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Agee on Film #1-2
Agee on Film: Criticism and Comment on the Movies
"In my opinion, [Agee's] column is the most remarkable regular event in American journalism today."--W. H. Auden
James Agee was passionately involved with the movies throughout his life. A master of both fiction and nonfiction, he wrote about film in clean, smart prose as the reviewer for Time magazine and as a columnist for The Nation. Agee was particularly perceptive about the work of his friend John Huston and recognized the artistic merit of certain B films such as The Curse of the Cat People and other movies produced by Val Lewton.
James Agee was passionately involved with the movies throughout his life. A master of both fiction and nonfiction, he wrote about film in clean, smart prose as the reviewer for Time magazine and as a columnist for The Nation. Agee was particularly perceptive about the work of his friend John Huston and recognized the artistic merit of certain B films such as The Curse of the Cat People and other movies produced by Val Lewton.
496 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1960
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About the author
James Agee
102 books294 followersNoted American writer and critic James Rufus Agee collaborated with photographer Walker Evans on
Let Us Now Praise Famous Men
(1941), a bleak depiction of rural poverty and posthumously published his novel
A Death in the Family
(1957).
This author, journalist, poet, screenwriter in the 1940s most influenced films in the United States. His autobiographical work won a Pulitzer Prize.
Life
Born at Highland Avenue and 15th Street (renamed James Agee Street in 1999) to Hugh James Agee and Laura Whitman Tyler. When Agee was six years of age in 1915, his father died in an automobile accident. From the age of seven, he and his younger sister, Emma, were educated in boarding schools. The most influential of these was located near his mother's summer cottage two miles from Sewanee, Tennessee. Saint Andrews School for Mountain Boys was run by Episcopal monks affiliated with the Order of the Holy Cross, and it was there that Agee's lifelong friendship with an Episcopal priest, Father James Harold Flye, began in 1919. As Agee's close friend and spiritual confidant, Flye was the recipient of many of Agee's most revealing letters.
Agee went to Knoxville High School for the 1924–1925 school year, then travelled with Father Flye to Europe. On their return, Agee moved to boarding school in New Hampshire, entering the class of 1928 at Phillips Exeter Academy. There, he was president of The Lantern Club and editor of the Monthly where his first short stories, plays, poetry and articles were published. Agee was admitted to Harvard University's class of 1932. He was editor-in-chief of the Harvard Advocate.
In 1951 in Santa Barbara, Agee, a hard drinker and chain-smoker, suffered the first two in a series of heart attacks, which ultimately claimed his life four years later at the age of 45. He was buried on a farm he owned at Hillsdale, New York.
Career
After graduation, he wrote for Fortune and Time magazines, although he is better known for his later film criticism in The Nation. In 1934, he published his only volume of poetry, Permit Me Voyage.
In the summer of 1936, Agee spent eight weeks on assignment for Fortune with photographer Walker Evans living among sharecroppers in Alabama. Agee turned the material into a book entitled, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men (1941). It sold only 600 copies before being remaindered.
In 1942, Agee became the film critic for Time and, at one point, reviewed up to six films per week. Together, he and friend Whittaker Chambers ran "the back of the book" for Time. He left to become film critic for The Nation. In 1948, however, he quit both magazines to become a freelance writer. One of his assignments was a well-received article for Life Magazine about the great silent movie comedians, Charles Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd and Harry Langdon, which has been credited for reviving Keaton's career. As a freelance in the 1950s, he continued to write magazine articles while working on movie scripts, often with photographer Helen Levitt.
Agee was an ardent champion of Charlie Chaplin's then extremely unpopular film Monsieur Verdoux (1947), which has since become a film classic. He was also a great admirer of Laurence Olivier's Henry V and Hamlet, especially Henry V, for which he actually published three separate reviews, all of which have been printed in the collection Agee on Film.
Legacy
Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, ignored on its original publication in 1941, has been placed among the greatest literary works of the 20th Century by the New York School of Journalism and the New York Public Library.
This author, journalist, poet, screenwriter in the 1940s most influenced films in the United States. His autobiographical work won a Pulitzer Prize.
