ReFocus: The Films of Richard Linklater

Reviews / Votes

Linklater has quietly developed into one of his generation's most celebrated directors, and this excellent collection helps to explain why. Fittingly conceptually heterogeneous, its chapters offer innumerable fresh dialogues with key philosophical, aesthetic, and sociopolitical dimensions of the filmmaker's most feted and lesser-known work. A rich and rewarding text. -- James MacDowell, University of Warwick In this collection of essays, Wilkins and Vermeuelen showcase recent debates about, and interpretations of, the films of Richard Linklater, an Austin, Texas, auteur whose work has long walked a fine line between art cinema and Hollywood-friendly genre offerings. The best essays look at major stylistic issues across multiple films: for example Bruce Isaacs explores time in Linklater's films, and Christopher Holliday looks at Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly and their innovative mixture of Linklater's long take and smooth style meeting the discordant and sometimes syncopated rhythms of the Rotoshop animation process. Though Linklater still seems young and is identified with youth films, the book makes a case for a mature and deeply considered career. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty. -- K. M. Flanagan * CHOICE connect * In this collection of essays, Wilkins and Vermeulen showcase recent debates about, and interpretations of, the films of Richard Linklater, an Austin, Texas, auteur whose work has long walked a fine line between art cinema and Hollywood-friendly genre offerings. The best essays look at major stylistic issues across multiple films: for example Bruce Isaacs explores time in Linklater's films, and Christopher Holliday looks at Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly and their innovative mixture of Linklater's long take and smooth style meeting the discordant and sometimes syncopated rhythms of the Rotoshop animation process. Though Linklater still seems young and is identified with youth films, the book makes a case for a mature and deeply considered career. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty. -- K. M. Flanagan * CHOICE connect * Rather than trying to fit Linklater's filmmaking and its shifts between scales of production and variances in narrative, style and theme into a singular auteurist vision, this collection skillfully promotes the value of approaching artistic achievement from different perspectives. What emerges is a critically rich exploration of resemblance and relationality. -- Lucy Fife Donaldson, University of St Andrews