands” Weinstein. Robert Redford is portrayed as being too busy with his own concerns to make an effective manager of the Sundance Institute and all of its divisions, but most of the quotes about him come from disgruntled ex-employees. Another important part of this book is that it really explains why so many unworthy films and actors are nominated for Oscars, as it's all part of the pressure and wheeling and dealing (and wining and dining) that goes on inside the studios and distribution companies, all of whom use all of their clout to make sure their people better win. Most people watching the Academy Awards couldn't care less which company produced which picture and are unaware that some Oscar nights are merely battles between two or three giant companies trying not to boost art but only to increase their coffers.

Verdict: Quite an eyeful! ***1/2.

HELLO,HE LIED

HELLO, HE LIED and other truths from the Hollywood Trenches. Lynda Obst. Little, Brown and Company; 1996.

Obst is a producer of some successful (Sleepless in Seattle) if somewhat undistinguished films who has put together a book detailing her adventures in Hollywood with advice for prospective producers, especially of the female gender. The book is not without value for such readers, and has an intrinsic interest as an insider's view of Hollywood, but anyone expecting gossip about the stars or a really “good read” (although the book is rather well written) should look elsewhere. The average movie buff may get tired of the tome long before the final pages. Obst describes a Hollywood that most people are already familiar with, where staying on top matters much more than friendship or anything else, a world unto itself full of self-absorbed people that Obst describes as smart but sound rather stupid. Obst, who first got a position at the New York Times through connections, worked her way west to switch from journalism to motion pictures. She comes off as someone trying to be nice even as she tries to find herself and gain as much personal "power" as possible. Her book is intelligent in its way, but also a little sad. Obst seems to be too close to it all to really see it for the crap it is. Her book may be of some value to would-be female executives, as she gives wise advice on what to do and what to avoid to get to and stay on the top.

Verdict: Not bad if not quite a must-read. **1/2.