TALKING PICTURES by Ann Hornaday, the film critic for The Washington Post, is a new book that I am excited to share with our Lit and Film teachers and their students. Subtitled "How to Watch Movies" and based on her earlier series of articles, Hornaday says she structured this non-fiction work roughly according to a film's production, with chapters on The Screenplay, Acting, Editing, Directing and more. Hornaday offers multiple examples throughout and she argues that "all films have an essential grammar in common: a lexicon of visual, aural, and performance conventions that link them to each other, or, when those conventions are cleverly subverted, constitute an invigorating break." I particularly appreciated her efforts to reach out to the reader, increasingly perhaps an informal reviewer on social media, and to include some leading questions that "viewers can ask themselves after they've seen a movie to ascertain whether it succeeded in particular craft areas." For example, she suggests reflecting on: Were the people in the movie complex, unpredictable, believable? Did I care about them? Did they change or stay the same? TALKING PICTURES will be an extremely valuable resource for our students and a copy is available in the library now.

Ann Hornaday’s Talking Pictures is its reader’s first-step towards watching films like a world-renowned movie-critic. Throughout the book, she accessibly breaks down the common errors that are made when it comes to film-making and alternatively, what constitutes a truly fantastic film. The book is fascinating and revelatory, but still easy-to-read without its reader needing to have watched every single film in existence to understand the topics in which the author is discussing.
Because, by breaking down films into their seven major components (acting, production design, scriptwriting, cinematography, editing, sound/music and directing), Hornaday throughly examines each aspect of the movie-making process and shows how, even the slightest margin of error in any of them, can make or break a film.
It is a book that will certainly enhance its readers’ film-watching experiences (it certainly enhanced mine!) and each chapter even ends with a list of required viewing; one which illustrates the very best in each film-component, in accordance with Hornaday’s vast experience.

Have you ever wondered about the engine under the hood of your favorite movie or television show? If so, Talking Pictures: How to Watch Movies is a comprehensive resource you need to read.

Beginning with the screenplay, this book has a chapter about each part of the movie making process. Other chapters focus on acting, production design, cinematography, editing, sound/music and directing. There is also a short chapter about documentaries in the appendix.

Each of the chapters offer an in-depth look at the work of the providers of the skill. The author defines some industry terms. There are fascinating stories from the past. Who knew the first time the title of production designer was used was for Gone with the Wind? Names of actors and movies are given as both good and bad examples of the skill being studied. Finally, at the end of each chapter is a list of recommended movies to watch to see the craft at its highest level.

Talking Pictures: How to Watch Movies is enchanting. It’s perfect for movie fans who want to see the multiple skills necessary to make a great movie. I loved it! 5 stars.

Thanks to Basic Books and NetGalley for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

Hornaday breaks her book into sections by film element--cinematography, story, directing, etc.--and discusses the things to pay attention to in each area. She even includes recommended viewing at the end of each chapter, to see great examples of the elements she discusses. You could dip into this book at any point and learn something interesting about filmmaking and film watching. My to-be-watched list just got a lot longer.

A Detailed Breakdown of Film's Essential Elements

What a pleasant wonderful surprise "Talking Pictures" turned out to be. It's easy to see why Ann Hornaday was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for criticism in 2008 - she can write!

Each chapter breaks down a different essential element of film:

- Acting
- Production Design
- Cinematography
- Editing
- Sound and Music
- Directing

For the average moviegoer, some categories (acting) are more obvious and perhaps easier to understand than others (what is Production Design exactly?), but the author does a great job of explaining and exploring each aspect of film in great detail without ever becoming confusing, or worse, condescending.

In the hands of a lesser writer, this might have turned into a dry technical manual - but as I mentioned above, Hornaday can write! The details in "Talking Pictures" feel like they're coming from an intelligent friend or exceptionally entertaining teacher.

With that said, I wish she had used a wider variety of movies as examples, - you should probably start a drinking game based on how many times Kenneth Lonergan is mentioned - but that's a minor nitpick at best and should not deter you from picking up this wonderful book. (I particularly liked her perspectives on "The Hurt Locker" and "Avatar.")

Overall, "Talking Pictures" left me wanting more - in a good way! I was wondering why she disliked "Forrest Gump" or found the settings of the "The King's Speech" to be overly artificial. She did explain her views, but only in service of the chapter. To expand on her thoughts at greater length, however, would turned this into a different book. I hope her film criticism is published elsewhere, because I plan to seek it out now.

