Includes bibliographical references (pages 211-214) and index.

"While the greatness of the classic Hollywood film is, for many of us, settled business, there are also many who have difficulty understanding why these films - which can often seem dated and unrealistic compared to modern fare - are taken as seriously as they are. Although we tend to accord our highest praise to films with strong and often didactic messages, Hollywood is resolutely unserious in its goals. In fact, in trying to blend serious messages (which garner critical respect) with the entertainment that attracts crowds, classic Hollywood became devoted, in an almost musical way, to style. Thus, in order to appreciate classic American movies, we have to understand them as the result of a style of filmmaking that justifies itself not through ideas or social relevance, but through the grace and beauty of its form." "The beauty of the Hollywood film challenges our notion of film as the poorer cousin of the "high arts," or as worthwhile only when it serves a social purpose. In his effort to answer the many questions that classic American cinema suggests, author John Fawell considers previous criticism of Hollywood, but also draws from a huge fund of recorded interviews with the directors, writers, cinematographers, set designers, producers, and actors who were a part of the studio process. He thus gives the filmmakers themselves the chance to explain a very elusive phenomenon: the glancing beauty of the Hollywood film. The films of certain great auteurs, including Charlie Chaplin, Ernst Lubitsch, Preston Sturges, Alfred Hitchcock, Billy Wilder, John Ford, and Orson Welles, receive particular attention here, but this book is organized by ideas rather than films or artists, and it draws from a wide array of Hollywood films, both successes and failures, to make its points."--Jacket.

British Library not licensed to copy,0.,Uk

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