Books

Cinegeek book review

By Leroy Douresseaux
September 19, 2017 - 22:39

Cinegeek cover image

Cinegeek is a collection of single-page cartoons created by the French cartoonist, illustrator, and graphic designer, Rudy Spiessert, using the name “Pluttark.”  Cinegeek was originally published as Cinégeek in 2014 by Editions Delcourt (France).

Each cartoon take as its subject Hollywood films, especially genre films like superhero, science fiction, fantasy, horror, and action movies and also big budget event films of multiple genres from the major studios.  These cartoons also reference famous, infamous, and cult actors and directors.  Filmmakers and performers referenced here are people that would be well-known to film buffs and fanatics and movie lovers.

THE LOWDOWN:  Each cartoon is centered around some kind of movie trivia, but most of the cartoons use trivia to comment, mock, spoof, make fun of the films, filmmakers, and movie stars.  An example of commentary would include “Pop Stars Miscast in Unsuitable Movie Roles” (like Rihanna in Battleship and Mick Jagger in Freejack).

An example of mocking would be “Michael Bay Movie Kits” and “Actors Who Always Play the Same Role.”  I think the best example of Pluttark spoofing is “Marlon Brando's Flowchart.”  In the “making fun of” category is “Movies It's Hard to Believe Ever Saw the Light of Day.”  Pluttark includes Super Mario Bros., which is indeed horrible, but he also mentions the live-action Thunderbirds movie from 2004 (with the late Bill Paxton as the Thunder papa), which I really liked.

Some of the trivia yields good-natured ribbing:  “Evolution of the Batman Costume,” and “Superhero Film Adaptations We Could Perhaps Have Done Without” (Catwoman; the 1979 Captain America TV series).  “Proof That Obi-Wan Kenobi Is Completely Crazy” might be gentle ribbing, but it makes me think that the “prequel trilogy” did more to hurt the original Star Wars films than to help.

Some of the cartoons also offer some really good and interesting trivia:  “Bizarre Japanese Film Genres,” “The Real Name of Those Animal Stars,” and “The Coolest Cars.”  The nicest bonus is the two-page “'Alien, as told by Ethel (6½ years old).

I am including links to some images from the book in this review because I want to encourage movie fans to buy Cinegeek.  No movie fan should go without reading Cinegeek at least once.

I READS YOU RECOMMENDS:  Lovers of Hollywood films and its players will want Cinegeek.

A
9 out of 10

See Pluttark cartoons at
Outright Geekery: http://www.outrightgeekery.com/2017/08/01/get-cinegeek-review/
Google: https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1684062284

Rating: 9 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12