Report
The
Starr Report
(Public Affairs, Prima Publishing, Pocket
Books, the Internet). Starr's "bodice-ripper" (Doreen Carvajal, the New York
Times ) gets an A- from Entertainment Weekly and holds the No. 1 spot
on Amazon.com's paperback nonfiction best seller list. Critics everywhere treat
the legal document as if it were a literary creation but disagree on which
genre it falls into. Some find it squarely in the tradition of "the
nineteenth-century novel of adultery" (James Wood, the New Republic ).
Others call it a combination of "low-grade erotica," "bedroom farce,"
"detective pulp," and "courtroom drama" (L.S. Klepp, Entertainment
Weekly ). Harvard Professor Stephen Greenblatt calls the report a
"nonfiction novel" in the New York Times and finds its closest literary
antecedent in the writings of medieval inquisitors, in particular Kramer and
Sprengerr's Malleus Maleficarum . Adam Gopnik writes in The New
Yorker that Americans overwhelmingly side with Clinton because "a
scapegrace hero is always more appealing than a moralizing narrator." (Read the
Starr report here as a Web document or here as a
Microsoft Word document.)
Books
Bag
of Bones
, by Stephen King (Scribner). King's foray into the realm of
more literary fiction is met with so-so reviews. He writes compellingly about
the grief of main character Mike Noonan--a successful lowbrow writer who
experiences crippling writer's block after the death of his wife--and has a
"real genius ... for the everyday" (Daniel Mendelson, the New York Review of
Books ). The problem is that the mixing of this traditional story with
King's trademark bone-chilling horror results in a novel that straddles the two
genres somewhat awkwardly. (Listen to this Terry Gross interview with King.)
Model Behavior
, by Jay McInerney (Random House). McInerney's
latest rehash of Manhattan fast living is Bright Lights, Big City all
over again: Smart young man works at a magazine, dates a model, runs with a
debauched crowd, looks for meaning. Critics say the novel "wears a sort of
KICKME sign" (Walter Kirn, New York ) in its baldfaced self-plagiarism
and, worse, "it's never clear if we are meant to ridicule, pity, or envy" the
characters (A.O. Scott, the New York Times Book Review ). Ken Tucker
dissents in the Baltimore Sun , calling the book "one of [McInerney's]
most clever, funny, and moving ... a Great Gatsby for the end of the
century." (Read an excerpt from the book.)
Birds of America
, by Lorrie Moore (Knopf). The latest collection
of witty stories by Moore ( Self-Help , Who Will Run the Frog
Hospital? ) is hailed as "older, wiser, and less frivolous" (Erika Milvy,
the San Francisco Chronicle ) than her previous work. Moore is known for
her wordplay, wry humor, and smart, bitter female protagonists; this collection
is said to show a "deepening emotional chiaroscuro" (Michiko Kakutani, the
New York Times )--Moore's most warm and powerful to date. (Read the
first chapter.)
Movies
Rush Hour
(New Line Cinema). Martial arts maestro Jackie Chan and
rising-star comic Chris Tucker join up in a fun but overly formulaic action
comedy. The two follow the clichéd cop-buddy film trajectory (initial distrust
gives way to bonding) and, along the way, treat the audience to some great
action scenes and some not so great ethnic stereotypes. Tucker's hyperactive
antics make the film almost a "scamp minstrel show" (Owen Gleiberman,
Entertainment Weekly ), while Chan is the butt of infantile
Chinese-food-related jokes. Despite these handicaps, Chan's Buster Keaton-style
physical comedy and Tucker's fast-talking humor are said to be "raucously
entertaining" (Joe Leydon, Daily Variety ). (Read David Edelstein's
review in
Slate
. Watch clips of the fight scenes here.)
Permanent Midnight
(Artisan Entertainment). The critics are
split: Some find Ben Stiller's performance as a heroin-addicted TV writer
(based on Jerry Stahl's memoir of the same title) ferociously compelling, while
others find it hollow. Those in favor call the film "scorchingly funny"
(Michael O'Sullivan, the Washington Post ) and Stiller's performance
"rivetingly caustic" (Janet Maslin, the New York Times ). Those against
complain that the film is "a shallow tale told by an idiot" (Joe Morgenstern,
the Wall Street Journal ) and that Stiller's junkie character is too
thoroughly unappealing for the audience to ever root for him. (Find out more
about Stiller here.)
A
Soldier's Daughter Never Cries
(October Films). Critics laud
Merchant-Ivory's exit from the 19 th century in this adaptation of a
semiautobiographical novel by Kaylie Jones (daughter of novelist James Jones).
The film is an understated but moving depiction of the day to day existence of
an intelligent young woman growing up in France and later America and is
praised as having "captured something true about families and friendship"
(Kenneth Turan, the Los Angeles Times ). Kris Kristofferson's performance
as the novelist-father is called the best of his career. Detractors say the
film lacks any real sense of narrative continuity and feels like "bits and
pieces of half a dozen coming-of-age films" (Gleiberman, Entertainment
Weekly ).
Recent
"Summary Judgment" columns
Sept.
16:
Movie -- Rounders ;
Movie -- One True
Thing ;
Movie -- Simon
Birch ;
Movie -- Touch of
Evil ;
Book -- Anne
Frank by Melissa Muller;
Music -- Mechanical
Animals , by Marilyn Manson;
Music -- Teatro , by Willie Nelson.
Sept.
10:
Movie -- Without
Limits ;
Movie -- Knock
Off ;
Movie -- Next Stop
Wonderland ;
Death --Akira
Kurosawa;
Book--
The Professor
and the Madman , by Simon Winchester;
Book -- At Home in the World , by Joyce Maynard.
Sept.
2:
Movie -- Blade ;
Movie--
Why Do Fools
Fall in Love ;
Movie -- 54 ;
Book -- The Farming
of Bones , by Edwidge Danticat;
Music--
The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill , by Lauryn Hill.
Aug.
26:
Movie--
Dance With
Me ;
Movie -- Your Friends
& Neighbors ;
Movie -- Unmade
Beds ;
Television -- The
Rat
Pack (HBO);
Book -- The First
Eagle , by Tony Hillerman;
Book -- Summer of
Deliverance: A Memoir of Father and Son , by Christopher Dickey;
Book -- Kaaterskill
Falls , by Allegra Goodman.
--Eliza
Truitt
