ReFocus: The Literary Films of Richard Brooks

R. Barton Palmer is Calhoun Lemon Professor of Literature Emeritus at Clemson University. He is the author, editor, or general editor of many books including Hollywood’s Dark Cinema: The American Film Noir (1994), After Hitchcock: Influence, Imitation, and Intertextuality (2006), and A Little Solitaire: John Frankenheimer and American Film (2011). He is the series editor for EUP’s traditions in World Cinema, Traditions in American Cinema and International Film Stars series, and he is co-editor of five recent EUP books: Michael Mann, George Cukor, Film Noir, International Noir and The Other Hollywood Renaissance. Homer B. Pettey is Professor Emeritus of Film and Comparative Literature at the University of Arizona. He serves as the founding and general editor for Global Film Directors (Rutgers U.P.), Global Film Studios (Edinburgh U.P.), and International Stars (Edinburgh U.P.).

• AcknowledgementsIllustrationsNotes on Contributors1. Introduction - R. Barton Palmer and Homer B. Pettey2. The Brick Foxhole (1945): Richard Brooks’s American Vision - Matthew H. Bernstein3. The Muted Voices of Conscience and Responsibility in Crisis (1950) - Alan Woolfolk4. Deadline U.S.A. (1952): A Fox Film of Fact - R. Barton Palmer5. "Man Against the Times": Conformity, Anti-Statism and the ‘Unknown’ Korean War in Battle Circus (1953) - Ian Scott6. Captured Interiors: Female Performances in The Last Time I Saw Paris (1954) and The Happy Ending (1969) - Daniel Varndell 7. Blackboard Jungle (1955): A Cinematic Education - Steven Rybin8. Hunting and the Economics of Adaptation: The Last Hunt (1956) and The Professionals (1966) - Homer B. Pettey9. The Curse of Money: Negotiating Marriage in A Catered Affair (1956) - Elisabeth Bronfen10. Adapting Modernism: Richard Brooks and The Brothers Karamazov (1958) - Douglas McFarland11. Haunted: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) - David Sterritt12. A Bite of Salvation - Murray Pomerance13. "Monstrous Cinemascope": Richard Brooks Adapts Sweet Bird of Youth (1962) - William H. Epstein14. Adapting the Unadaptables: Lord Jim (1965) - Thomas Leitch15. Adaptation as Mutation: In Cold Blood (1967) - Jennifer L. Jenkins16. Looking for Mr. Good Guy: Anatomizing 70s Fracture and Fragmentation - Julie Grossman17. Failing to Locate Wrong is Right (1982) and What that Reveals about Cinematic Reality - Allen H. RedmonBiblioographyIndex

In this volume, the rich and varied career of ‘literary director’ Richard Brooks finally receives its well-deserved re-evaluation. The fine set of essays commissioned by Palmer and Pettey describes Brooks as a writer-filmmaker equally committed to the respectful adaptation of literary fiction as he was to a socially concerned cinema.