Cain’s “Double Indemnity,” starring Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray. “Body Heat,” famously featuring Kathleen Turner and William Hurt, is a not entirely successful revision of the earlier film version of James M. Truffaut’s “The Bride Wore Black,” originally starring the beautiful Jeanne Moreau, was remade decades later by Quentin Tarantino as “Kill Bill” with Uma Thurman. Nothing is more truly American than the so-called “hard- boiled school” of writing that Hammett and others championed in the ’20s and ’30s. Not that I have anything against either Hammett or the detective novel. Local red-meat conservatives are bound to have some fun with this one.
Subsequently Hammett was blacklisted in Hollywood, together with his longtime girlfriend, playwright Lillian Hellman. On the plus side, Hammett, in addition to being an elegant prose stylist, has the distinction of being the only author featured so far in One Book/ One Denver who was actually jailed for sedition, having done hard time for refusing to talk to the House Un-American Activities Committee in the 1950s. Still, taste is at best a matter of dispute, and the mayor has a right to his preferences. To make matters worse, “The Thin Man” is not even Hammett’s best book, being outranked in the view of most critics by “The Maltese Falcon” and “Red Harvest.” In his wisdom, Hickenlooper has chosen “The Thin Man,” a whodunit by Dashiell Hammett that has the distinction of being one of the few cases in which the film version of a book is actually better than the novel. So far so good, but since this opens up the field considerably, you’d think the mayor might go with an author or book that has some kind of local following. Other cities feature books by authors who can’t be in attendance, so why not Denver? At least a dead author can’t be insulted by anemic audiences at discussions of his or her book. Given the discouraging attendance at programs featuring recent honorees, this is understandable, but one wonders what took Hickenlooper so long. Digital Replica Edition Home Page Close MenuĪfter four years of steadily dwindling support for his One Book/One Denver program, Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper has decided to make some changes for this year’s event.įirst and most important, he’s given up the idea that the book under consideration must be by a living author who can come to town and entertain the masses.
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