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837 reviews for:
The Lady from the Black Lagoon: Hollywood Monsters and the Lost Legacy of Milicent Patrick
Mallory O'Meara
4.11 AVERAGE
837 reviews for:
The Lady from the Black Lagoon: Hollywood Monsters and the Lost Legacy of Milicent Patrick
Mallory O'Meara
4.11 AVERAGE
I'm ashamed it took me so long to read this! I bought a physical copy and started it, but put it down for some reason. I ended up listening to this on audio, and since I love listening to the Reading Glasses podcast, I found that Mallory O'Meara reading this book to me was a much better way to take it in. The subject matter of this book isn't something I'm normally drawn towards (I'm not big on Hollywood/film history), but I did want to learn more about Milicent Patrick and why her story has gone untold for so long. Kudos to Mallory for the numerous hours of research she had to do for this project! If you like monster movies, learning about female artists, or Hollywood history, you'll probably enjoy this book.
The Lady from the Black Lagoon is an absolute gem and I loved it. It's not only well-researched and well-written, but it's inspirational and heartbreaking, fun and raw. It's about women and monsters, feminism and horror, art and support. As a horror nerd I was fascinated, entertained and sometimes angry, too. Mallory O'Meara has done a great service to Milicent Patrick and all of us monster girls out there.
Mallory O’Meara’s Lady from the Black Lagoon is a Russian doll of a book.
Of course, the basis is an exhaustive (this being a positive thing) look into the heavily researched life of the elusive artist Milicent Patrick (elusive not of her own doing).
But it is so much more than that.
It is a story of the author herself and her observation of the current state of gender politics. This, along with the fascinating portrait of Patrick’s career and beginnings, gives this book life. It could’ve stopped there. But in addition, O’Meara found a way to not only unbury the success of Milicent Patrick. She was able to find Patrick’s humanity and share it with us all, the readers.
Lady from the Black Lagoon feels like an important book, because it is. A must-read for film enthusiasts as well as anyone with two eyes or two ears or both.
Of course, the basis is an exhaustive (this being a positive thing) look into the heavily researched life of the elusive artist Milicent Patrick (elusive not of her own doing).
But it is so much more than that.
It is a story of the author herself and her observation of the current state of gender politics. This, along with the fascinating portrait of Patrick’s career and beginnings, gives this book life. It could’ve stopped there. But in addition, O’Meara found a way to not only unbury the success of Milicent Patrick. She was able to find Patrick’s humanity and share it with us all, the readers.
Lady from the Black Lagoon feels like an important book, because it is. A must-read for film enthusiasts as well as anyone with two eyes or two ears or both.
Prob more of a 3.5/5 for me, but rounding up.
I am not really a "film" person--I like movies and I have an appreciation for the horror genre in particular (especially older stuff!), but I am not someone who is "into film," necessarily. However, I was drawn to this book because I love reading about badass ladies women who are pioneers in their field, and I love spooky weird shit, so a old-Hollywood story of a woman who designed monsters but whose story was (until now) lost to time felt right up my ally.
Here's the stuff I really liked about this book:
-Obviously, Millicent Patrick's story is super interesting. I'd never heard about her before, and not just because "nerdy film stuff" is not my usual wheelhouse. Her story was never told before now, and I love that this book is getting her name out there and getting her the credit she deserves.
-I initially hesitated to read this book because I don't really have more than a cursory background knowledge about film. I had zero preconceived notions about the creation of Creature from the Black Lagoon or the history of horror film in general, so this was pretty much all completely new information for me. Luckily, O'Meara didn't expect readers to have background info and she explains everything clearly as far as different jobs/roles in film creation, history of film stuff, etc, so I didn't feel lost or confused (if you're a film buff, I'd suspect a good chunk of the explanations in this book might be redundant for you but for the rest of us, it's good!)
-I enjoyed the author's writing style. She writes like she's her age (which is also about my own age), and so I found it to be funny, witty, and accessible. It has a youthful vibe--you can tell it was written by a millenial, and I'm into that. I appreciated her little jokey footnotes, her snarkiness, and the personality that shines through.
-The book was not just a biography of Millicent Patrick--it's also a memoir of O'Meara's journey researching Patrick + what Patrick meant for her personally. I liked reading about why Patrick meant so much to the author, I liked the personal anecdotes, I liked how Mallory ties in her own experience as a woman working in horror films in present day to Millicents experience 50+ years ago.
-You can tell that O'Meara did an impressive amount of research to put this book together. As she explains herself throughout the book, during the time Millicent Patrick was active in Hollywood, it was not uncommon for people "behind the scenes" to not be officially listed in credits anywhere. By the time O'Meara began her research, most of Patrick's family and friends were deceased, which meant she really had to do quite a lot of work to find information for this book and you can tell that it was a real labor of love for her. There are sections of this book where the author speculates timelines/emotions--I could see where some readers might not like this sort of thing, but I felt like these speculations helped to humanize Patrick a bit, rather than just presenting her story as a series of concrete facts from O'Meara's research.
For full transparency, here's what I didn't really love about this book:
-Huge, long sections of this book were not about Patrick at all. We got a ton of background information about Patrick's parents/family members (particularly her father and his job as an architect), about the history of Disney, of animation, of special effects/movie makeup, of Universal, and about lots of films (including Creature from the Black Lagoon, but also several other monster movies). This is probably (definitely) owed to the fact that, as mentioned above, much of Patrick's history was lost to time, so O'Meara probably filled pages with tangentially related material to get this project to be...well, book length. It's not that the information was irrelevant--it tied in to Patricks larger life story and I understand why it was included, for sure--but a lot of it felt like O'Meara was providing way too much unnecessary detail about background characters just as a means of filling up space.
There were pages upon pages that I knew were just fluff/filler and those sections of the book were really hard for me to get through. I was most interested in the sections of this book that were about Patrick herself or about O'Meara's research journey, but unfortunately I felt like there were really long pieces of this book that could have been cut down to a few paragraphs. A direct result of this was me having my eyes glaze over multiple times and having to put this book down--it took me a long time to finish this one (long for me, ha) because I just kept getting bored with the unnecessary details and is the main reason why I don't rate this book higher.
-A smaller point (and I've seen it come up in a few other reviews of this book too): O'Meara laments on numerous occasions that people don't take women seriously in the film/horror industry/in general (definitely true!) and goes on at length about the objectification/sexualization of women. She talks and talks about how men were obsessed with Millicent Patrick's appearance and how this was a Bad Thing, because she is so much more than just her physical beauty, etc etc. All true, all valid! I'm here for it! HOWEVER, O'Meara then goes on, almost in the same breath, to gush herself about how beautiful Millicent was. One of the captions on a photo she includes is literally "You could roast marshmallows over this picture." Look, it's an objective fact that Millicent was beautiful--the problem for me was that O'Meara seemed to be doing the very thing she was reprimanding others for (ie: constantly focusing on Millicent's appearance) and it just rubbed me the wrong way, especially as she did it not just once or twice but over and over and over again throughout the entire book.
Anyway! Overall I found this book interesting and I'm glad I picked it up. Always happy to learn about fascinating women in history, and kudos to O'Meara for highlighting someone as interesting as Millicent Patrick and giving her the the credit for her work that she rightfully deserves.
I am not really a "film" person--I like movies and I have an appreciation for the horror genre in particular (especially older stuff!), but I am not someone who is "into film," necessarily. However, I was drawn to this book because I love reading about badass ladies women who are pioneers in their field, and I love spooky weird shit, so a old-Hollywood story of a woman who designed monsters but whose story was (until now) lost to time felt right up my ally.
Here's the stuff I really liked about this book:
-Obviously, Millicent Patrick's story is super interesting. I'd never heard about her before, and not just because "nerdy film stuff" is not my usual wheelhouse. Her story was never told before now, and I love that this book is getting her name out there and getting her the credit she deserves.
-I initially hesitated to read this book because I don't really have more than a cursory background knowledge about film. I had zero preconceived notions about the creation of Creature from the Black Lagoon or the history of horror film in general, so this was pretty much all completely new information for me. Luckily, O'Meara didn't expect readers to have background info and she explains everything clearly as far as different jobs/roles in film creation, history of film stuff, etc, so I didn't feel lost or confused (if you're a film buff, I'd suspect a good chunk of the explanations in this book might be redundant for you but for the rest of us, it's good!)
-I enjoyed the author's writing style. She writes like she's her age (which is also about my own age), and so I found it to be funny, witty, and accessible. It has a youthful vibe--you can tell it was written by a millenial, and I'm into that. I appreciated her little jokey footnotes, her snarkiness, and the personality that shines through.
-The book was not just a biography of Millicent Patrick--it's also a memoir of O'Meara's journey researching Patrick + what Patrick meant for her personally. I liked reading about why Patrick meant so much to the author, I liked the personal anecdotes, I liked how Mallory ties in her own experience as a woman working in horror films in present day to Millicents experience 50+ years ago.
-You can tell that O'Meara did an impressive amount of research to put this book together. As she explains herself throughout the book, during the time Millicent Patrick was active in Hollywood, it was not uncommon for people "behind the scenes" to not be officially listed in credits anywhere. By the time O'Meara began her research, most of Patrick's family and friends were deceased, which meant she really had to do quite a lot of work to find information for this book and you can tell that it was a real labor of love for her. There are sections of this book where the author speculates timelines/emotions--I could see where some readers might not like this sort of thing, but I felt like these speculations helped to humanize Patrick a bit, rather than just presenting her story as a series of concrete facts from O'Meara's research.
For full transparency, here's what I didn't really love about this book:
-Huge, long sections of this book were not about Patrick at all. We got a ton of background information about Patrick's parents/family members (particularly her father and his job as an architect), about the history of Disney, of animation, of special effects/movie makeup, of Universal, and about lots of films (including Creature from the Black Lagoon, but also several other monster movies). This is probably (definitely) owed to the fact that, as mentioned above, much of Patrick's history was lost to time, so O'Meara probably filled pages with tangentially related material to get this project to be...well, book length. It's not that the information was irrelevant--it tied in to Patricks larger life story and I understand why it was included, for sure--but a lot of it felt like O'Meara was providing way too much unnecessary detail about background characters just as a means of filling up space.
There were pages upon pages that I knew were just fluff/filler and those sections of the book were really hard for me to get through. I was most interested in the sections of this book that were about Patrick herself or about O'Meara's research journey, but unfortunately I felt like there were really long pieces of this book that could have been cut down to a few paragraphs. A direct result of this was me having my eyes glaze over multiple times and having to put this book down--it took me a long time to finish this one (long for me, ha) because I just kept getting bored with the unnecessary details and is the main reason why I don't rate this book higher.
-A smaller point (and I've seen it come up in a few other reviews of this book too): O'Meara laments on numerous occasions that people don't take women seriously in the film/horror industry/in general (definitely true!) and goes on at length about the objectification/sexualization of women. She talks and talks about how men were obsessed with Millicent Patrick's appearance and how this was a Bad Thing, because she is so much more than just her physical beauty, etc etc. All true, all valid! I'm here for it! HOWEVER, O'Meara then goes on, almost in the same breath, to gush herself about how beautiful Millicent was. One of the captions on a photo she includes is literally "You could roast marshmallows over this picture." Look, it's an objective fact that Millicent was beautiful--the problem for me was that O'Meara seemed to be doing the very thing she was reprimanding others for (ie: constantly focusing on Millicent's appearance) and it just rubbed me the wrong way, especially as she did it not just once or twice but over and over and over again throughout the entire book.
Anyway! Overall I found this book interesting and I'm glad I picked it up. Always happy to learn about fascinating women in history, and kudos to O'Meara for highlighting someone as interesting as Millicent Patrick and giving her the the credit for her work that she rightfully deserves.
slow-paced
I was deeply excited by finding this book and couldn’t wait to dive in. Unfortunately, I found myself struggling to finish it. Early in the book O’Meara mentions colleagues expressing concern that there is not enough content available for an entire book and I have to agree. Only a small portion of the book covers Patrick’s work on the Creature, and I found myself feeling incredibly misled. O’Meara clearly lacked the researching expertise to unearth anything new about Patrick’s professional career and instead used the book as a platform to talk about herself and her personal views (which I tend to agree with, but was absolutely not what I wanted from the book). Her casual writing style and speculation on Patrick’s feelings and motivations without offering up evidence led to me believe this subject would have been better covered in a blog post.
Mallory O'Mears brings to light the life and work of Milicent Patrick, an animator, actress and special effects makeup designer who created the Creature From the Black Lagoon. With Milicent's legacy and contributions to Hollywood almost completely lost, O'Meara sets out to uncover her story. The author's research treasure hunt, taking you to places like Hearst Castle and the film archives of Hollywood, is as fascinating as the tale of Hollywood success and tragedy that it weaves together. A book not only about a nearly forgotten Hollywood trailblazer, but a history of movie monsters (on and off screen) and the realities of the film industry for anyone who doesn't fit the white male mold.
3.5 stars.
One of the books I was really looking forward to reading this year. I really enjoyed the subject material, I loved learning about Milicent and her life. My biggest problem was that there just wasn't enough of her in this book. The first 100 pages aren't even about her really. They're about her father and William Randolph Hearst. The first half also becomes a book about the author finding Milicent. I love O'Meara's enthusiasm for her and the passion that she writes with, but this book isn't about Mallory O'Meara. Even in her own book, Milicent Patrick seems to get pushed out of the spotlight. She seemed like a very complicated woman and I don't feel like I ended the book knowing her as a person any better than I did when I started.
I also found the writing style just not for me. The author inserts herself, her biases, viewpoints and opinions way too often. Others might like that form of blog writing, but I didn't. In non-fiction, I'd like to have the facts presented to me and be allowed to draw my own conclusions on that.
I also found her somewhat hypocritical and choosy. O'Meara constantly laments that journalists and writers of the day only focused on Milicent's beauty, but there are also several times within this book that O'Meara says how great Milicent looks in a picture or how astonished she is that Milicent looked so good at 45. The woman was beautiful and her style was glamorous. That's part of who she was.
O'Meara also felt that it was fine if Bud Westmore and Camille Rossi's legacies were erased from history because they were not very nice people, but her whole book is about uncovering a person's legacy who has been erased. Milicent wasn't a great person herself. Two people committed suicide directly because of her. And sometimes you have to grapple with the fact that people who do great things can also do really shitty things. That's human nature. But you don't get to pick and choose based one being a man and one being a woman.
While I loved her passion for the subject, I felt O'Meara didn't come across as a professional in the book. She doesn't need to, but I think the story and Milicent's legacy could have been better serviced. I wish there were more pictures. It sounded like the author had bins full of Milicent's things and this book only felt like a very small taste. I loved learning about her, the industry at the time and have found new respect for the women who worked behind the scenes in Old Hollywood. I think it's an important book that really resonates today. I would recommend this book for any who are interested in the subject matter, but probably as a jumping-off point.
One of the books I was really looking forward to reading this year. I really enjoyed the subject material, I loved learning about Milicent and her life. My biggest problem was that there just wasn't enough of her in this book. The first 100 pages aren't even about her really. They're about her father and William Randolph Hearst. The first half also becomes a book about the author finding Milicent. I love O'Meara's enthusiasm for her and the passion that she writes with, but this book isn't about Mallory O'Meara. Even in her own book, Milicent Patrick seems to get pushed out of the spotlight. She seemed like a very complicated woman and I don't feel like I ended the book knowing her as a person any better than I did when I started.
I also found the writing style just not for me. The author inserts herself, her biases, viewpoints and opinions way too often. Others might like that form of blog writing, but I didn't. In non-fiction, I'd like to have the facts presented to me and be allowed to draw my own conclusions on that.
I also found her somewhat hypocritical and choosy. O'Meara constantly laments that journalists and writers of the day only focused on Milicent's beauty, but there are also several times within this book that O'Meara says how great Milicent looks in a picture or how astonished she is that Milicent looked so good at 45. The woman was beautiful and her style was glamorous. That's part of who she was.
O'Meara also felt that it was fine if Bud Westmore and Camille Rossi's legacies were erased from history because they were not very nice people, but her whole book is about uncovering a person's legacy who has been erased. Milicent wasn't a great person herself. Two people committed suicide directly because of her. And sometimes you have to grapple with the fact that people who do great things can also do really shitty things. That's human nature. But you don't get to pick and choose based one being a man and one being a woman.
While I loved her passion for the subject, I felt O'Meara didn't come across as a professional in the book. She doesn't need to, but I think the story and Milicent's legacy could have been better serviced. I wish there were more pictures. It sounded like the author had bins full of Milicent's things and this book only felt like a very small taste. I loved learning about her, the industry at the time and have found new respect for the women who worked behind the scenes in Old Hollywood. I think it's an important book that really resonates today. I would recommend this book for any who are interested in the subject matter, but probably as a jumping-off point.
This book is phenomenal. Mallory shares the story of Milicent Patrick who created the design for The Creature from the Black Lagoon But was never given her proper credit because men in Hollywood are trash more often than not. I can’t fathom the amount of research Mallory did but she has created a biography that brought me to tears for a woman I barely knew existed. This is a must read for any fan of old Hollywood or movie monsters.
informative
reflective
I loved listening to Mallory O'Meara read her book in the audio version. Felt like sitting in my living room, having tea, and listening to a friend tell me a fascinating story. Excellent feminist critique of the sexism in Hollywood, intertwined with Milicent Patrick's life and career and O'Meara's journey to find her.
This book was not what I expected it was going to be and I mean that in a good way! Most biographies are told in a very dry way, which don’t get me wrong I love a good biography, but this one was told in a humorous, witty, and engaging way that I was sucked in wanting to know more about this mysterious person that is Millicent Patrick. A couple of things that I wanted to point out: 1. There is a lot of talk about the Hollywood industry. It more so talks about it though in the early 1900s with mentions of today's industry for reference and clarification. I think O’Meara explains it in such a way that is not confusing probably because she is an executive producer in hollywood herself. 2. There are 2 main topics that are discussed throughout the book. One is Millicent Patrick’s life from before she was born (her parents and how they met) till she passed away and the other is Mallory O’Meara’s journey on finding all the information she has put into the book. This may be confusing to people because there isn’t a time stamp or mention of the transition except for extra space between the paragraphs. I, personally, was fine with this, I had no trouble but I would just pay close attention to the setting and tone of the writing. 3. There are author's notes at the end of the page (on almost every page) that correspond to the numbers in the text. Some are there for comedic purposes but most are there to show important information that wasn’t necessary to the main text but gives readers a better understanding of the work. All in all, I would say that this was a successful read and I enjoyed it very much!