One can appreciation the idea behind Ronald Schwartz’s Houses of Noir: Dark Visions from Thirteen Film Studios without doing the same for the execution.

That idea is simple: Pick the best example of film noir from each studio in play of that golden era, and discuss it. Granted, this mean the work is driven by the author’s subjectivity — no problem there. What ultimately makes the McFarland & Company paperback lacking of substance is what passes for discussion and criticism.

Schwartz, a New York film professor, has great taste. For his baker’s dozen of bullets, broads and blackmail, he’s selected some excellent movies, including Charles Vidor’s Gilda, starring Rita Hayworth at her va-va-voomiest; Edgar G. Ulmer’s cheapie Detour; and Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity, certifiable classic.

I hope you’ve seen them, because should you choose to read the book, you’re given lengthy, detailed, beat-by-beat plot summaries of each. What’s the point? Following each summary is a list of the film’s main actors, each of whom is presented with a list of other notable titles from his or her filmography. What’s the point? More futility lay ahead, as Schwartz closes each chapter by describing each photograph. What’s the point?

Far better books from earlier this year tackle the same subject. Spend your ever-valuable time and money on David J. Hogan’s Film Noir FAQ or John Grant’s A Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Film Noir instead. —Rod Lott

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Early in last year’s Alfred Hitchcock biopic (Hitchcock, natch), a reporter asks the master of suspense, “You’ve directed 46 motion pictures. You’re the most famous director in the history of the medium. But you’re 60 years old. Shouldn’t you just quit while you’re ahead?”

Greydon Clark had nothing to do with Hitchcock, but I was reminded of that scene throughout his autobiography, On the Cheap: My Life in Low Budget Filmmaking, because it’s rife with that kind of quick-draw, big-picture exposition.

The reason? Clark chose to write On the Cheap in the format of a screenplay. That means rat-a-tat-tat dialogue and lightning-fast transitions — in other words, the kind of efficient storytelling the writer/director has near perfected in a career of B movies. Those attuned to the unique rhythms and pleasures of such films as Satan’s Cheerleaders, Black Shampoo and Without Warning will get it. All others have a lot of catching up to do — don’t worry, it won’t hurt. Much.

The speed doesn’t mean readers will be short-shrifted. At almost 300 pages, the paperback takes us through Clark’s work chronologically, film by film. No time is wasted on his childhood and upbringing, because he knows no one cares about that. They want to know behind-the-scenes stories on movies, dammit! And throw in some tits while you’re at it, why don’t ya?

Clark delivers by jumping right in, starting with working for Al Adamson. The author holds little love for the schlock titan, but it yields the first of On the Cheap‘s great stories, from the set of 1970’s Hell’s Bloody Devils, when Clark was ordered to convince a cameoing Col. Sanders (of Kentucky Fried Chicken fame) to say a line he refused to say: “Ain’t that chicken finger-lickin’ good.”

There are dozens more irresistible anecdotes, from Martin Landau backing out of the horror spoof Wacko because of a lack of humor to how Robert Englund accidentally got cast as a man and a woman in 1992’s Dance Macabre, a Russian ballet thriller (!) backed by Menahem Golan, formerly one-half of Cannon Films. In fact, Golan’s craziness leads to the book’s funniest part: the entire chapter on The Forbidden Dance, one of three movies rushing to be first to cash in on the short-lived Lambada dance craze.

Clark’s own humor stops when it comes to two of his movies being featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000: Angels’ Brigade and Final Justice; that he doesn’t like that scenes were cut suggests he doesn’t quite get what the show is all about. Still, I came away from On the Cheap with a great deal of respect for Clark, both for mortgaging his home (more than once) to get his movies made and for being screwed over by shady distributors (also more than once) when he should have earned a windfall. One wishes the industry hadn’t changed so wildly as it has, so that Clark could continue the work he’s left behind since 1998.

One last note: In typical ballyhoo fashion of the Bs, the back cover’s trumpeting of “Over 150 Color Photos” should be taken with a lowering of expectations, as small snapshots are crammed onto collage-style pages. On the other hand, praise be to Eddy Crosby for the incredible, ever-colorful front cover. —Rod Lott

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To call Roberto Curti’s book an Italian Crime Filmography, 1968-1980 is to do it a bit of disservice. Yes, the McFarland & Company trade paperback qualifies as a reference book, but by definition, a “filmography” is merely a list, and this is far more than that.

Across a heavy 332 pages, the Italian film critic Curti covers a lot of Eurocrime ground from the country shaped famously like a boot: 13 years worth, to be exact, from 1968 to 1980. Such movies existed before the earlier date, of course, but the author pinpoints that year as the beginning of the subgenre’s peak period, due both to real-life political events and the financial wane of the almighty spaghetti Western.