Life
Born at Highland Avenue and 15th Street (renamed James Agee Street in 1999) to Hugh James Agee and Laura Whitman Tyler. When Agee was six years of age in 1915, his father died in an automobile accident. From the age of seven, he and his younger sister, Emma, were educated in boarding schools. The most influential of these was located near his mother's summer cottage two miles from Sewanee, Tennessee. Saint Andrews School for Mountain Boys was run by Episcopal monks affiliated with the Order of the Holy Cross, and it was there that Agee's lifelong friendship with an Episcopal priest, Father James Harold Flye, began in 1919. As Agee's close friend and spiritual confidant, Flye was the recipient of many of Agee's most revealing letters.
Agee went to Knoxville High School for the 1924–1925 school year, then travelled with Father Flye to Europe. On their return, Agee moved to boarding school in New Hampshire, entering the class of 1928 at Phillips Exeter Academy. There, he was president of The Lantern Club and editor of the Monthly where his first short stories, plays, poetry and articles were published. Agee was admitted to Harvard University's class of 1932. He was editor-in-chief of the Harvard Advocate.
In 1951 in Santa Barbara, Agee, a hard drinker and chain-smoker, suffered the first two in a series of heart attacks, which ultimately claimed his life four years later at the age of 45. He was buried on a farm he owned at Hillsdale, New York.
Career
After graduation, he wrote for Fortune and Time magazines, although he is better known for his later film criticism in The Nation. In 1934, he published his only volume of poetry, Permit Me Voyage.
In the summer of 1936, Agee spent eight weeks on assignment for Fortune with photographer Walker Evans living among sharecroppers in Alabama. Agee turned the material into a book entitled, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men (1941). It sold only 600 copies before being remaindered.
In 1942, Agee became the film critic for Time and, at one point, reviewed up to six films per week. Together, he and friend Whittaker Chambers ran "the back of the book" for Time. He left to become film critic for The Nation. In 1948, however, he quit both magazines to become a freelance writer. One of his assignments was a well-received article for Life Magazine about the great silent movie comedians, Charles Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd and Harry Langdon, which has been credited for reviving Keaton's career. As a freelance in the 1950s, he continued to write magazine articles while working on movie scripts, often with photographer Helen Levitt.
Agee was an ardent champion of Charlie Chaplin's then extremely unpopular film Monsieur Verdoux (1947), which has since become a film classic. He was also a great admirer of Laurence Olivier's Henry V and Hamlet, especially Henry V, for which he actually published three separate reviews, all of which have been printed in the collection Agee on Film.
Legacy
Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, ignored on its original publication in 1941, has been placed among the greatest literary works of the 20th Century by the New York School of Journalism and the New York Public Library.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
December 12, 2022
I read this in high school after I read Agee's A Death in the Family. This book contains five movie scripts and has 488 pages. The forward is written by John Huston. One of the scripts is for The African Queen. I purchased this gem of a book for $2.75. The inside front cover is even signed by the high school me. I'm thinking I should watch The African Queen while reading the script just to see what changes were made during filming.
August 10, 2018
A smoothy, Agee's writing makes you forget that he really hasn't much to say, but he can keep you stuck in his honey pot. Most annoying, he influenced Pauline Kael by praising & smacking at same time. Example: "The loudest and most vulgar of the current musicals. It is also the most fun." (Thank Your Lucky Stars, 1943)
I'll pin Agee with a parody of himself: He was a good writer, but a blinkered critic. Let us now stop gushing over this famous man.
I'll pin Agee with a parody of himself: He was a good writer, but a blinkered critic. Let us now stop gushing over this famous man.
June 3, 2020
I was glad to read these 1940s reviews but I don't think this is a book I will keep in my collection. I like the fact that he covers both big hits and little B-movies, but as other readers have noted, he often praises and damns a movie at the same time; I understand the instinct, but this gets a little tiresome over the course of the entire book. He liked the more realistic war films and didn't like the cheaper flag-wavers, but aside from that, I was never quite clear what criteria he was using in judging most of these films. I ended up skimming sections of it. I know Agee is a well-regarded author, but for me, most of these magazine pieces don't quite stand the test of time.
September 12, 2019
Really only here for his article on Buster Keaton and the kings of silent comedy, which is a 5/5 in my book.
