Tony Earnshaw’s latest book, ‘Fantastique’, brings together a collection of interviews with key movers and shakers from the worlds of science-fiction and horror…
As journalist, reviewer and broadcaster Tony Earnshaw notes in the introduction to his latest tome – Fantastique – the art of film-making has changed a lot over the years. But he also notes that the act of covering film-making has changed as well. The cinema industry has switched its allegiances and efforts to often fly-by-night blogs rather than with the longer-term, veteran critics. Perhaps that’s the natural order of things, but there’s little doubt that he is right that context, experience and a broad knowledge of the medium has largely been sacrificed at the altar of quick stunt promotions and those eager to get their names on a poster by providing avenues for pre-approved copy.
Fantastique comes from a different time when critics like Earnshaw (and, with fair disclosure, those like myself and others who also came into the business in the early 1990s or before) were able to work their way up through the ranks with genuine effort and a feeling that we were working WITH the industry rather than at its pleasure. In being so, the interviews and coverage between the book’s 400+ pages go much deeper than cursory magazine pieces or twitter-length opinions that now dominate proceedings. Most of the thirty entries get between ten to twenty pages of tightly-formatted insight from those key to the success of milestone projects. Writers, directors, producers and actors talk about their decisions and their opinions of the finished result. In most cases this is people speaking in the moment, during production or promotion of their projects, with details fresh in their minds. While hindsight and history sometimes paints a different picture of the result (for better or worse), this is a book that deliberately and carefully goes to the source of their original intent.
The list of people that the author has spoken to is expansive. Some are mainstream and household names – the likes of tentpole innovators such as George Lucas, George A. Romero, Terry Gilliam and Peter Jackson. Others will be known to older readers for their equal and ground-breaking contributions… think Danny Boyle, Dean Devlin, Barry Sonnenfeld and Edgar Wright. There’s also contributions from sometimes divisive auteurs such as Eli Roth, Luc Besson, M.Night Shyamalan and Quentin Tarantino.
Perhaps the only criticism, or observation, is that the expansive content covers so many different areas of what could be described as ‘the fantastique’ that there isn’t a distinct central hub around which to pivot. Many of the interviews and quotes are fascinating in their own right, a clear insight into the work-ethics and decision-making process of key movers and shakers of the last two decades and beyond. But, as the cover montage suggests, there’s such a vast range that the genre description can focus upon, that the book bounces from one aspect to another, through the years and different approaches: quantum-leaping from Stargate to The Exorcist, from Star Wars: The Phantom Menace to The Descent… all interesting in their own right, but also very different from each other. That is both a positive and negative, but the result makes a fascinating, varied landscape to wander through at your leisure.
Officially launched in May, Fantastique is already available to order through Amazon and published by BearManor Press.
Recommended.
