Second Sight: The Selected Film Writing of Adam Mars-Jones

Description

The film review can be a little art form, not just a consumer guide, as this collection shows. Covering more than 30 years of film releases, celebrated critic Adam Mars-Jones guides us through the most entertaining, most appalling, most fantastic films of his viewing lifetime, interleaving his original film reviews with new insights and reflections. Mars-Jones answers the questions that no other book has even bothered to ask. What is Twister really about? How many Steven Spielbergs are there? (Spoiler: he counts thirteen). How many of them are worth anything? Who had the greatest slow-burn career in the movies. (Clue: he taught Montgomery Clift how to roll a cigarette.) Which science-fiction film features the most haunting use of slime? Funny, combative and revealing, Second Sight is a celebration of the art form that maintains the strongest hold on the modern imagination.

Adam Mars-Jones is Research Professor in Creative Writing at Goldsmiths, University of London. He was the first film reviewer for the Independent (1986-1997) and currently writes on film for the Times Literary Supplement. His books include the novels Pilcrow (2008) and Cedilla (2011), and the 2015 memoir Kid Gloves (2015).

"Just as he doesn't write reviews like anyone else, so it follows that Second Sight rejects the orthodoxy of the criticism collection. Though it draws from around three decades of work, predominantly at the Independent and the Times Literary Supplement, it is not merely a sheaf of disinterred cuttings. Its distinguishing feature is the abundant new material which links the pieces, evolving far beyond the function of connective tissue. The effect is rather as if a DJ's between-song patter had unexpectedly become as dynamic as the dancefloor-filling hits themselves. . . . Phrasing and analysis never fall below a level of shimmering fastidious excellence."-- "Sight and Sound" "Mars-Jones's Second Sight brings together reviews and essays written as a film reviewer for the Independent, the New Statesman, and, more recently, the Times Literary Supplement. The book alternates between these pieces and a running commentary with an element of memoir. Mars-Jones recalls atmospheric basement screenings in 1990s Soho, dictating his copy over the phone and the vicissitudes of working for different papers as the editorial winds changed. Formative movie-going experiences are evoked, recalling the memoirist mode of Kid Gloves, his book about his father. . . . A fine contribution to the tradition of intellectual film reviewing."-- "Times Literary Supplement" "Mars-Jones's Second Sight, a collection of film journalism from across thirty years, became an instant candidate for my desert island book."--Leo Robson "New Statesman, Books of the Year"