posted 03-21-2005 05:34 PM                    

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"The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001" A Book Review By Michael Coate

I understand the old axiom: If you don't have something nice to say then you shouldn't say anything at all. Except that in the case of reviewing "The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001," to say nothing would be doing a disservice.

I found "The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001" (McFarland, 2003) to be a frustrating read because the book had so much potential, but its author, to use a silly but effective cliché, fumbled the ball. My time reading the book can be summarized by asking the question: "What is an acceptable margin of error?"

The author is Richard W. Haines, who previously penned "Technicolor Movies: The History Of Dye Transfer Printing" (McFarland, 1993), and he sets up "The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001" with a fantastic and relevant premise. Haines seized an opportunity to cover a subject that has been underrepresented in print. However, two major problems are quickly revealed. The first, which the casual reader should be able to spot, is that the book is poorly written, with a frequent and annoying absence of commas in many sentences and a surprising number of misspelled words. The second, which will likely be sniffed out only by serious enthusiasts of the subject, is that the book appears to be poorly researched and inadequately fact-checked, resulting in an unfortunate dose of erroneous information. As I found myself counting the errors, I wondered if this project was nothing more than a big joke to see if a badly-written book could actually get published!

The focus of the book is on changes since 1968 that have impacted the moviegoing experience, the majority of which the author asserts have had negative repercussions. Haines' essential argument is that the experience of watching movies has had a downward shift in quality — both content and presentation — due to a variety of factors ranging from the demise of the Production Code; to the building of multiplex theatres with small screens and the use of automated equipment; to the discontinued usage of dye-transfer Technicolor prints, large-format negatives and magnetic audio; to the acceptance of "small-gauge" formats such as Super-35 and emergence of home video formats; and to the current-day use of digital technology in exhibition.

The book is nicely divided into chapters dealing with specific topics. Haines sets the stage by introducing the book with a boyhood recollection of seeing a memorable presentation of "2001: A Space Odyssey" at a theatre in his hometown of Peekskill, NY. He details the presentation and describes how the 70mm screening left a lasting impression on him. This experience is contrasted with a contemporary trip to the movies, and Haines claims that the former represented a zenith in what the industry offered moviegoers, whereas the latter demonstrated everything that has gone wrong with the film industry in the past thirty-plus years.

Haines' introductory point is clear and effective, though I believe his specifics have fallen into that ever-common trap of bad memory. Familiarity with geography and film distribution will clue one in that Peekskill isn't exactly an "A" market. Taking it a step further, a check of Westchester County (in which Peekskill is located) newspapers archived on microfilm reveal that "2001" (1) did not screen in Peekskill during 1968 (its first engagement occurred in spring 1969), and (2) the first 70mm engagement in Westchester County did not occur until 1970. This example of the use of memory and research is, unfortunately, a sign of things to come in the subsequent pages of the book.

Topics covered include Cinema in the Sixties (Chapter 1), which details the type of content being produced at the time, exhibition practices, and cinematography styles and release print types. Chapter 2 gives a thorough and fascinating overview of the Production Code and its demise, the Motion Picture Association of America's adoption of the rating system, exploitation films, and the blacklist era. The practice of multiplexing and twinning is the subject of Chapter 3, and differences in projection equipment, such as reel-to-reel vs. platters and carbon arc lamphouses vs. xenon bulbs are explained in Chapter 4. A chapter on cinematography explores differences in visual styles with a description of the Classic Studio style vs. the Contemporary style. The home entertainment revolution (Chapter 6) and changes in distribution approaches (Chapter 7) are covered in depth, as is a chapter on alternate venues (Chapter 8). The emergence of digital cinema and the future of film are detailed in chapters nine and ten. An appendix section appears at the tail-end of the book featuring extensive listings of surviving movie palaces and drive-ins, as well as profiles of famous cinematographers and their style. These sections are interesting, though some readers may find the drive-in portion frustrating as the names are provided but not the corresponding locations. Therefore, one will require the use of another source if they wish to know the location of the drive-ins listed. All of the chapters are insightful with Chapter 2 being my favorite.

It is unclear, however, who the target audience is for this book. If the general public is the target, I'm not sure that there's sufficient interest. But let's argue that there is. Due to the quality of research, however, a great disservice is being done to those seeking a quality introduction to the subject or reference-quality listings. To the other possible audience — the history-loving, accuracy-seeking, data-obsessed film geek who already has a familiarity with the subject — the book is a disappointment, because, as mentioned before, these readers will more than likely be able to detect the work's many inaccuracies.

