From Booklist
Like everything else ever associated with Hollywood, it seems, this book overstates its importance. The
greatest stories ever filmed? When some of the films whose inspirations appear herein are
Saturday Night Fever,
Hellraiser, and
Rollerball--not exactly your celluloid classics--that superlative's pretty hard to swallow. On the other hand, the stories are often better than the films based on them: good as they are, John Huston's films
The Man Who Would Be King and
The Dead cannot quite touch the masterpieces by Kipling and Joyce, respectively, that inspired them. So, all in all, and with such additional contents as Philip Van Doren Stern's "Greatest Gift" (source of
It's a Wonderful Life), Christopher Isherwood's "Sally Bowles" (
Cabaret), and "The Tin Star" (
High Noon) by John M. Cunningham (who?), this a short story anthology that will satisfy filmgoer curiosity and reading enjoyment in equal measures.
Ray Olson
