Book Review: Admit One

Admit One: A Journey into Film
Emmett James
Fizzypop Productions, 2007; 197 pages

I really wanted to like this book. It combines two of my favorite things in the realm of multimedia: memoir and film. While in college I took as many film classes as possible - production, general study, the relationship of film and theology - the phenomena of Hollywood and motion pictures is endlessly fascinating to me. I am captivated by culture.

And this is what I was expecting to read on the pages of James' memoir. And it is generally what was there... though I was less than inspired by most of it. Perhaps I have been too deadened to the simple memoir by the rowdy likes of Augusten Burroughs and David Sedaris, and the politically charged thoughts of Anne Lamott; but in the realm of these writers with some seriously messed up lives that they bare for all to see, Emmett James seems pretty "every man."

And perhaps that is the point? Maybe he wanted to write a story that could be each of our own stories?

There were definite moments within the narrative that made me chuckle with familiarity; I know full well the overwhelming desire to emulate favorite movie characters. I understand the importance, above all else, of getting that Millennium Falcon toy - and the necessity of the Star Wars movies in inspiring this need in young children all over the world.

Overall the narrative is easy to read (proved to be a great airport book for my bookends of delayed flights this weekend), and ends in a fairly convincing, potentially refreshingly simple, "aha" moment of James' life. Certain chapters would have been excellent companions to some of the more dry texts in a couple of my film classes, specifically in the discussions of how people watch movies.