I am impressed. Thanks to Netgalley I had an opportunity to read a marvellous book I would probably pass by in the bookshop (not because I do not like the subject but because I simply tend to skip nonfiction in favour of fiction). The author really went into great detail about how to approach the movie watching from every angle of their making, and she did it without going into heavy technical explanations and theorizing. I liked that she also provided examples from books and interviews for all the suggestions and questions about each profession concerning moviemaking. All that was really helpful and memorable. It is easy to say you do not like one movie, but why, isn't. I think this book helps to form your thoughts and ideas better, even if you aren't a rookie in that sphere. The sources and further reading suggestions at the end of the book were also more than welcome!

🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿

Early in my career I reviewed films as a freelancer. So was thrilled to find veteran movie critic Ann Hornaday’s TALKING PICTURES: HOW TO WATCH MOVIES on NetGalley. Loved her intro, where she describes not being a film fan, but finding her way to the critic’s seat anyway.

For me, it was the opposite ... I ADORED movies and still do. Left to babysit my brother, I had the riches of Saturday Night at the Movies. One night Kev and I watched “Niagara” as Marilyn Monroe and Joseph Cotten sped toward the falls in a dinghy. We both screamed at the screen, “Jump,” while Cotten retorted over the roar, “We can’t. We’ll be torn apart by the rocks.” Hooked from that moment on!

Ann, by contrast, came circuitously to the job ... a fascinating trip which included a stint as Gloria Steinem’s P. A. She describes writing her first official film review, terror stricken, knowing she loved the flick but couldn’t fathom how best to say why. Then she recalled advice from TV critic David Friedman, who riffed off Goethe when he told her to ponder three questions, “What was the artist trying to achieve? Did they achieve it? And was it worth doing?”

Ann survived that moment of terror to go on to bigger gigs, eventually making her way to the elevated realm of The Washington Post, where her reviews are revered.

In TALKING PICTURES, she shares her wisdom by taking readers through the production of a typical movie--from script and casting to final sound edit--and explains how to evaluate each phase. She instructs on screenwriting, performances, cinematography, editing, and sound design. She also includes engaging anecdotes and interviews with actors and filmmakers ... all designed to shape us into movie critics in our own right. A highly recommended trip for every lover of flicks! 5/5

Pub Date 06 Nov 2018  

Thanks to Perseus Books, Basic Books and NetGalley for the review copy. Opinions are fully mine.

#TalkingPictures #NetGalley

A detailed, exhaustive study about movies, what we should notice watching a movie, with many - actually too many - examples.

She gets a given area for a chapter: screenwriting, characters, editing etc. It helps a lot to understand how a movie is created and what's the role of the professionals around. She makes the fundamental points first, then illustrates them with examples. The author's lexical knowledge is impressive, but she lists too many different examples. A movie could be made this way or another, the characters could talk much or less, the sound could be loud or quieter, and she mentions many good and bad examples for both! It's hard to follow her through so many kind of examples.

Additionally, the average reader have never seen so many movies. I see and appreciate her enthusiasm, but I'm not really interested in her personal fandom (classical movies) - she would have added some more practical advice instead.

The author is a journalist, and at the beginning there's a perfect sentence about how to write a review. But later the book becomes more of a study than a guide: it has some good points, but it's hard to decide what to check sitting in a cinema, the book is not practical enough for other would-be-journalists.

What I surprised at most, television series are not even mentioned in the book. It's OK that her personal favorites are made to film (instead of digital formats), in 2D and displayed in a cinema, but television series made such a big effect to the audience and the industry, that it seems a mistake not even mentioning them it a book about movies.

But it's impressive anyway, you can learn a lot about movies, and you definitely will be a better company when movies will be discussed among your friends.

After watching a movie, I can almost always say whether or not I liked it, although whether a movie was good or bad get much more difficult quickly. Hornaday offers the casual viewer the framework and vocabulary to think about and explain how we can judge movies outside of our personal attachment to them--was the success or failure due to the script, or the casting, or the production design? How do the elements come together to create something, and how does that something fit in the context of its time, endure as a classic or quickly fade as an artifact of its time? Using vivid and accessible examples, this is a good primer for movie fans.