Reviews

"I devoured this book--an appalling pocket of cinema history, delightfully explored and obsessively researched. Andy Milligan is one scary man."

"Obsessively researched, written with wit and vinegar, brimful of bizarre tales, unflinching of both its subject and its author. . . . A masterpiece."

The Marquis de Sade had nothing on filmmaker Andy Milligan, who between 1965 to 1988 cranked out a prodigious number of plays and 29 sex-and-exploitation films, many of which are now lost, with such sleazoid titles as The Filthy Five, Gutter Trash, Fleshpot on 42nd St., and Torture Dungeon. It would be (sl)easy to dismiss Milligan, who died of AIDS in 1991, as a grindhouse auteur, but that, as journalist and biographer McDonough so wonderfully and effectively explicates, would be an egregious mistake. Juxtaposed with Milligan's story, told with the help of a cornucopia of interviews, including trenchant commentary and extended passages from Milligan himself, are the colorful and significant tales of the developing Off Broadway scene, the birth and rise of the exploitation film industry, and that Ber-nude-a Triangle of "all sizzle, no steak" celluloid called the Deuce, or 42nd Street. Chock-full of movie stills, lurid poster art and advertisements, and some great excerpts from Milligan's film scripts, McDonough's book succeeds overwhelmingly in making the respectability case for Milligan. Undoubtedly, it will also lead many to seek out Milligan's work; may y'all have better luck than this reviewer had at your local video store. Clearly, this title will not be everyone's bowl of borscht, but it is enthusiastically endorsed for all large public and academic library film and American studies programs. Barry X. Miller, Austin P.L., TX Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

"I devoured this book--an appalling pocket of cinema history, delightfully explored and obsessively researched. Andy Milligan is one scary man."
"Obsessively researched, written with wit and vinegar, brimful of bizarre tales, unflinching of both its subject and its author. . . . A masterpiece."