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The Encyclopedia of Stanley Kubrick
Surveys the director's life and career with information on his films, key people in his life, technical information, themes, locations, and film theory.
- GenresFilmNonfiction
422 pages, Hardcover
First published June 1, 2002
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 24, 2019
Well, why not?
Bronx-born Stanley Kubrick spent much of his professional life in England where he made some of the most controversial and original films ever to grace the silver screen. This uneven but fascinating book is in a sense a tribute to the man and his work. This is not the first encyclopedic treatment of a top movie director published by Facts on File--they have also done Alfred Hitchcock and Orson Welles. Perhaps this format--an "encyclopedia"--will catch on. At any rate, it is fun to leaf through randomly or perhaps one could actually proceed alphabetically.
The entries of course all have some connection with Kubrick. Included are actors who played in his movies, and people related to him and his friends and other people he worked with. There are also entries on movie business phenomena like "antiwar themes" and "censorship." There is an interesting entry on Steven Spielberg's Artificial Intelligence (2001) in which I learned that the original conception came from Kubrick. There are a number of black and white photos spread throughout the text and some line drawings, mostly of Kubrick and the actors who played in his films. Often the photos are stills from the movies. It is interesting to see Kubrick at various stages of his career and how time changed his appearance. My favorite photo is of George C. Scott and Stanley Kubrick playing chess on the set of Dr. Strangelove underneath the "War Room" mock up. By the way, Scott is reported to have gained respect for the younger Kubrick when Kubrick beat him at chess.
There is rather a lot of repetition in the entries, some of it unavoidable of course because entries overlap in content. However the entry for Sue Lyon, for example, who was Kubrick's Lolita, contains a summary of the plot of Lolita to the exclusion of the rather sparse information about Lyon. Also the editing and proofreading of the entries is not first rate. The text was begun by Rodney Hill and then taken up by Gene D. Phillips, which may account for some of the avoidable repetition. Some of the entries were written by John C. Tibbetts and others tagged with initials and identified as "Contributors" near the back of the book.
Clearly the strength of the book is in the light it sheds on Stanley Kubrick and his life in film. The detail is fascinating and the writing, in spite of the repetitions, is engaging. There are nice pieces on George C. Scott, James Mason, Peter Sellers, Malcolm McDowell, Nicole Kidman, Shelley Winters, Arthur C. Clarke, etc. as well as essays on all of Kubrick movies. Included are behind the scenes information about what went on during the shooting of the films, how the films were conceived and how they progressed. I was intrigued to learn that Kubrick was able to get a fine performance from the otherwise undistinguished Sue Lyon partly because he sometimes allowed her to use her own vernacular instead of words from the script. Also interesting was the difficulties that Shelley Winters experienced (from her viewpoint!) in working with James Mason and Peter Sellers in Lolita (1962). The relationship between Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, who wrote the novel 2001: A Space Odyssey and worked with Kubrick on the screenplay for the film, is interesting to follow. One realizes again that at the base of Kubrick's film creations is an abiding interest in science and human psychology.
Bottom line: an irresistible companion to the films of Stanley Kubrick, one of cinema's greatest directors and one of my personal favorites.
--Dennis Littrell, author of the movie review book, “Cut to the Chaise Lounge, or I Can’t Believe I Swallowed the Remote!”
Bronx-born Stanley Kubrick spent much of his professional life in England where he made some of the most controversial and original films ever to grace the silver screen. This uneven but fascinating book is in a sense a tribute to the man and his work. This is not the first encyclopedic treatment of a top movie director published by Facts on File--they have also done Alfred Hitchcock and Orson Welles. Perhaps this format--an "encyclopedia"--will catch on. At any rate, it is fun to leaf through randomly or perhaps one could actually proceed alphabetically.
The entries of course all have some connection with Kubrick. Included are actors who played in his movies, and people related to him and his friends and other people he worked with. There are also entries on movie business phenomena like "antiwar themes" and "censorship." There is an interesting entry on Steven Spielberg's Artificial Intelligence (2001) in which I learned that the original conception came from Kubrick. There are a number of black and white photos spread throughout the text and some line drawings, mostly of Kubrick and the actors who played in his films. Often the photos are stills from the movies. It is interesting to see Kubrick at various stages of his career and how time changed his appearance. My favorite photo is of George C. Scott and Stanley Kubrick playing chess on the set of Dr. Strangelove underneath the "War Room" mock up. By the way, Scott is reported to have gained respect for the younger Kubrick when Kubrick beat him at chess.
