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Barry Forshaw's Top Book Recommendations
Want to know what books Barry Forshaw recommends on their reading list? We've researched interviews, social media posts, podcasts, and articles to build a comprehensive list of Barry Forshaw's favorite book recommendations of all time.
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Enter the world of film noir, a world of darkness, ambiguity, and moral corruption. Meet the cynical and obsessive heroes of film noir portrayed by actors like Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre, James Cageny, Joan Crawford, and Bette Davis. You may encounter a gun-toting gangster, a femme fatale wrapped in fur, a detective with the brim of his hat turned down, or a desperate murderer lurking in the shadows of a doorway. It's a world we all know - the seedy underbelly of the American Dream, and every bit as much a part of our culture.
This wonderfully exhaustive text - tallying more than... more
This wonderfully exhaustive text - tallying more than... more
Recommended by Barry Forshaw, and 1 others. 2
This BFI Screen Guide provides an accessible, richly-illustrated introduction to 100 key noir films, from Hollywood classics such as Double Indemnity to more recent titles such as Sin City, as well as examples from Europe, Japan, India and Mexico, together with an editorial overview of the genre and its key debates. less
Recommended by Barry Forshaw, and 1 others. 3
Crime movies are as old as filmmaking itself. They embody the American nightmare, functioning both as a mirror of society and a tool for educating the public about its enemies. In this history of the genre Carlos Clarens gives us a mini-history of crime American-style. From D. W. Griffith and New York's Biograph Studios, where raw violence was introduced to celluloid immortality, to today's multimillion-dollar celebrations of blood and power, Crime Movies shows us the whole picture: the unchanging cast of characters (the gangster hero, swaggering, charming, suspicious; the... more
Recommended by Barry Forshaw, and 1 others. 4
From dimly lit streets and glamorous apartments to world-weary detectives and irresistible femmes fatales, The Rough Guide to Film Noir illuminates every corner of cinema's darkest and most compelling genre. From early masterpieces like Double Indemnity and Kiss Me Deadly through to neo-noir classics such as Chinatown and LA Confidential, this book highlights all the groundbreaking noir movies. There are profiles of legendary performers such as Humphrey Bogart and Barbara Stanwyck, great directors like Fritz Lang plus key cinematographers, composers and designers. Complete with website... more
Recommended by Barry Forshaw, and 1 others. 5
"The American Cinema is the Citizen Kane of film criticism, a brilliant book that elevated American directors from craftsmen to artists, launched the careers of numerous film critics, and shaped the aesthetics of a whole generation of viewers by providing new ways of looking at movies."--Emanuel Levy, author of George Cukor, Master of Elegance
The auteur theory, of which film critic Andrew Sarris was the leading American proponent, holds that artistry in cinema can be largely attributed to film directors, who, while often working against the... more
The auteur theory, of which film critic Andrew Sarris was the leading American proponent, holds that artistry in cinema can be largely attributed to film directors, who, while often working against the... more
Recommended by Barry Forshaw, and 1 others. Barry ForshawFilm noir is a genre that had no definition in its own day other than ‘crime film’. All of those who were making films noirs, such as Robert Mitchum and similar great stars and directors of that era, wouldn’t have called what they were working on film noir. They were making crime movies and dramas. So, the title ‘film noir’ defines the moment when we started to take such films seriously and it... (Source)
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