Haines' background is as a filmmaker, and while serving as the post-production supervisor for Troma, Inc., he edited such fare as "The Toxic Avenger" (1985). He would go on to write and direct several movies such as "The Class Of Nuke 'Em High" (1986), "Run For Cover" (1996), and "Unsavory Characters" (2001). With "The Moviegoing Experience,1968 - 2001," it appears that Haines is attempting to add scholar to his resumé. It would be fair to say that Haines is very creative and has been successful as a filmmaker. Based on this book, however, his success as a film historian or scholar is debatable.

From a research and copy-editing standpoint, "The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001" is an unqualified disaster. I found it to be poorly executed, with far, far too many errors. Worse, the reading experience is disrupted by an apparent lack of proof-reading, or a lack of expert proof-reading and copy-editing, anyway. Surely, someone, anyone, looked this book over before being sent to the printer. In his acknowledgments, the author thanks three research assistants and another for editorial advice. Makes me wonder what their contributions were.... The value of expert proof-reading and copy-editing cannot be overstated. (I'm reminded of a time when I worked for an editor who, in a classic moment of sheer idiocy, claimed having a proof-reader on staff was not necessary and instructed his writing team to simply "...proof as you write.")

Many of the errors in the book seem to be fact-check or editorial in nature. Easy-to-spot, recurring mistakes range from misspelled names and movie titles, to films being given an incorrect year of release (typically off by one year, though a few were off by several years!), to the author confusing a film's box office gross (the total amount of ticket sales) with its rental (the portion of the gross returned to a distributor as specified in the booking contract). Haines does supply a bibliography and footnotes, and, in his defense, any writer/researcher can fall victim to a bad source. However, there are simply too many mistakes present for any reasonable reader to look the other way, and the many incorrect years, for instance, reek of sloppy editorial guesswork.

The most egregious errors can be found in Chapter 7, where the 70-millimeter format is covered at length. The most troublesome aspect to this is that no sources for Haines' 70mm film list appear in his bibliography and footnotes section, and... the information included bears a striking resemblance to previously published material, namely the 70mm titles in the book "Wide Screen Movies" (McFarland, 1988) and the "Presented In 70mm" article from a 2001 special issue of Widescreen Review magazine (portions of which were re-purposed on the in70mm.com website). None of those works are cited in Haines' bibliography, and a substantial amount of information, including errors and omitted titles, appear identically in "The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001." For example, several titles listed with an incorrect principal photography notation or listed in an incorrect year in the earlier works appear in Haines' book in the same incorrect year or with the same photography notation. Would independent research yield the same exact incorrect information? One of the confusing aspects to the "Presented In 70mm" article was the arrangement of foreign-language titles being listed by their original foreign-language title rather than in English. A few of these are listed in Haines' book... by their foreign-language title. In the case of two of these examples, Haines duplicates the titles in English, apparently not realizing they were one and the same. (I'm not fluent in French, but it seems obvious to me that "Le Grand Bleu" is the original title for "The Big Blue"!!!) Much of what I would consider specialized information suspiciously appears in Haines', and it is evident that it was referenced without attribution. Worse, Haines duplicates a major drawback of the 70mm list from "Wide Screen Movies," in that no effort is made to distinguish U.S. releases from those released in 70mm only in international regions. And, whereas the "Presented In 70mm" piece offered details on unconfirmed titles, Haines makes no such distinction, further propagating claims of 70mm print availability on films that in all likelihood were released only in standard 35mm. Those readers new to the subject of large-format films or those seeking a reference-quality filmography will be misled by the 70mm compilation present in the book.

I think what will determine whether someone accepts this book (and my review) is one's personality and philosophies. If you think details matter, then you'll recognize my point that this book, being a work of non-fiction, is all about the details. The details are the book!!! It's not a novel.... It's not fiction.... Information is either correct or it is incorrect. And in my estimation, too much of the book is incorrect, despite the otherwise excellent information provided. I believe most reasonable people will accept an occasional error. But when one plunks down money to buy a book and sets aside time to read it, there are expectations that need to be met.

The major issue I have with this effort is that I believe the unspoken "contract" between author/publisher and reader/consumer has been violated. It's amazing that a book could be published in the type of condition as this one. (If this is normal, then I guess I don't read enough!) As a high school or college assignment, this work might get an excellent grade for the effort alone — and I praise Haines for making the effort. But to get published — come on! It's bad enough that the Internet has spawned a legion of "experts," but to get a book published, there's an expectation that the author is an expert and will deliver the goods. In McFarland's defense, I think they should ask for some of their payment back from the author. But then, perhaps the author paid the publisher. This may explain the appearance of this being a vanity project, because this cannot and should not be taken seriously by anyone seeking an enlightened or reference-quality history of the subject. But, unfortunately, I've already seen the book on the library shelves at a couple of universities and a highly-regarded motion picture industry research library.

I hope Haines is not considering another non-fiction book. I would much rather see his energy focused on something more suited to his skills. Is there a sequel to "The Class Of Nuke 'Em High" in the future? I'd much rather encourage someone to see "The Class Of Nuke 'Em High School Reunion In 3D" than be subjected to another book... unless it is expertly researched and proof-read.

In closing, I'd like to share one last item I found amusing. There is a review of "The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001" posted at e-tailer Amazon.com's site. Amazon offers an opportunity to post user-reviews of the products it sells. If one looks up "The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001," there is a review (or at least there was a few months ago when I last checked). Am I the only one who finds it interesting that the posting is credited to... a Richard Haines! Is it any surprise then that the "review" is positive?!

"The Moviegoing Experience, 1968 - 2001"
By Richard W. Haines
Softcover; 270 pages
McFarland & Company, Inc.
2003
$32.00

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posted 03-22-2005 11:49 AM                       

quote: Michael Coates

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The major issue I have with this effort is that I believe the unspoken "contract" between author/publisher and reader/consumer has been violated. It's amazing that a book could be published in the type of condition as this one. (If this is normal, then I guess I don't read enough!) As a high school or college assignment, this work might get an excellent grade for the effort alone — and I praise Haines for making the effort. But to get published — come on! It's bad enough that the Internet has spawned a legion of "experts," but to get a book published, there's an expectation that the author is an expert and will deliver the goods.

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OK, granted, but I think there's another aspect to this 'contract' as well. Before I go on I'd like to make it clear that I haven't actually read this book and therefore I'm talking in general terms here, not in relation to Haines' book specifically (although, that having been said, I am familiar with both Wide Screen Movies and his Technicolor book, and AFAIK neither is believed to be as conceptually flawed or as error-ridden as Michael concludes that The Moviegoing Experience is). But when you're writing a book which is essentially a factual, historical narrative designed to present, interpret and guide the reader through a large amount of factual information based on empirical research, you're bound to get some of those facts wrong. That's just being human. Even John Belton's book, which has rightly been widely praised as a groundbreaking study, contains the odd error - mostly ones which have been uncovered by subsequent research. But if the flaws in this (Haynes') book go as deep as Michael believes, then it should never have been published - period.

Part of the publisher's job is to get the manuscript read by one or more independent experts before it goes to press. Their reports should (i) point out factual errors, or what they believe to be errors, (ii) raise 'why are you devoting so much space to this?' or 'why did you dismiss this important issue in just two paragraphs?' type questions, (iii) comment on general areas of structure, coverage, illustrations and so on, and (iv) basically, provide an honest assessment of whether the book is fit to print. The point I'm trying to make is that the relationship is really one which is between the public and a collaboration of the author and publisher. The names of both are on the cover, and it is in no publisher's interest to publish something which falls way below the mark.

How do I know all this? Because I've just finished my writing my first book, which is out next month (I admit - how shameless a plug can you get?). I was very lucky to have the benefit of extensive feedback from not one but three external readers, all of whom made detailed comments which were taken on board during the rewrites. Without those comments I would guess that around 15-20 factual blunders would have made it into the final draft, and some may still have done.

Why did those blunders get there in the first place? The writing was done entirely in my spare time, I had limited resources for research trips (for example, even the nearest complete run of the SMPTE Journal is in a library in London, 220 miles away, and there were a limited amount of hours I could afford to spend there) and over some issues I was dealing with such obscure material that facts were very difficult to check. Where I have put my head on the block I've tried to footnote my sources: but the word length for footnotes was limited and there was an editorial decision as to how much of that information I could give. And in some cases, experts disagree. For example, I gave (based on two sources, one contemporary) 1906 as the year in which the Pathécolor stencil process was first used commercially. Two of the readers corrected this, saying 1905 and 1907 respectively! So in the end, I just changed '1906' to 'in the mid-late '00s'...

But the point is that I didn't want to put my name to a book which doesn't do the job I set out for it to do, and neither does the publisher. It takes both to ensure a good product, IMHO. I must admit to being a bit surprised at Haynes' latest work being so problematic, though - although, like Michael, his writing style and the level of insight and analysis he offers was never going to set the world on fire, I'd always thought of his stuff as being a solid and reliable source to go to for basic facts.

posted 03-22-2005 05:32 PM                    

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Very technical but fascinating reference book on Technicolor, March 6, 2003

Reviewer: Richard W. Haines (Croton-on-Hudson, New York United States) - See all my reviews

This is a very complex book with a lot of technical information, some of which I didn't understand. However, I did get the overall gist of the writer's arguement which is the Technicolor process was vastly superior to the Eastmancolor process that replaced it. I've seen some 16mm film collector prints in Technicolor which were gorgeous. One of them was "The Adventures of Robin Hood" which was beautiful. Rich and vibrant...it took my breath away. I also saw 16mm Technicolor prints of "North by Northwest" and "Singin' in the Rain" which were spectacular. Boy do I love Technicolor. You can actually buy these prints on ebay if you have a lot of money.

I can't believe Hollywood abandoned this process. It's hard to compare old Technicolor movies with current Eastmancolor films like "Minority Report" which is drained of color and looks terrible. Are current directors color blind? I guess most people have never seen a Technicolor print and don't know what they're missing...

This book is better than Fred Basten's "Glorious Technicolor" in that it details all the different processes that used dye transfer printing including Cinerama, Technirama, 3-D, VistaVision and CinemaScope. Basten's book only covers the 3 strip camera and pretty much ignores the fifties and sixties. This book lists every film that was printed in Technicolor and lists them in each category or process. My only complaint is that unlike the Basten book, there are no color pictures. There are a lot of technical diagrams though.

In Haines second book, "The Moviegoing Experience 1968-2001", he made the technical aspects of his subject a bit easier to understand but this book is still an excellent reference source.

Haines is also a film director and made a very interesting 'film noir' movie called "Unsavory Characters" which I saw on DVD. The color portions of that movie resembled a Technicolor film from the era so he seems to understand the aethetics of cinematography. I also saw his "Alien Space Avenger" on videotape. According to The Perfect Vision magazine, it was printed at the Technicolor lab in China!

I read that Technicolor dye transfer printing was revived a couple of years ago and used on "Rear Window" and "Apocalype Redux" but few people in Hollywood cared and it was shut down again. Shame on them!

There's no question that the author is the greatest champion of Technicolor and has made an impact on film history by chronicling the story. He's one of the most interesting writers and directors out there and I hope someone discovers him soon!

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Excellent follow up book to the author's Technicolor Movies, February 14, 2003

Reviewer: Richard W. Haines from Croton-on-Hudson, New York United States

I was able to read a special preview copy of this book which I borrowed from a friend. It's an excellent follow up to the author's other book, "Technicolor Movies" but is less technical and easier to understand. In the Technicolor book, Haines describes the fabulous process that brought the rich colors to the Golden Age of Hollywood. This book explains why Technicolor along with movie palaces, large screen cinemas, drive-ins and 70mm disappeared from 1968-2001.

I was quite surprised at the author's outlook. I had always read that 'New Hollywood' saved the movie business. According to Haines, they destroyed the moviegoing experience. There are charts showing weekly attendence declining as more and more R rated movies are produced and fewer G and PG films. I guess it makes sense because children can't get into R films and many adults don't like movies with graphic sex and violence. The lack of mainstream films forced the movie palaces to fold and large screen theaters to twin. I had no idea that Jerry Lewis was the first person to build multiplexes.

The chapters on the blacklist, counterculture, exploitation, sexploitation and blaxploitation are facinating and give a whole new perspective to these subjects. Haines is very critical of directors who use film for propoganda rather than entertainment. While he's opinionated, the book is well researched and he makes a good point about how too many message movies alienate a lot of viewers.

Haines also shows the corner cutting methods that theater owners used in reaction to declining attendence. He discusses platters which ruins the prints. I always wondered why new movies looked so scratchy after only a few days.

Haines also gives a history of home video and cable and how they affected exhibition. As home entertainment improved, cinemas got worse while ticket prices kept going up. Really interesting
trivia. It was news to me that 65 theaters were set up with video projectors in the fifties along with cable stations and pay per view boxes in the home. I thought all that stuff was new.

There is so much information in this book I'll have to re-read it. There's a chapter on videocassettes, laserdiscs and DVD. There's a history of revival theaters that played old movies and film collecting. I didn't know that so many people had projection rooms in their house to show Technicolor and Cinerama movies! The last chapter talks about digital projection and why it's inferior to film.

There's a section in the back of the book that lists all of the surviving movie palaces and drive-ins. It's worth owning a copy just for that! After reading this book, I want to go check them out.

One of the most interesting film books I ever read.

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posted 08-04-2005 10:13 AM                   

quote: Michael Coate

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Surely, someone, anyone, looked this book over before being sent to the printer.

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Surely PEOPLE are not sent to the printer! The correct form of that sentence would be...

Surely, someone, anyone, looked this book over before it was sent to the printer.

Sorry, Michael, couldn't resist.

As usual, great work on this review.

Cheers.