Hardboiled Hollywood: The Origins of the Great Crime Films - Hardcover

Décharné, Max

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 184243070X ISBN 13: 9781842430705

Publisher: No Exit Press, 2003

Synopsis

1st edition hardcover, new fine book in fine dw In stock shipped from our UK warehouse

About this title

Synopsis:

Kiss Me Deadly, Bonnie & Clyde, Get Carter, Little Caesar, Goodfellas - behind each of these classic films there's a little-known story waiting to be told, and pulp novels, real-life bank robbers and twisted serial killers have all played a part in shaping the high-points of crime cinema. After Hollywood had cheerfully thrown these elements into the mincer, together with the various demands of film censors and financial backers - to say nothing of the frequently rampant egos of the stars and directors - the finished film sometimes owed little except a title to its source material. Real life crimes were often considered by film-makers to be too brutal - and their perpetrators too ugly - for the delicate sensibilites of cinema audiences. Thanks to Hollywood, runty little failed bank-robbers Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow are forever fixed in the popular imagination as a handsome young couple with toothpaste grins and an upbeat bluegrass soundtrack, and hell, those bullets don't really hurt so much in slow motion.

Similarly, middle-aged Wisconsin ghoul Ed Gein (few people's idea of a dream date) mutates into handsome young matinee idol Anthony Perkins for the purposes of Hitchcock's Psycho. Jim Thompson's pulp classic Pop 1280 was filmed as Coup de Torchon but the location was shifted from the American Deep South to pre-war Colonial French West Africa, yet survived the transition remarkably well. By contrast, when Sam Peckinpah filmed Thompson's The Getaway, the pessimistic ending of the original had to be completely changed to suit the demands of the glittering Hollywood couple playing the starring roles - Steve McQueen and Ali McGraw. The films themselves may be well known, but their origins are often far less familiar. This book provides a chance to compare the sources with the finished films, placing them in the context of the times in which they were made and the studio system that produced them. From The Big Sleep to Point Blank, and from The Godfather to LA Confidential, Hardboiled Hollywood takes you behind the scenes at the scene of the crime. It's an offer you can't refuse.

About this edition

• Publisher: No Exit Press
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 184243070X
• ISBN 13: 9781842430705
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 240