Last month brought a very pleasant
surprised encounter. A young New York based author who has read my previous
reviews on Amazon approached me with his book, a recently published
comprehensive study of Woody Allen’s work. The young man introduced himself as
Alex Sheremet. As it turned out, he was my former fellow countryman. We come
from the same town, Gomel, which means we were brushed by the same national
tragedy, the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl. Having spent most of his life in the US, understandably,
he doesn’t dwell on his late-Soviet childhood. He has a very fresh and unique
view of life and culture in New York. I invite you to check out his website.
This is my review of his book on Amazon.
Authored by an extremely brainy and precocious
20-something year old, Reel to Real
is not a book to be gulped in one sitting. It's not the sort of editorial fast
food that goes down easy. Many contemporary film critics and biographers have a
background in arts & entertainment journalism and tailor their style to fit
the readers' short attention span. I believe that the upper echelon of
"lay" readership will enjoy the book, but the core audience is made
up of film students and historians. Given the meaty, dense content of the book,
I would like to see it in paperback format. I would also like to see stills
from the actual films referenced in the text as well as candid shots from the
sets. You really need images to fortify a comprehensive study of Woody Allen's
work. In a perfect world, this book would be picked up and reissued by a larger
publisher that specializes in illustrated biographies.
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