An introduction addresses the Italian crime pictures before ’68 at the book’s opening and then the ones after ’80 near the book’s end. These bookends provide nice context and closure, but it’s the meat between that really matters.

Here, going year by year — and then alphabetically within those — Curti runs through a good 220 or so films. A cursory plot summary merits a mercifully brief paragraph before a full piece that doubles as essay and review, and this is why “filmography” doesn’t cut it. Curti offers incredible insight and credible criticism throughout, and reading his book is like gaining additional perspective on the titles you’ve seen and compiling recommendations on those you haven’t … yet.

Per McFarland’s usual treatment of film books, poster art and still photos are hardly in short supply. Bravo! —Rod Lott

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It’s amazing how often publishers put superlatives like “ultimate” or “best” in the titles of nonfiction works that don’t merit such use. John Grant’s A Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Film Noir: The Essential Reference Guide dares to have two, but damn if it doesn’t fulfill them.

From Limelight Editions, this weighty hardcover — nearly five pounds, nearly 800 pages — has “Christmas gift” written all over it for the film fan on your list. (Or “Hanukkah gift” if he/she is Jewish.) And after the holidays pass, consider it for yourself with any cash or gift card balance you may acquire.

Pay note to one more word in the title: “encyclopedia.” It is that; in other words, the book is not meant to be read cover to cover, although you sure could. Approximately 3,250 movies are covered, with each entry being built on the base information (year, country, key talent), a brief plot summary (minus spoilers) and briefer bits of criticism. On occasion — say, with a Citizen Kane or your Vertigo — Grant extends the usual paragraph or two into a mini-essay; more opinion and background material are included when this occurs.

If picky readers are to have a problem with A Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Film Noir, it’s going to be with the author’s loose definition of the subject. He acknowledges this in his introduction, and one need only flip open to nearly any spread to see the kind of films whose presence may raise an eyebrow. A mere random sampling: the glitzy Whitney Houston assassination vehicle The Bodyguard, the hyperkinetic visual feast known as Germany’s Run Lola Run, the Zucker/Abrahams/Zucker broad comedy Ruthless People. To those who may be upset, I say, “Calm down, Tex. It’s not like your Double Indemnity has been kicked out because of it.”

Besides, any film noir text that doesn’t think twice about including the likes of Ray Dennis Steckler (Body Fever) and Ed Wood (The Sinister Urge) is one after my own heart. —Rod Lott

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That Richard Connell’s 1924 short story “The Most Dangerous Game” has spawned so many adaptations and knock-offs is hardly surprising; the premise is simple and easy to, um, execute. What is more notable is how a wide a berth those resulting films cast, in terms of genres. Straight-ahead action/adventure takes aside, they include sexploitation, science fiction and even pratfall-fueled comedy.

Whatever form — official to plagiarising, well-known to obscure, excellent to awful — the movies are all rounded up in The Most Dangerous Cinema: People Hunting People on Film, Bryan Senn’s book-length journey into the meaty, man-vs.-man subgenre.

For the core of the McFarland & Company paperback, 14 theatrical efforts are examined at length, including the classic 1932 adaptation; John Woo’s Jean-Claude Van Dame vehicle, Hard Target; and Cannon Films’ awesomely named Avenging Force, with stops at everything from quasi-porn (The Suckers) to Z-level director Ted V. Mikels (War Cat) along the way. In these chapters, Senn not only encapsulates each film, but reviews it, delves into its production and, of course, details its similarities to and differences from the source material, whether or not Connell’s name shows up in the credits (which it hardly does).

But, wait, cries the pitchman, there’s more! No less enjoyable chapters take in dozens and dozens more titles that fall into the categories of flicks that went direct-to-video, that draw a little inspiration without being outright adaptations, that substitute aliens for humans, that televise these sick games and that aren’t flicks at all, but episodes of TV series. Throughout these sections, you’ll find everything from Arnold Schwarzenegger’s blockbuster The Running Man to two episodes of the long-running Fantasy Island and an equal number of Jess Franco pics, one of which is somehow decidedly more pervy than the other.

The sheer amount of viewing hours is undeniable, and somehow Senn’s work never grows repetitive, despite essentially trodding the same story over and over. The Most Dangerous Cinema is the year’s entertainment title I didn’t know I wanted, and I feel that the more adventurous film buffs will agree.

So go get it. I’ll even give you a head start. —Rod Lott

Read our reviews of Most Dangerous Cinema movies:
• Countess Perverse (1974)
• The Most Dangerous Game (1932)
• The Suckers (1972)
• Surviving the Game (1994)

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