Rating: 
Summary: Thomson the frustrated intellectual
Review: David Thomson has an opinion on most things, from U.S. education (worst in the developed world)to Gwyneth Paltrow (maybe the public does not really like her). He prefers old movies and the stars of the Golden Age. The book is entertaining; but his views are a little outrageous and often unfair. His judgements on the current generation are too harsh. Mr. Thomson has obviously watched a lot of movies, and has intellectual pretensions. One has to ask why he bothers writing about movies given that he is so often disappointed. Unfortunately not many films made by Hollywood stand up to repeated viewings. They are primarily designed as shallow - but emjoyable entertainments. You accept their limitations when you buy a ticket. That said it was a good and stimulating read. I have always thought Scorsese over-rated and it is good to find someone who has similar views. His view that Spielberg's Ryan is "a magnificent film" is hard to understand.
Rating: 
Summary: A Wonderful Challenging Book!
Review: David Thomson is the gadfly of film criticism. He has gathered his thoughts into his biographical dictionary, now in its fourth edition. His dictionary, however, is like no other biographical dictionary. Compare it, for example, with Ephraim Katz' "The Film Encyclopedia," which is also mostly a biographical dictionary, and which I couldn't imagine being without. Katz' bios are long and leisurely. For noteworthy film people Katz tells in detail their life stories from cradle to grave, including comments about the important films in their career (always about their circumstances and how they were received generally by audiences and critics rather than his own evaluation), and ends with a long, usually complete, film list. I can sit for hours reading Katz, always being led from one biography to another. I am informed, I am entertained, but I am not challenged. Katz and his successors (Katz passed away in 1992) are historians more than critics, at least in "The Film Encyclopedia." Thomson, on the other hand, doesn't devote a lot of time to the life story. What he does offer is a very idiosyncratic analysis of his subject's work. If you wish, he writes critical professional biographies. His critical analyses are usually at variance with the common wisdom and challenge the reader at every step of the way. One has to ponder what Thomson has written with almost every sentence. Katz is wonderfully informative about the indisputable facts of a film person's career. Thomson is wonderful about making you think about the parts that are disputable. If Katz helps us to become better informed, Thomson helps us to grow as film lovers. I would not be without Thomson's biographical dictionary any more than I would be without Katz' film encyclopedia. No other book makes me think as much about film. No other book can cause me such dismay, because I come to fear that my earlier opinions were completely off the mark and that I had understood nothing. Sometimes, in fact, they ARE off the mark, and sometimes they are simply different from Thomson's. There are a number of directors whose works I own almost completely on DVD or VHS and that I thought I understood. That was before I began reading the various editions of Thomson's dictionary. I am less smug now, a little more confused, and, perhaps, a lot closer to the truth (if there is one). Is "Under Capricorn" really among Hitchcock's greatest achievements? I'm still not convinced, even if Thomson is. And there are times too when I think that Thomson is too fussy, too atuned to what his subject's work lacks rather than to its special qualities, the frequent bane of critics. I doubt that Thomson would mind my differing judgments, but I don't think he would want me to make them facilely. Read Thomson with great profit... and at your peril. Fortunately for David Thomson, being forced to drink hemlock went out with the Athenian state more than two millenia ago. Fortunately for us, he keeps producing new and larger editions of his wonderful challenging book. I wonder if he likes animals and little children...
Rating:
Summary: Oh, so worth the wait!
Review: For those of us who are movie buffs, we're forever looking for biographical information on people in film. David Thomson goes way beyond the usual dry recitation of dates and facts and actually renders informed opinions on the people about whom he writes. Flip to any entry and you'll be entertained and informed by Thomson's refreshingly truthful take. He's one of the few people with the guts to say that Monster's Ball was not the greatest movie of all time, while giving kudos to Halle Berre for her performance. While I don't necessarily agree with all his opinions, it's great to read biographical material that actually offers commentary along with data. From Diane Lane to Bette Davis to Julia Roberts to Rudolf Valentino, Thomson offers comments and insights that no other volume does. I have the previous 1994 edition. Now, happily, I've got hours of happy reading ahead in the 2002 edition. This is a must-have, not just for film fans but for its pure entertainment value as a gigantic collection of biographical short takes.
My highest recommendation.
