Author Description

Once in a century, a book comes along that both defines a genre - and defies it. This is that century. This is that book. The book is A History of Violence (1973). A memoir of the human race. Its concept is simple: take the date in 1973 on which a violent film was first screened - and go beyond the film to see the world that exists outside the theatre. It's a book that realizes that the line between life and cinema is as much a horizon as it is a terminator. A History of Violence (1973) takes you across that horizon to places in time you never even imagined existed. Because bombs don't explode in only one direction. 169 films. The brutal and transgressive sex films (Forced Entry; High Priestess of Sexual Witchcraft; Teenage Jailbait). The films of cinematic masters like Brian De Palma (Sisters), Terence Malick (Badlands), and Nicolas Roeg (Don't Look Now). The Italian crime films (Death Carries a Cane; The Flower With the Deadly Sting; Torso). The police procedurals (Blade; The Laughing Policeman; The Marcus-Nelson Murders). The flat-out shocking and bizarre films that can only be appreciated by surviving them (The Hunchback of the Morgue; The Night God Screamed; The Sinful Dwarf).1973. The year that the War in Vietnam ends, military coups convulse Afghanistan and Chile and Rwanda, and the specter of Watergate looms large.1973. The year that a teen thinks his neighbor is using telepathy to make him gay - so he strips him nude, kills him and his entire family, and burns down their house. The year that a husband kidnaps young men and holds them at gunpoint - while they have sex with his wife. The year that a man goes out for a night on the town with a friend - and comes home to find that his wife has murdered their children, then killed herself. 1973. The year of the deaths of writers W.H. Auden and Victor Jar