Bernard F. Dick, professor of communications and English at Fairleigh Dickinson University, is the author of numerous books on film history, including Engulfed: the Death of Paramount Pictures and the Birth of Corporate Hollywood and Hal Wallis: Producer to the Stars.
"A breezy and informative six-reeler about the 'engulfing' of the
once proud studio by a mega-conglomerate to which film art was
merely another commodity." -- EH.NET Reviews
"An important book not only about the history of a studio, but also
about the apparently ineluctable direction big business has taken
in American society." -- Donald Spoto
"Astutely analyzes the role of outside corporate money in the film
industry, and how the changes at Paramount heralded a new,
inevitable trend in American film and arts.... Dick's in-depth
analysis and research makes for great -- and shocking --
journalism." -- Publishers Weekly
"Clever, thought-provoking...Dick has the ability to explain the
complex in-fighting among studio executives in the corridors of
power in a movie studio -- and their even more complex negotiations
with the conglomerates who own the studios -- in a way that is
clear and incisive." -- Gene D. Phillips
"Dick has composed an authoritative account of Paramount Pictures
Corporation and accomplished the not inconsiderable feat of making
it read less like business and more like history." -- Washington
Times
"Dick lends the personalities and events so much emotional colour
that his book is as compulsively readable as a biography." -- Sight
and Sound
"Does a fine job of detailing the death of a studio and its
reincarnation as a subsidiary of a conglom. Dick's forensics peel
back history, revealing the passions, politics and power plays of
filmmakers and dealmakers that culminated in the dissolution of a
Hollywood empire." -- Daily Variety
"Everybody knows that Paramount was one of the major studios, but
few know the twists and turns of the history of the studio over the
years." -- Peter C. Rollins
"Provides a helpful scaffolding of Paramount's fascinating history
thus far and suggests that business historians would do well to
engage the film industry further in their explorations of
twentieth-century business and economic life." -- Enterprise and
Society
"Provides historical insight into the death of Paramount Pictures
as an autonomous studio and its fall to the conglomerate Gulf +
Western in 1966." -- Journal of Economic History
"The stories behind some of the greatest films ever made pale
beside the story of the studio that made them." -- Hollywood Inside
Syndicate
"This thoroughly researched story reveals the shift in the
industry's primary focus from making fine film to making a
successful, multifaceted business deal and prompts debate over
which one is considered to be real art in modern Hollywood." --
Library Journal
"Through the richness in cases, examples and anecdotes it gives a
practical, nuts-and-bolts insight into the workings of the film
business." -- Business History
"Traces Paramount's lineage from its 1912 origins to its 1966
purchase by Gulf & Western and its present ownership by
Viacom/CBS." -- Publishers Weekly
"Uses Paramount Pictures to illustrate the evolution of the
motion-picture industry from Thomas Edison to Michael Eisner....
Always erudite and entertaining." -- Kirkus Reviews
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