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HUMANITIES 215 bound 'Jesus,' flanked by the heavily armoured Roman 'soldiers' (played by the two main actresses, Johanne-Marie Tremblay and Catherine Wilkening), and a number of poignant close-ups of the main players. Jesus de Montreal, then, is a fine concluding note to 'le cinema quebecois des annees So.' (B.-z. SHEK) Douglas Fetherling. The Crowded Darkness Quarry Press and Subway Books 1988. ii, 144. $12.95 paper In The Crowded Darkness Douglas Fetherling has recycled in book form a selection of his 1970s movie columns, largely on Hollywood films, from the Canadian Forum. Fetherling, however, as he makes clearin his preface, has here reprinted essentially social, not cinematic, criticism: discussing popular American films largely as 'diseased' exempla of American social and political values. And he takes care further to distance himself from popular film per se by telling us that his columns were written hastily, 'weeks' after seeing the movies concerned and 'as a break between other types of scribbling.' Certainly its detailed reflection of and commentary on contemporary social attitudes and beliefs is an important reason for studying American popular film. Moreover, Fetherling looks at some films (e.g., Godfather 1 and 2, Taxi Driver, Rocky 1) and some actors, screenwriters, and directors (e.g., De Niro, Scorsese, Coppola, Stallone) that demand consideration in the serious examination, from any perspective, of the popular cinema of the 1970s. But to deal with popular films largely as 'diseased' exempla of the dark 'empire' of America is a somewhat self-blinkering approach: minimizing the films themselves, and leading to such odd critical assessments as the statement that The Godfather 2 is 'about the American quest for the perfect tan.' It is easy to become irritated at Fetherling's putting down of Hollywood films, at the lack of interest in checking information (e.g., 'it was, I believe, in Goldfinger,' and 'the device used in the book, if I'm not mistaken'), at the seemingly thoughtless generalizations (New York, New York as offending at first viewing because 'unlike all other musicals, it is not happy.' Unlike Carousel? West Side Story? Cabaret?). For the sake of a clever putdown Fetherling can even ignore facts he himself has stated: as in his comment on Blue Collar, which he says is set in Detroit though in part filmed in Kalamazoo, that a character's seeing of a sign indicating a tunnel to Canada is 'not an easy feat from Kalamazoo ... which is about 200 miles from the border.' And the writing indeed shows journalistic haste: with sentences such as 'What has been obvious about Scorsese was that he has unusual street savvy.' Parts of The Crowded Darkness are also, given its social slant, predictably 216 LETTERS IN CANADA 1989 now dated. Nor do the collected columns give a real overview of the popular cinema ofthe 1970s. Missing, for example, are such popularfilms of major social significance as Dirty Harry, Apocalypse Now, Star Wars in any extended way (it gets, dismissively, one third ofa page), The Exorcist, anything by Spielberg. Nevertheless, any book based on the premise that contemporary popularfilm has somethingofvalue to offer us, if we viewit thoughtfully, is to be welcomed, and The Crowded Darkness should make its readers more aware, even ifinlimited ways, ofthe powerful connections between contemporary moral and political attitudes and the popular art that flickers before us on the multitudinous screens across North Americaand beyond. Fetherling also writes entertainingly, and the ideas come fast. Indeed, Fetherling's very omissions tell us something important about the necessarily partial vision of any immediately contemporary social/ cultural criticism. The point is ultimately as valuable as any particular social or political argument explicitly made in the text of the work itself. (ANNE LANCASHIRE) Claudia Oausius. The Gentleman Is a Tramp. Peter Lang. 194 Claudia Clausius's centennial exegesis ofChaplin's comedy grew outofa number of associations, direct and indirect, with the film program at the University of Toronto; and it would seem to be the most accomplished and valuable literary production of that program so far published. The present reviewer read the manuscript at an early stage, and feels no compulsion to disqualify himselffrom reviewing the book: withouta blue pencil in sight, what...

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