Peter Bogdanovich is an American film historian, director, writer, actor and critic. He was part of the wave of "New Hollywood" directors (which included William Friedkin, Brian DePalma, George Lucas, Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Michael Cimino and Francis Ford Coppola, among others), and was particularly relevant during the 1970s with his film The Last Picture Show.
One of two or three leading authorities on American film, Peter Bogdanovich writes with intelligence and humour. Pieces of Time; title taken from a comment by Jimmy Stewart, is everything you'd expect from the movie savant. Articles taken from previous magazine publications and mostly written in the 60's and 70's, the book is a little down on the films of that time, which from the perspective of 2013 is easy to disagree with, but the book is about passion and love for one of the great American art forms. Great stuff!
Great collection of his esquire writings that are informative and interesting and entertaining. One caution: if you already have his actors and directors books then this is not worth getting since those were reworkings and updatings of these pieces.
A very entertaining collection of early pieces about movies and movie people by a young Peter Bogdanovich. If you love movies and know something, even a little, about them, you'll enjoy this book.
Bogdanovich is an interesting reviewer/interviewer/interviewee on TV and DVDs. But he has an annoying quality on camera which doesn't show up in his writing at all. It borders on pretentiousness in my view, but he's still very humorous and likeable. That he is quite knowledgeable about 1930s films is not open to question. I found these essays about directors, films, etc. most enjoyable and will be putting this book in the To Keep pile.
Purchased and read this at about the time I was reviewing movies for a newspaper (1974-75). Good stuff! Helps you appreciate old-time Hollywood and understand PB's influences. I think much (or all) was previously published in Esquire, which I was reading about that time