Meeting movies

the long version

""If I can show you why I feel as I do toward a certain film," writes Norman Holland, "perhaps you can try out my response for yourself and enrich your own." This book combines subtle readings of eight classic films with memories and associations that make it possible for both Holland and his readers to understand why he sees movies as he does. Meeting Movies offers interpretations of what's on the screen through the filter of personal memories." "Casablanca, for example, provides millions with a sense of satisfaction. Why? How did this movie about World War II satisfy an adolescent boy afraid of "not being a man," but too young to be in the military? How did such an outrageously sentimental film enable Holland (and many others) to deal with the scary state of the world in 1942 and, indeed, ever since?" "Meeting Movies poses such questions again and again. As a professor of literature and film, Holland feels compelled to interpret. Yet, beneath and beyond his intellectualizing, a variety of half-conscious personal considerations and recurring themes color his feelings and hence his interpretations. And this, he claims, is true for all of us."--Jacket.