Author Topic: Paul Sutton's "Talking About Ken Russell"  (Read 6045 times)

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Offline peabody

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Re: Paul Sutton's "Talking About Ken Russell"
« Reply #5 on: October 26, 2017, 10:27:28 PM »
Received the book yesterday and I'm very, very impressed by it. It cost me 95 quid but it was definitely worth it. Don't know what to say, really... It's fantastic! Just been reading about "Song of Summer" and "The Boy Friend", two of my favourites by Ken, and the chapters about them were chock-full of interesting facts and great photos. Every fascinating anecdote I came across made me want to put the book down and re-watch the films right away. That's the highest praise I can give a book about film.

I'm ALMOST considering getting the latest, expanded version now...  :-[ :o

Online Iain Fisher

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    • Iain Fisher
Re: Paul Sutton's "Talking About Ken Russell"
« Reply #4 on: October 07, 2017, 12:24:52 AM »
The text for both seems to be identical.

For the photos the standard edition has most the same, but in b&w.  A number of times a full page colour photo will be reproduced as a half page b&w photo, and some photos are missing.  But confusingly, the standard edition also has a few (very limited) photos not in the colour editions, for example on Gothic the standard edition has Ken beside a prop of a dead child which is not in the colour edition.

The colour edition is definitely better, given the visual aspects of Ken's films.  But it is half as expensive.

Bottom line, either is worth having.

Iain

Offline peabody

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Re: Paul Sutton's "Talking About Ken Russell"
« Reply #3 on: October 04, 2017, 09:26:35 AM »
Being a sad person I have both versions.

The text is more or less the same for the two editions.  The standard edition is 482 pages with b&w pictures.  The deluxe edition is 542 pages with a mixture of b&w and colour pictures.

The difference in the number of pages is due to fewer photos, and sometimes a page photo is given as half page, but the fewer photos does not hinder any of the text.

Given the early work was filmed in b&w the photos are b&w in both editions.  For later films like The Boyfriend the colour photos in the deluxe version are beautiful, though some of the photos are also b&w, presumably to save costs.  For Mahler the deluxe version has mainly b&w photos which is a bit disappointing.

On Amazon the deluxe edition is half as much more expensive than the standard edition.

Which to buy?  The standard edition is good and recommended.  The deluxe version has colour photos which complement the later works, and is also recommended.

Thanks for your reply, Iain! That's not being sad. That's a sign of awesomeness and having impeccable taste when it comes to the arts.

If I understand correctly, the latest, expanded book has additional text not found in the earlier editions?

Also, just making sure I understand correctly:

There are more photos in the deluxe edition? It's not just that the regular version has all of the photos found in the deluxe edition, but reproduced in black and white?

Online Iain Fisher

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Re: Paul Sutton's "Talking About Ken Russell"
« Reply #2 on: October 03, 2017, 09:11:50 PM »
Being a sad person I have both versions.

The text is more or less the same for the two editions.  The standard edition is 482 pages with b&w pictures.  The deluxe edition is 542 pages with a mixture of b&w and colour pictures.

The difference in the number of pages is due to fewer photos, and sometimes a page photo is given as half page, but the fewer photos does not hinder any of the text.

Given the early work was filmed in b&w the photos are b&w in both editions.  For later films like The Boyfriend the colour photos in the deluxe version are beautiful, though some of the photos are also b&w, presumably to save costs.  For Mahler the deluxe version has mainly b&w photos which is a bit disappointing.

On Amazon the deluxe edition is half as much more expensive than the standard edition.

Which to buy?  The standard edition is good and recommended.  The deluxe version has colour photos which complement the later works, and is also recommended.

Offline peabody

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Paul Sutton's "Talking About Ken Russell"
« Reply #1 on: October 03, 2017, 11:02:49 AM »
I now realize that I need this book in my collection, but I'm not sure if it's worth the extra money getting the "deluxe edition" in favour of the latest, expanded edition. Is anyone here familiar with the book, or perhaps have seen both?

The brief video on Amazon offers a tantalising glimpse of the colour photos within, and from what I understand the other versions have the images in "just" black and white...

Decisions, decisions...