There is rather a lot of repetition in the entries, some of it unavoidable of course because entries overlap in content. However the entry for Sue Lyon, for example, who was Kubrick's Lolita, contains a summary of the plot of Lolita to the exclusion of the rather sparse information about Lyon. Also the editing and proofreading of the entries is not first rate. The text was begun by Rodney Hill and then taken up by Gene D. Phillips, which may account for some of the avoidable repetition. Some of the entries were written by John C. Tibbetts and others tagged with initials and identified as "Contributors" near the back of the book.
Clearly the strength of the book is in the light it sheds on Stanley Kubrick and his life in film. The detail is fascinating and the writing, in spite of the repetitions, is engaging. There are nice pieces on George C. Scott, James Mason, Peter Sellers, Malcolm McDowell, Nicole Kidman, Shelley Winters, Arthur C. Clarke, etc. as well as essays on all of Kubrick movies. Included are behind the scenes information about what went on during the shooting of the films, how the films were conceived and how they progressed. I was intrigued to learn that Kubrick was able to get a fine performance from the otherwise undistinguished Sue Lyon partly because he sometimes allowed her to use her own vernacular instead of words from the script. Also interesting was the difficulties that Shelley Winters experienced (from her viewpoint!) in working with James Mason and Peter Sellers in Lolita (1962). The relationship between Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, who wrote the novel 2001: A Space Odyssey and worked with Kubrick on the screenplay for the film, is interesting to follow. One realizes again that at the base of Kubrick's film creations is an abiding interest in science and human psychology.
Bottom line: an irresistible companion to the films of Stanley Kubrick, one of cinema's greatest directors and one of my personal favorites.
--Dennis Littrell, author of the movie review book, “Cut to the Chaise Lounge, or I Can’t Believe I Swallowed the Remote!”
September 7, 2012
Fr. Gene Phillips is an old hand in Kubrick studies, and this Encyclopedia is a typical entry in his bibliography. Sad to say that Phillips spends MUCH more time summarizing plots than truly analyzing Kubrick's films, with the effect of padding out entries and repeating himself throughout. Just because James Mason starred in Lolita does not necessarily require a complete synopsis of its plot, esp when this was given for Peter Sellers, Sue Lyon, Vlad Nabokov, AND the film and novel themselves. Inessential addition to the Kubrick library.
November 18, 2015
Encyclopedia of Stanley Kubrick: From Day of the Fight to Eyes Wide Shut by Rodney Hill, Gene D. Phillips (Checkmark Books 2002)(791.430233) is an interesting compendium of the legendary director's film career. Though these entries scrutinize his works in exhaustive detail, I found the individual entries arising from a given film to be curiously repetitive rather than cumulative. Nevertheless it is an interesting collection of information about his body of work. My rating: 7/10, finished 10/24/12.
January 26, 2016
Un considerevole lavoro di ricerca organizzato per nomi in ordine alfabetico: informazioni su tutte le persone che hanno collaborato con Kubrick (biografia, altri film, dichiarazioni, ecc.), sui temi ricorrenti nelle sue opere (antimilitarismo, doppio, ecc.), sulle innovazioni tecniche usate (front-projection, steadicam, ecc.) e sui film diretti. Compilato in collaborazione con Katherina Kubrick Hobbs e la Kubrick Estate. Arricchito da una prefazione di Anthony Frewin e una nota conclusiva di Leon Vitali, presenta numerose fotografie per la maggior parte inedite, tratte dagli archivi Kubrick.
July 8, 2013
For lovers of film everywhere. As thorough and detailed as the title suggests, with intelligent and incisive analyses of every film in the Kubrick oeuvre as well as a treasure trove of information about everyone even remotely associated with the man and his work. Highly recommended
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September 27, 2007I haven't finished this one it is literally an encyclopedia - but its an excellent reference for any questions on kubrick
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews