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Loading... Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex-Drugs-and-Rock 'N' Roll Generation…by Peter Biskind
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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. Rather too much gossip and trivia and not enough of his genuinely insightful interepretations of the radical shift in how movies were photographed and plotted in the 1960's. Especially annoying is his habit of referring to principals as "Bob" or "Tom" -- when, in fact, he has talked about several people with the same first name, so you're wondering, "which Bob is this?" This is especially irritating because he will introduce someone with both his or her names, but then, with no transitions, mention them again 100 pages later by their first names only. I hate it when I have to keep lreferring to the index to try to keep people straight. (  ) echaika | Sep 21, 2009 |  An interesting behind-the-scenes look at the making of movies that shaped my generation. (  ) KenBuddah | Aug 24, 2009 | A trashy, entertaining, and informative read that shifts all over the place, moving from analysis of key films to anecdotes about which actor and/or director was doing what drug and sleeping with who. (  ) mikeandsarahlibrary | Aug 8, 2009 | Biskind wrote a wonderful history of the major filmmakers of the 1970's, where coke flowed like magical candy, and films were made that shaped the face of film forever. Though the book is ultimately very depressing, it's also amazing to read about the relationships of the 1970's. Amazing book, recommended for everyone that has a desire for film history, but a fair warning: it lags pretty hard in the middle. (  ) Kunzelman | Jul 8, 2009 | alles, was sich lohnt über die 70er in der US-Filmproduktion zu wissen (sendet mehr Lilaque-Vasen auf die Philippinen für Coppola...) ( ) moricsala | Nov 27, 2007 |  no reviews | add a review
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Biskind did hundreds of interviews with people who make the president look accessible: Scorsese, Spielberg, Lucas, Coppola, Geffen, Beatty, Kael, Towne, Altman. He also spoke with countless spurned spouses and burned partners, alleged victims of assault by knife, pistol, and bodily fluids. Rather more responsible than some of his sources, Biskind always carefully notes the denials as well as the astounding stories he has compiled. He tells you about Scorsese running naked down Mulholland Drive after his girlfriend, crying, "Don't leave me!"; grave robbing on the set of Apocalypse Now; Faye Dunaway apparently flinging urine in Roman Polanski's face while filming Chinatown; Michael O'Donoghue's LSD-fueled swan dive onto a patio; Coppola's mad plan for a 10-hour film of Goethe's Elective Affinities in 3-D; the ocean suicide attempt Hal "Captain Wacky" Ashby gave up when he couldn't find a swimsuit that pleased him; countless dalliances with porn stars; Russian roulette games and psychotherapy sessions in hot tubs. But he also soberly gives both sides ample chance to testify.
Easy Riders, Raging Bulls is also more than a fistful of dazzling anecdotes. Methodically, as thrillingly as a movie attorney, Biskind builds the case that Hollywood was revived by wild ones who then betrayed their own dreams, slit their own throats, and destroyed an art form by producing that mindless, inhuman modern behemoth, the blockbuster.
When Spielberg was making the first true blockbuster, Jaws, he sneaked Lucas in one day when nobody was around, got him to put his head in the shark's mechanical mouth, and closed the shark's mouth on him. The gizmo broke and got stuck, but the two young men somehow extricated Lucas's head and hightailed it like Tom and Huck. As Peter Biskind's scathing, funny, wise book demonstrates, they only thought they had escaped. --Tim Appelo
(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:57:56 -0400)
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