Review by C.J. Bunce
Turner Classic Movies/TCM enlisted long-time film critic Leonard Maltin and his daughter Jessie Maltin to share how a father got his daughter excited about movies in the hopes of getting a new generation to love movies, too. The result is TCM Family Movie Night Menus—Recipes & Films for Unforgettable Times Together (available for pre-order here at Amazon and coming to bookstores this week). The Maltins selected 25 movies for families to screen. To set the mood they’ve included a recipe paired with each movie–a main dish or a dessert for your next family night at home. The movies selected present a nice cross-section of films, spanning a century of film and several genres. It’s one of the best overall selections of movies in any TCM library book yet.
Leonard Maltin is probably the best known living film critic, following Gene Shalit, Gene Siskel, and Roger Ebert. That means he’s had many in-person encounters with filmmakers and actors. He peppers his recommendations with anecdotes about the films, many learned firsthand.
Father and daughter’s selections include some themes readers will spot easily. They are fans of Elsa Lanchester, Judy Garland, and Julie Andrews, and they love musicals, so much that it’s the biggest genre covered. That includes movies like Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music, Meet Me in St. Louis, and The Wizard of Oz.
Here’s a sample from the book discussing A Princess Bride:
Genres are well-covered. For science fiction they chose The Bride of Frankenstein, Star Wars, and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, plus an interesting choice you rarely find in books like this: Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. For fantasy, in addition to Mary Poppins and The Wizard of Oz, you’ll find entries including Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, The Princess Bride, The Addams Family, and Enchanted. More dramatic selections include To Kill a Mockingbird, Sounder, and 1990s remakes of A Little Princess and The Secret Garden. OK, it’s tough not to see the version of A Little Princess with Shirley Temple and Arthur Treacher included!
Here is an excerpt from the chapter on A Christmas Story:
The food selections are fairly typical faire, recipes similar to what you’d find in a standard kitchen cookbook. They range from cornbread for To Kill a Mockingbird to a chocolate peanut butter pie for E.T. to a stir fry for A Christmas Story.
Mostly the Maltins make good use of a few pages to summarize each film, discuss each in context, and offer trivia and tidbits to get readers interested in giving the movie a try. Some of the photographs and marketing materials shown are rare images readers might not have seen before.
You may just learn something new about one of these classic films. For cinema aficionados, for anyone trying to share their love for movies with a new generation, TCM Family Movie Night Menus—Recipes & Films for Unforgettable Times Together is available for here at Amazon, in stores tomorrow.
Don’t miss the other volumes from TCM’s film library reviewed here at borg, covering a wide range of topics across film history and genres: 52 Must-See Movies That Matter, 52 More Must-See Movies That Matter, Must-See Sci-Fi, Dynamic Dames, Forbidden Hollywood, Viva Hollywood, Fright Favorites, Summer Movies: 30 Sun-Drenched Classics, TCM’s Hollywood Victory, TCM’s Danger on the Silver Screen, TCM’s Rock on Film, TCM’s Essential Directors, TCM’s Christmas at the Movies, Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir, TCM’s 50 Oscar Nights, But Have You Read the Book?, Eddie Muller’s Noir Bar, Lena Horne: Goddess Reclaimed, Double Indemnity and the Rise of Film Noir, Forbidden Cocktails, Hollywood Pride, Falling in Love at the Movies, Dark City Dames, TCM Imports, TCM Rewinding the ’80s, TCM Pre-Code Essentials: Must-See Cinema from Hollywood’s Untamed Era 1930-1934, TCM Family Movie Night Menus–Recipes & Films for Unforgettable Times Together, and TCM’s 20th Century Fox: Darryl F. Zanuck and the Creation of the Modern Film Studio.
