Bøker av Scott Ryan

This provocative tome, sure to foment heated discussions among cinephiles of all generations, argues that the 1990s was the last decade in which films were made for grownups, with complex, adult-based plots, nuanced characters, and meaningful themes.“I feel like Scott Ryan could have written this directly to me and others in our generation who have basically ‘given up’ on movies. It is at once tribute and eulogy, so bittersweet.” – Screenwriter Helen Childress (Reality Bites)“The nineties are lucky to have Scott Ryan.” – Actress Natasha Gregson Wagner (Two Girls and a Guy, Lost Highway)Ah, the nineties. Movies were something in those days. We’re talking about a decade that began with GoodFellas and ended with Magnolia, with such films as Malcolm X, Before Sunrise, and Clueless arriving somewhere in between. Stories, characters, and writing were king; IP, franchise movies, and supersaturated superhero flicks were still years away. Or so says Scott Ryan, the iconoclastic author of The Last Days of Letterman and Moonlighting: An Oral History, who here turns his attention to The Last Decade of Cinema—the prolific 1990s. Ryan, who watched just about every film released during the decade when he was a video store clerk in a small town in Ohio, identifies twenty-five unique and varied films from the decade, including Pretty Woman, Pulp Fiction, Menace II Society, The Prince of Tides, and The Shawshank Redemption, focusing with his trademark humor and insight on what made them classics and why they could never be produced in today’s film culture. The book also includes interviews with writers, directors, and actors from the era. Go back to the time of VCR’s, DVD rentals, and movies that mattered. Turn off your streaming services, put down your phones, delete your Twitter account, and take a look back at the nineties with your Eyes Wide Shut, a White Russian in your hand, and yell “Hasta la vista, baby” to today’s meaningless entertainment. Revel in the risk-taking brilliance of Quentin Tarantino, Amy Heckerling, Spike Lee, Robert Altman, Paul Thomas Anderson, and others in Scott Ryan’s magnum opus, The Last Decade of Cinema.

Australia has enjoyed an unprecedented period of prosperity in recent decades, yet despite this there has been a widely reported loss of faith in politics and institutions. With the COVID-19 pandemic, Australia faces its most significant economic and social challenges in decades. How is politics placed to deal with these challenges and what is the capacity of our key institutions to do so? What are the lessons and warnings from history? In Challenging Politics, longtime politician Scott Ryan argues that the way we determine issues, the way we practice politics, and what we expect from politicians and government, is in flux. To some, the virtue of compromise has become the sin of sellout. The louder voices of fringe and single-issue movements attract attention, money and commitment, and apply litmus tests to those who seek to govern. This makes it more difficult for our institutions, and therefore our politics, to function effectively. The long-talked-about collapse of the centre isn't solely about extreme ideas. It is also about how our expectations of politics and our institutions have changed.--

"Once upon a time ABC-TV's Moonlighting was among the most buzzed-about shows in the country, thanks largely to the bravado of creator Glenn Gordon Caron, who never met a television convention he didn't want to break, and the sizzling on-screen chemistry between glamorous erstwhile film star Cybill Shepherd and a New Jersey bartender nobody had ever heard of before named Bruce Willis. This combustible blend of creative brilliance produced some of the most acclaimed, audacious, and innovative programming of the eighties. The real story of this pioneering television series and the extraordinary behind-the-scenes challenges, battles, and rewards has never been told-- until now. Author Scott Ryan conducted over twenty interviews with the actors, writers, directors, and producers who made Moonlighting such a dynamic, unforgettable show, delving deep into their thoughts and feelings as they relive this magical moment in pop culture history in this full color oral history."--Provided by publisher.