Back in September, we gave one lucky reviewer a complimentary $50 gift voucher as thanks for posting their impressions up on our site. Well, now that October has rolled on by, it’s once again time to announce the winner of our latest monthly Review Competition. So let’s get into it!
I’m pleased to announce that our winner for October is…
*drumroll*
…Dub Rosa!
But don’t take our word for it. See for yourself! The full review is reproduced below:
Everything Is Cinema: The Working Life of Jean-Luc Godard
Richard Brody
Rating: 4/5
Richard Brody’s biography ‘Everything Is cinema’ is exactly as the full title suggests: it is more of chronological journey though the Nouvelle Vague film director’s working career via his filmography whether they be long, short or unfinished than a intimate biography. It is very comprehensive and, surprisingly, even takes the reader through his “revolutionary” Dziga-Vertov group and his late video and television periods which are so often forgotten in Godard analyses.
Brody has raised the ire of many Godard fans and students by heaping a little too much US specific material in his biography but it was fairly logical that this would occur in book by a writer for ‘The New Yorker’ magazine, plus Godard has always had a strong, but not often amicable, relationship with America and is very much worth exploring in detail.
Also up for heated debate amongst fans, critics and students is Brody’s supposed over-emphasis of Godard’s apparent Anti-Semitism. Personally I don’t think Godard is an Anti-Semite, especially in his later years. ‘Histoire(s) du cinema’ and many other films and video work of recent date are a clear testimony to the contrary. I do think Brody does draw a rather longbow in regards to Godard’s supposed right-wing associations in the 1950′s.
Overall, it is a wonderful accompanying volume to MacCabe’s 2002 biography and the excellent essay collection ‘For Ever Godard. Obviously, there can never be a definitive Godard biography – especially since Godard still produces more and more fascinating work to this date.
Recommended.
For their troubles, Dub Rosa will receive a $50 book voucher. Congratulations!
If you submitted a review this month, all of us here at TheNile.com.au would like to thank you. You are helping to make our site a better place – and getting a shot a collecting $50 worth of books in the process.
So next time you finish a book, post up your impressions. It’s simple, it’s easy and it doesn’t take long. And who knows? Maybe your review will be in the spotlight next month!
So get posting!
