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A review by ginbott
Best. Movie. Year. Ever.: How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen by Brian Raftery
2.0
This book suffers from false advertising and a poorly chosen marketing angle. If you're in the market for a summary of 'some' of the years best remembered movies with added 'how we made it' flavour from the people involved this is a fine read. Raftery has a talent for phrasing and writes well.
However, this book is not a critical analysis of why one could claim that 1999 might be the best movie year ever. There is no structured argument. Raftery never states a thesis or explains how he's going to go about proving this claim. In fact, early on he comments that any year could be dubbed 'best movie year ever'. Right.
No thorough overview of 1999 movies is included, nor does the author clarify why he's chosen to focus on the films included in the book and leave others out.
There is no sense of the personal, of why Raftery has come to the conclusion that this more than any other year is The Best.
So, not a bad read, but definitely not a resounding and well-researched and argued case as to why 1999 is such a special movie year. Perhaps I should have a go myself...Raftery has certainly made me think about how I would approach such a task. 2.5 stars if Goodreads would've let me.
However, this book is not a critical analysis of why one could claim that 1999 might be the best movie year ever. There is no structured argument. Raftery never states a thesis or explains how he's going to go about proving this claim. In fact, early on he comments that any year could be dubbed 'best movie year ever'. Right.
No thorough overview of 1999 movies is included, nor does the author clarify why he's chosen to focus on the films included in the book and leave others out.
There is no sense of the personal, of why Raftery has come to the conclusion that this more than any other year is The Best.
So, not a bad read, but definitely not a resounding and well-researched and argued case as to why 1999 is such a special movie year. Perhaps I should have a go myself...Raftery has certainly made me think about how I would approach such a task. 2.5 stars if Goodreads would've let me.