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Rating: Summary: A Really Interesting Selection Review: First of all, this is not, as claimed by the author (or the Random House publicist), "the definitive guide to independent and foreign films on video and DVD." First of all, there are far too many foreign and independent films in existence for such a collection, especially one as large as this one, to be definitive. Compilations of the greatest 100 films seldom agree on even half of the entries, and disagreements of ranking will increase disproportionately as the list grows longer. Secondly, this guide is highly skewed toward recent films. Although one film is from 1919 ("The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari"), two-thirds of the films are from 1980-2002; one-half from 1990-2002. Foreign films have been around since 1895. The (struggling) indies have been very prominent since the late 50's, when the price of movie equipment began coming down, and the big-budget indies for even longer, ever since the big studios began renting their sound stages and equipment. Hence, the selection can hardly be representative of the best, and you simply can't be definitive in something like this without being representative as well.Many readers, and this writer, will disagree in their hearts with what may be called a foreign or an independent film in this book. Are "The Bridge on the River Kwai" (1957) and "Lawrence of Arabia" (1962), films with A-list casts, crews and budgets, foreign for being British or independent for having an independent producer (Sam Spiegel)? More than 50 years have passed since the Motion Picture Academy abandoned Foreign Film as a catagory in favor of Foreign-Language Film, and Sam Spiegel, although certainly independent legally, was nonetheless typical of the meddling Hollywood producer. And let us not forget "Gone with the Wind" (1939), INDEPENDENTLY produced by David O. Selznick (the son and son-in-law of movie moguls and who replaced Irving Thalberg as VP for production at MGM after the latter's death, a position he held until he went independent to make GWTW). This was also an indy, technically, even though it has been described in one film guide (TLA) as "the definitive example of old, big-studio moviemaking." We usually think of indies as being films by independent anti-Hollywood producers and directors. I like that concept better than the legal one. And why aren't ultra-indy films like "El Mariachi" or "The Blair Witch Project" included in this book? Are these reasons to shun this book? Not in your life! This book has great descriptions of oodles of very worthwhile true foreign and independent films, 695 films in all (as opposed to the author's modest claim of only 650). And these films are almost all very very good and a goodly fraction great. (I'm not even sure that there are 650 "great" films in the world, foreign or domestic, Hollywood or indy. Out of 19,000 films rated Maltin gives only about 400 four stars; Halliwell less than 250.) These films are just about all interesting and quirky or just different in the way we expect independent or foreign films films to be. And yes, there are a few (very few) that (IMHO) are only cable TV fodder. If you prefer films that haven't had big TV advertising campaigns, this is a very good book to have. I recommend this book highly. Now if only you can find most of these films at your local video store.
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