Thumbs up for this filmmaker’s collection of postcards from the edge.
From Cannes to the Far East, author Zarchy, a professional cinematographer, tells of exotic places and people he has met (and sometimes filmed) in his international career.
Subtitled “Tales of Filming From Bombay to Brazil,” this work is a roving anthology of reminiscences, presented roughly in reverse chronological order by Zarchy, a San Francisco–based professional cinematographer, primarily for corporate PR, advertising and scientific-industrial films. Star-struck movie fans will have to wait until late in the book for the gossip about diva starlets, tyrannical directors or alternate endings even though journeyman Zarchy has worked for Morgan Freeman’s production company. Travel-style vignettes (most previously published in trade journals, newspapers, blogs and the Chicken Soup for the Soul series), with an emphasis on cultures of Asia and the Far East, fill the book. The title essay refers to an impromptu bowling tournament with clients in Tokyo: Normally reserved Japanese business people loosened up and showed their emotions while Team Zarchy was distracted by the surreal fiasco of the 2000 presidential elections back home. On a road trip between Mumbai and Pune, India, the American film crew used dark humor to cope with the poverty and squalor surrounding them. In Shenyang, on assignment for a Dutch company, the San Franciscan discovered a Filipino band doing 1980s pop-song covers in a Bavarian-themed Chinese dive—true globalization. Not all the shoots are in such far-flung venues; Zarchy made promotional videos around the U.S. for Apple and a “prickly” Steve Jobs (including the opening of the very first Apple store, which, Zarchy reminds us, Business Week predicted would be a resounding retail failure), and he bonded with Bill Clinton while doing an Emmy-winning White House special. TMZ followers might be sated by a long, penultimate chapter in which the author recalls his near “big break” in mainstream entertainment as a novice director doing preproduction in the Philippines for a low-budget Japanese sci-fi film, engendering friendship and loyalty from his motley collaborators even as the financing fell through. In contrast to many movie-insider tell-alls, Zarchy’s congenial voice is never mean-spirited or score-settling, and one is glad to be on his crew. He’ll eat lunch in this town/world again. Likely sushi or sashimi.
Thumbs up for this filmmaker’s collection of postcards from the edge.Pub Date: Nov. 20, 2013
ISBN: 978-0984919109
Page Count: 216
Publisher: Roving Camera Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 17, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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