July 8, 2009
It's hard to go wrong with an early champion of Val Lewton, not to mention the screenwriter of Night of the Hunter. This book contains a superb essay on the comics of the silent era, as well as the hundreds of reviews Agee did for Time and the Nation during and shortly after WWII. There are quite a few war documentaries and movies that have long since disappeared, as well as an all too rare and beautiful appreciation of Theresa Wright's acting chops.
On a personal note, Agee often peppers his reviews with swipes at the psychobabble run wild, and its purveyors, unfortunately still running wild, in education. If only Lewton had made a film about those monsters.
I only wish Agee had lived longer. It would have been great to read his reviews of what came next, but I'll finish with one of the funnier digs at For Whom the Bell Tolls: "If you are not careful, you may easily get the impression that Gary Cooper is simply fighting for the Republican party in a place where the New Deal has got particularly out of hand."
On a personal note, Agee often peppers his reviews with swipes at the psychobabble run wild, and its purveyors, unfortunately still running wild, in education. If only Lewton had made a film about those monsters.
I only wish Agee had lived longer. It would have been great to read his reviews of what came next, but I'll finish with one of the funnier digs at For Whom the Bell Tolls: "If you are not careful, you may easily get the impression that Gary Cooper is simply fighting for the Republican party in a place where the New Deal has got particularly out of hand."
December 15, 2015
A collection of renaissance man James Agee's film reviews, including his famous essay on silent film comedians. Agee's inextinguishable hopes for the medium, his fixation with Hollywood's moral responsibility, his attention to technical prowess, and his incorrigible wit (eg. - MGM = "rigor artis") set the scene for the hip high-mindedness of future practitioners, from Kael to Thompson. And his perpetual plea for realism (he had been, after all, an investigative journalist) precluded the looser post-studio cinema born after his death.
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September 11, 2007My boss gave me this as a goodbye gift. He said he considers it one of the best books written about film.
Read
September 13, 2020This really great thing of my life. I am also read this a lot. Very learning base story. Here I am written about this
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 29, 2020
Very good film, and highly recommended !!!
redmovies
redmovies
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May 26, 2023The big liberal movie critic of his time. Couldn't possibly say the same things today, he would be cancelled so fast.
December 9, 2025
I think this is a really good book on film read it. Robert Towne was inspired by it.
July 4, 2010
James Agee was film critic for Time Magazine, as well as a columnist for The National during the bulk of the 1940s. Agee's thoughtful, engaged, and clear-sighted comments on all manner of films from that era (and before) make him one of the stand out film critics of all time.
Reading this collection of his columns and reviews, one develops a clear sense of Agee's preferred aesthetic: one that favors a poetic approach, a humanist portrayal, and a film that drives the audience to engage actively. His favorite filmmakers--John Huston, early Rene Clair, the Italian neo-realists, and most of all, Charlie Chaplin--embody this aesthetic preference to a tee.
Unfortunately for Agee, most of what Hollywood was releasing in the 1940s was not up to this lofty standard. Instead, the films catered to the lowest common denominator of audiences, spoon feeding rather than challenging. This pattern has continued today, making Agee's criticism a kind of prophetic voice from the past, one that calls for something better and something more lasting, from the movies.
Reading this collection of his columns and reviews, one develops a clear sense of Agee's preferred aesthetic: one that favors a poetic approach, a humanist portrayal, and a film that drives the audience to engage actively. His favorite filmmakers--John Huston, early Rene Clair, the Italian neo-realists, and most of all, Charlie Chaplin--embody this aesthetic preference to a tee.
Unfortunately for Agee, most of what Hollywood was releasing in the 1940s was not up to this lofty standard. Instead, the films catered to the lowest common denominator of audiences, spoon feeding rather than challenging. This pattern has continued today, making Agee's criticism a kind of prophetic voice from the past, one that calls for something better and something more lasting, from the movies.
June 20, 2008
At one time I owned a two volume set of Agee on Film. One was his criticism, the other is scripts. But yeah, Agee was probably one of the first great American film critic, who wrote for a national press. Always insightful, mostly inspirational (if you want to write on film), and sadly much missed in today's world of film writing.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews