Friday, October 16, 2020

Book review - "There's a Fax from Bruce" by Bruce Beresford and Sue Milliken

 Highly entertaining series of faxes between two old mates and collaborators. The films that get most attention are their specific projects, Black Robe and Paradise Road; there's probably a little too much on the latter film, as there was in Milliken's memoirs, come to think of it, but I get she's proud of the achievement.

The banter is rapid and fun and enjoyably bitchy at times - enjoying Tony Ginane's financial trouble. Miliken says in her intro she wanted to show how hard they worked and they do, I guess, but life it still pretty good - they're zipping around all over the place, and Beresford has a great life (he's always off skiing and hanging out with famous people).

The period covers 1989 to 1997 so basically an optimistic time - FFC, Fox Studios, etc. Beresford was coming off Black Robe a critical darling. During this period he made his worst movie a Good Man in Africa and had some bad knocks (getting booted off Bridges of Madison County) but we don't read that much about it. I would have liked more but understand maybe Milliken wasn't as across those projects.

Still, a charming fun read.

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