Rating: 
Summary: One Terrific Tome
Review: Here, finally, is an author unafraid to examine and critique movies from a classical point of view, i.e., using Aristotle's guideline that works of art "must have a faultlessly articulated plot, combined with a profound understanding of human motivation." Thomson rarely finds such movies and thus, in my opinion, is correct in finding fault with such Hollywood icons such as Spielberg, Scorsese, Ford, etc. But using the guideline, and unlike one reviewer here, finds such works as "Moulin Rouge" and "Rules of the Game" to be superb. Because this book is a critique, it is by definition, a collection of opinions. Therefore, the appropriate examination of the book by readers should not be whether they agree or disagree with Thomson's conclusions but whether he adheres to his own criteria and how well he writes it. On both counts, the author succeeds. Why did I give it only 4 stars then? Because I, too, am following Thomson's model: 5 stars is perfection. No work achieves perfection, the issue is only how close it comes.
Rating:
Summary: Comulsive if not Comprehensive
Review: I admire anyone who can wed devastating wit to incisive analysis--Thomson does this time and time again, and with flair, and with marvelous understatement, too. I thought I was alone in finding the Coen brothers semi-fraudulent AND Breaking the Waves abominable AND Paul Newman a poseur. Thankfully, no. There are some serious omissions, though: Where is Natalie Portman? Claire Danes? These might be the two most intriguing actresses under 25, and they're completely excluded from the work. His entry on Johnny Depp is mild and incomplete, and, yes, it would have been "nice" to see a few pictures here and there. But there's nothing dry about the book
Rating: 
Summary: Infuriating fraud
Review: I am relieved to see that it's not necessary for me to reveal for the first time the utter inadequacy of this mistitled tome. Let me just add a few details. The extensive entry on Hitchcock never MENTIONS "Shadow of a Doubt ," to my mind one of his greatet films. The omission is made possible, like so many others, by Thomson's mistake of incorporating titles in a rambling, discursive, mostly chronological narrative rather than a simple list. There are innumerable such omissions, both within entries and in listings; I shuddered repeatedly as I discovered no listing at all for one after another expected name (e.g. Red Skelton). Thomson's errors of judgment are equally crippling. He carps at David Lean's "Lawrence of Arabia," the incidental value of which in helping us understand the West's inability to understand "the Arab street" is enormous right now, calling the film "incoherent. Terry Gilliam gets less than half a page, his almost universally admired "Brazil" is reduced to "art direction at the expense of any scrutiny" without a mention of the famous battle with Universal or of the terrifyingly powerful vision so many have admired it for, and "Twelve Monkeys," which Thomson says he likes, gets only a dismissive contrast with films he likes better. Similarly Stanley Kubrick seems not to have produced five minutes of film worth watching since "The Killing" in 1957. Other reviewers here have demonstrated how Thomson's eccentric judgment weakens his entries for major figures like FelliniI. I'll add another, chosen virtually at random: Peter Sellers, whose universally acclaimed portrayal of three characters in "Doctor Strangelove," of which Thomson says only "his own pretensions vied with those of the director."*
Rating:
Summary: great book, horizon expanding
Review: I don't think i've had as much fun, or been as challenged by any book on film as i have this one. Thomson's entries found me reevaluating opinions i had previously thought immovable on many directors, actors and films. And no matter my initial revulsion to his rejection of a particular favourite of mine the more i think about it, in most cases, the more i believe he has a special gift for perception and reasoning in his chosen field of study. Most importantly to me he cites a great number of appealing films i had never heard of as masterpieces (oh to be a film critic and see more of them than is possible in liverpool), it is every film fans dream to discover such classics that have slipped through the cracks of critical approval and popularity. Not that there isn't plenty i disagree with in this book, but to take a few entries already mentioned in the reviews bellow i found myself agreeing wholeheartedly with his assessments of John Ford, David Lynch (which i found myself agreeing with word for word), Fellini, Jospeh Losey, Lars Von Trier, Ralph Nelson, Raoul Walsh and many many many more. In some of these cases and more i found my quiet, cowardly dislike or love of certain directors (especially of their less lauded films, Losey being a good example) vindicated by perceptive writing, in others my love shattered by the epiphany "My God, he's right". Special mention to his section on Merchant Ivory films. There's simply too much wonderful stuff in this book for me to list in a