The book lovingly details 50 films which never got beyond the planning stages for various reasons. Many of them involved heavy Hollywood hitters, from Steven Spielberg (who helped to get the first ROGER RABBIT off the ground), to DOUBLE INDEMNITY director Billy Wilder (who brainstormed the aborted Marx Brothers film as well as a Laurel & Hardy comedy), to Alfred Hitchcock (who proposed a movie about a blind pianist whose sight is restored).

While the book is a fast-paced, popcornish read, the book's not-so-subtle point is to make film purists gnash their teeth at the thought of these potential film classics never getting made. For me, the book's only surprise was that they left out many of my favorites, including Buster Keaton's proposed take-off of Grand Hotel, Charlie Chaplin's The Freak (about a girl who sprouts wings), and an aborted Western starring The Beatles.

It's easy to cry about potential film masterpieces that never got beyond the planning stage. The trouble is that, like many real lost films that come to light after being re-discovered, they often turn out to be classics only if they remain lost. And considering some of the awful ideas which do make it to the light of a movie theater--as witness the recent bomb AT FIRST SIGHT, starring Val Kilmer as (shades of Hitchcock) a blind artist who regains his sight--maybe these movies have rotted in Development Limbo for some very good reasons.

That said, the book will be an eye-opener to novices who have never heard the term "turn-around," and brain candy for those who have seen awful ideas that *did* get made into movies.


An extra star for originality...   May 1, 2002
 5 out of 6 found this review helpful

Chris Gore's The 50 Greatest Movies Ever Made is wildly uneven, frequently enjoyable, occasionally insightful, and at times kinda annoying. It's also a pretty cool idea that was long overdue and if Gore's book doesn't quite take advantage of the full potential of his concept, its still an idea that was long overdue. Content-wise, this book would probably rate three stars (whatever that actually means) but it deserves that one extra star for being the first of its kind. Hopefully, should someone decide to write a follow-up on other great films that were never made, they'll keep a copy of this book so that they may learn from not only the book's flaws but its strengths as well.

Every film fanatic has a few cherished projects that they learned about while they lingered in Hollywood's development limbo. These were the movies that you looked forward to saying, that you found yourself checking up on whenever you got a spare moment, and these are the movies that either vanished all together or died right when they were on the verge of actually being made. These are the movies that we regret we'll never get a chance to see. Chris Gore's book details fifty of these film projects that, for various reasons, never actually made it to postproduction. In Gore's opinion (and if Chris Gore has anything, its opinions), these fifty films would have all been classics of the cinema and, film-by-film, he details not only why the films were never made but why he believes we should mourn their loss.

Obviously, this is a highly subjective enterprise and Gore is often found defending a film's lost greatness on the basis of little more than his gut instinct. As a result, I doubt there's a reader out there who will agree with all of Gore's choices. Personally, its hard for me to share Gore's disappointment that we were never allowed a chance to see a Stephen Sondheim musical directed by Rob Reiner and co-written by William Goldman. (In fact, I found myself rather relieved that the whole thing fell apart.) Try as I might, I can't summon up any enthusiasm for Swirlie, a serious crime film featuring a crime boss whose head is a giant ice cream cone. Even Gore himself seems to be trying a bit too hard to convince himself that the failure of Jerry Lewis' That's Life is something to be regretted. However, for every project that left me scratching my head, Gore came through with chapters on lost film projects that actually did seem to have the potential to be something special. After completing this book, I did find myself wishing that I could run out and rent a copy Harrow Alley (costarring George C. Scott and Mel Gibson). I did wish for a chance to catch the macabre comedy Won't Fade Out on late night TV. Even the campy, stoner thrills of Biker's Heaven, the Easy Rider sequel, sounded like a potentially fun film to watch with a couple of properly medicated friends. Its films like these that are the saving grace of Gore's frustratingly brief overview.

As a critic, Gore has never been one to emulate the psuedo-literary approaches made famous by Andrew Sarris and Pauline Kael. And indeed, one wishes that he had gone into a lot more detail on most of the films he writes about in this book. However, while his style leaves some of his less compelling unmade film favorites at a disadvantage, it also works wonders for the occasional film that actually has the spark of something special. After reading his terse, to-the-point descriptions of Harrow Alley, I felt as if I had actually watched that film in all of its potential genius. Whatever its flaws, this is a book to be commended. Now hopefully, Gore or some other critic will work out the kinks in time for a second edition and give us a book that leaves us with no doubt that its unrealized films deserve to be known as the greatest.


C.G. will quickly make you want to strangle him!   July 11, 2000
 4 out of 6 found this review helpful

This was certainly a good idea for a book, but it was very badly done. What annoyed me the most was how Chris Gore kept ranting against the studio system, sometimes forgetting to talk about the movie in order to write a couple of pages about how Hollywood studios stink. (Hey, Gore, if there were no major studio movies, there would be almost no movie theaters to show Hollywood *or* independent films!)

Also, as other people have pointed out, he frequently doesn't go into depth about the movie in areas such as (1) why the movie never got made, (2) what ingredients might have made the movie so great, and a few times, to some degree, (3) what the movie is actually about other than a quick description!

His snotty and oh-I-'m-so-right-and-clever attitude will make you want buy copies of his book just so you can throw them at him.

P.S. - Hey Chris, do you still think "The Fantastic Four" movie is fabulous, and better than any major studio with a big budget could make?


Great idea, poorly executed...   May 22, 1999
 4 out of 4 found this review helpful

Chris Gore was at his journalistic peak when writing and editing "Film Threat" Magazine. Then he sold out to Larry Flint. I believe that if Chris attempted this book a few years earlier it might be more of an honest endeavor. THE 50 GREATEST MOVIES NEVER MADE reads like tabloid journalism, and offers no serious or insightful cinematic commentary. Chris spends too much time talking about the stories behind the screenplays instead of addressing what makes them great. They are not presented chronologically, which might have helped his presentation. He could have grouped them by decades, prefacing his discussion of the screenplays with background information on the climate in Hollywood then. He rarely presents material from these unproduced screenplays, nor offers much insight in the form of quotations or interviews. The nature of his commentary leads me to question whether he actually read many screenplays he discusses. Further, several of his facts were not current. What should have been interesting quickly became boring and repetitive. Almost every chapter ends with an attempt at negative sarcasm on the film industry. I have no idea who the audience for this book is. Many people who would purchase a copy already know the stories, and probably have most of these screenplays in their collection. In addition, there are numerous free sites on the Internet that contain similar, if not more detailed and current, information on these projects. What should have been a memorable film book is reduced to a waste of paper in the age of the Internet.


Was There An Editor?   July 5, 2000
 3 out of 3 found this review helpful

While I did enjoy this book somewhat, I was baffled by the overwhelming number of typos and factual errors contained within. This was an amazing distraction from the otherwise enlightening content that Gore's book provides.