- Paperback: 432 pages
- Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press; New edition edition (April 1999)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0801861926
- ISBN-13: 978-0801861925
- Product Dimensions: 23.4 x 15.5 x 2.9 cm
- Shipping Weight: 603 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #2,270,027 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon.com
Nowadays the "talkie" seems, like some other technological breakthroughs, to have obliterated its less-advanced predecessor, the silent movie, in one fell swoop. The reality, of course, is more complex. As Scott Eyman writes in his prologue to The Speed of Sound, "To examine this period of unparalleled industrial change, it is necessary to reverse the perspective, to give a fair, detailed idea of what silents were like to the people who made and watched them, and how talkies permanently changed the creative and personal equations." Eyman's eye-opening book fulfills this mission. He focuses on just five years--1926 through 1930--but tells the story on many levels. We learn about the technology, the details of actors' and technicians' lives, the elaborate business machinations associated with the rise of sound, and the resulting transformation of not just the movies but Hollywood itself. The Speed of Sound fills a gap in any film buff's library.
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
From Library Journal
The transformation of the movies from silent to talking pictures is a fascinating subject. For the serious film devotee, there is a profusion of information in Eyman's work (LJ 2/15/97), and narrator Adams Morgan moves it along briskly. There are moments when Eyman engrosses us in situations evoking the human face behind the events of this turbulent time, and legendary names such as Edison and Eastman, Griffith and Vidor, Fox and Warner, and Jolson and Barrymore emerge as vital personalities. Too often, however, we are subjected to a description of some technical innovation and are sidetracked by repetitious detail concerning frames per second, memos to projectionists, numbers of reels and discs, and directions for keeping equipment clean. Regrettably, the information is confusingly organized. For the general listener, it cannot be recommended.?Barbara Mann, Alelphi Univ., Garden City,
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
In New York, in the year of our Lord 1907, the horse-drawn cars on West Street, Chambers Street, and Canal Street and even the cable cars on Broadway were slowly being replaced by electric streetcars. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
In New York, in the year of our Lord 1907, the horse-drawn cars on West Street, Chambers Street, and Canal Street and even the cable cars on Broadway were slowly being replaced by electric streetcars. Read the first page
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Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Hollywood's turbulent era,
By
This review is from: The Speed of Sound: Hollywood and the Talkie Revolution 1926-1930 (Hardcover)
Scott Eyman's masterful research of the Talkie Revolution is a must-read for silent-film and early sound-film fans. He covers early unsuccessful sound-film attempts, some of the last great silent film classics like THE CROWD and SUNRISE, Warners' and Fox's different sound systems, and many other topics. The main scope of the book is the period from 1926-1930. The focus of the book is on how the business of filmmaking and the art of filmmaking was completely changed with the coming of the talking movie. Careers were born and destroyed overnight. Sometimes a performer's voice was a problem in sound films. In other cases, like John Gilbert's, the studio thought that he was too expensive and the type of film that was his forte became passe. For a couple of years, the sound-man was the most important person on a movie set.Eyeman's book is comprehensive, but not comprehensive enough. Curiously, he gives short shrift to some comedians like Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Raymond Griffith. Except for a brief mention of the British change-over, the book focuses exclusively on Hollywood studios. He covers all of the bases such as legal wrangling over patents, financial profits and losses, the problems that studio artists encountered in making sound films, and the many poor films that were produced in the early sound era. If you like classic films, you will love this book.
4.0 out of 5 stars
serious film history buffs only,
By
This review is from: The Speed of Sound: Hollywood and the Talkie Revolution 1926-1930 (Hardcover)
If you have a passing interest in this period, this is not for you. It is a very detailed -- often overdetailed -- history of the coming of the talkies. Everyone who writes on silents tends to overpraise them,and Eyman is no exception, but this is not a screed and not overly nostalgic, just a good revealing history of the the time.
5.0 out of 5 stars
ONE OF THE BEST FILM BOOKS EVER WRITTEN,
By anonymous (san francisco, ca United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Speed of Sound: Hollywood and the Talkie Revolution 1926-1930 (Hardcover)
You know you're dealing with a serious achievement when you read a book and can't conceive how one person was able to write it. Eyman does some amazing things in this book. He covers the BUSINESS side of the talkie revolution. He covers the TECHNOLOGICAL side of it. He covers the ARTISTIC side of it. And he covers the HUMAN side of it. Moreover, he does this in the context of a flowing narrative that drops some stories here and picks them up there, juggles one aspect with another; sets them aside, traces another development . . . without ever losing the flow, without ever losing the reader. I've read a lot of film books, and the skill and the intelligence of this one just amazed me. This is a dazzling piece of work, and it reads like a really good novel. I couldn't recommend a book more enthusiastically.
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