review. Every time i open it i find something gripping. In his columns for 'The Independent' newspaper and his hero worshipping appearances in hagiographic documentaries on Steve McQueen and Robert Mitchum i often found him smug, irritating and sometimes nauseating (i could understand in Mitchum's case, but McQueen?). But in this book he offers a more considered opinion, less gushing. As far as actors go i think i enjoyed the Robert Ryan entry most so far. His entry on Anthony Mann is fascinating, it seems to me Thomson is forever questioning himself and examining his nagging doubts and is not afraid to change his mind. When he closes his modestly appreciative segment on Robert Siodmak with "That's what i wrote aboout Siodmak in 1975. All i want to add it that it's not enough <........> Siodmak had not just a great eye but i way of seeing life. He was an artist, and he deserves fuller retrospectives." i am desperate for more detail, i would love to read more of his thoughts on this subject. I honestly believe his rhapsodic verdicts on Bresson, Ophuls, Mizoguchi, Bunuel and others to be virtually incontestable (i was disappointed to see no discussion of one of my favourite Ophul's films 'The Reckless Moment' however). The icing on the cake is his contrarian verdicts on curiosities i have always loved despite popular critical opinion seemingly being against them: 'Rancho Notorious' (Lang), 'These Are The Damned' (Losey) and to a much lesser degree 'Macao' (Sternberg and Nicholas Ray). Also films that if my memory serves me correctly might have gone straight to video in Britain recieve glowing write ups (did Rosi's adaption of Primo Levi's "The Truce" suffer that ignominy?). Maybe a previous reviewer on this page is right when he says that 5 stars cannot be awarded as it would be a claim of perfection for this book. Besides, the omissions, Mastroianni gets an entry and not Gian Maria Volonte (who Thomson enthuses about in 'Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspiscion') and there is nothing on Glauber Rocha and many other seemingly forgotten major foreign figures (although there is one for Kinugasa, a pleasant surprise as i have never met anyone who has seen one of his films). Maybe Thomson doesn't rate some of them, i'd still like to read why. I suspect it is simply an oversight or a case of time and effort, to put everyone i like or am interested by in this volume inside the first 15 editions would be a monumental achievement requiring telepathic powers on the author's part.
Rating:
Summary: One of the Finest
Review: I first read David Thomson's Biographical Dictionary of Film in 1995, when I was 15 years old. It forever changed the way I looked at film, stars, and writing in general. Mr. Thomson is able to look at a Star/Director/Preducer and in just a few words get right to the heart of the character.
Fans of his earlier edition will be happy to note many new additions of stars who came into their own in the 1990's, including Sandra Bullock, Meg Ryan, Julianne Moore, Jude Law, Leonardo DiCaprio, Nicole Kidman, George Clooney, and many more. Also included are updates on Julia Roberts, Michelle Pfeiffer, Michael Douglas, Sharon Stone, Bruce Willis, Winona Ryder, and others who were just coming into their own when the last edition was published.
Quite simply, the finest book ever written on Hollywood.
Rating:
Summary: One of the "must have" books about the movies.
Review: I have bought every edition of this book (this is the fourth) and find each one well worth the money. Thomson is the best writer among the movie critics, probably the best writer that has ever reviewed movies. His writing is so good, even when disagreeing with him, I still love reading the reviews or biographical sketches. He has a tremendous poetic economy with the English Language: consider the following: About Bruce Dern in the film Coming Home: ". . . A rapturous embrace between Jane Fonda and Jon Voight was being watched by a wistful, suspicious Bruce Dern, his eyes lime pits of paranoia and resentment." Or Basil Rathbone: "The inverted arrow face, the razor nose, and a mustache that was really two fine shears stuck to his lip. Ladies looked fearfully at him, knowing that one embrace could cut them to ribbons." Both these passages capture the essence of the star perfectly. Just perfectly. The book is full of this kind of superior writing. The update has all the new stars, some who probably wish they were excluded. Who can not read a reviewer that says of Ben Affleck: ". . . Mr. Affleck is boring, complacent, and criminally lucky to have got away with everything so far." As I say, Thomson has a way of capturing things perfectly in a few words.
Rating:
Summary: Cranky
Review: I used to be a fan of this book. Every time I saw an old movie I read Thomson's entries on its director and actors. But slowly I came to see his prose not as artful but as incoherent. Then I came to see Thomson as a crank loaded with poorly supported opinions. Then I sold my copy to a used bookstore. I feel clean again.
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