Running Scared: Masculinity and the Representation of the Male Body (Contemporary Approaches to Film and Media Series) Paperback – August 10, 2007

When a male author begins by explaining that "male sexuality is the real hidden continent" (actually, quoting female cinema critic kind but deluded enough to make the statement), I stop awhile, say fine, tell us about it. Men have been writing for centuries, tell it like it is, my e_mail box is overflowing with viagra ads in 85 languages, please do tell me what you think about the issue. No, he doesn't. Maybe realizing, yes, we know.Title rather silly. Scarred perhaps, the intellectual dishonesty - fright suggesting victimization - is thus a bit off-putting.I also am quite appalled at a scholar who values the quality of Hemingway's writing (specifically, The Sun Also Rises) above that of Jim Thompson's (RE: The Nothing Man.) At least he has heard of J. Thompson, but while recognizing greater psychological insight on the author's part (wow) he dismisses him as low-brow, never mind, these pulp-fiction guys who cares didn't make much $$$$ did they? So the BIG NAMES are much better writers & we get 3 pp. of embarrassing anecdotes, discussions (no footnotes, so questionable, Hemingway sounds like it, Fitzgerald sort of NO WAY?) alledgedly between Ernest & F. Scott about the size of their respective penis - unless they were drunk, sorry, Bubba, not 3 pp. They were busy with the ladies. In French, "plus on en parle, moins on en fait".Good issues indeed are aspects still not addressed in contemporary cinema/ culture - cinema being the medium of the day, the point is fascinating: why is the male body never shown - even in the sub-genre of homosexual hardcore cinema (personal info) - A) Nude standing facing the camera AND B) Looking into the camera?No answer is provided, so a bit of a disappointment, book poorly structured, yet admirable in addressing issue which I doubt publishers wanted to come within 50 miles of.My opinion: the eyes are the most revealing. No guy will show himself vulnerable - which seems to mean feeling something, expressing emotion - yes having the guts to have a brain, on film. Act the fool, no poblem. Be one even better. Honesty the hardest act of all. Run to your mother young man. That is scary.

Regarding this hardback version, the paperback version, and the audio-book version, the hardback is not factually corrected in many areas and is badly edited overall. However, the paperback version has been corrected and as such matches the audio-book version.As for the five stars, I do not rate books - I read.

Love Peter Lehman's work, this book is one of the best in its acute insight into representations of the male body.