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Title: Book Review: Shock Masters of the Cinema Post by: Menard on January 24, 2005, 07:26:02 AM Shock Masters of the Cinema
Author: Loris Curci First American Edition 1996 Published by Fantasma Books 152 pages Roughly 6x9 Paperback MSRP $19.95 SHOCK MASTERS OF THE CINEMA is a collection of twenty-six interviews conducted by Loris Curci or via proxy for a very few. Although the back cover touts interviews with ' The World's Greatest Horror Filmmakers and Celebrities...', some of the personalities interviewed, very few though, stretch this claim. One such interview which does have one wondering why it is in this volume is with Anthony Timpone, editor of Fangoria magazine. Being that Loris Curci has written for Fangoria probably explains the self-postulating and self-promoting review given by Timpone, which erroneously declares Fangoria magazine to have been the first horror movie magazine. Of course this error could have been in the editing of the book which does suffer. SHOCK MASTERS OF THE CINEMA does suffer from problems in its editing and publication. In order to apparently fit this many interviews into such a compact volume, most of the interviews are relatively short. Where some interviews are hurt is in the editing of the responses. For the most part this works fine, but in some instances the responses have been turned into an incomprehensible mess. The book is additionally hindered by many misspellings, grammatical errors, and poor typesetting. Despite its problems, SHOCK MASTERS OF THE CINEMA does provide entertainment from the reviews as well informative insights within the personalities represented, which are: Dario Argento, Peter Atkins, Mariano Baino, Kenneth Branagh, Jorg Buttgereit, Ramsey Campbell, John Carpenter, Jeffrey Combs, Don Coscarelli, Wes Craven, Robert Englund, Freddie Francis, Lucio Fulci, Frank Henenlotter, Steve Johnson, Lloyd Kaufman, William Lustig, Bill Malone, Antonio Margheriti, David Price, Jean Rollin, George Romero, Dardano Sacchetti, Angus Scrimm, Sergio Stivaletti, and Anthony Timpone. As a whole, despite some useful interviews, I find myself unable to recommend SHOCK MASTERS OF THE CINEMA as I would certainly hope for more from a book published at $19.95. If a used copy were available for a few dollars, that would be worth it, but better can be found in the current crop, and old, of horror cinema magazines. Post Edited (01-24-05 06:34) |