Play Time

Turvey provides a sharply observant account of the scope and function of the more ‘cognitively challenging’ of these comic devices in Tati’s major films. -- David Trotter * London Review of Books *
Turvey’s study of Tati’s context traces a fascinating continuity between the clown tradition, Charlie Chaplin’s construction of comic personas and the role of the 'living object' in Dada, Surrealism, Cubism and other interwar artistic movements. * Times Literary Supplement *
Play Time is a subtle, intelligent—and wonderfully funny—book. It has much to offer both Tati novices and his connoisseurs. -- Pardis Dabashi * Modernism/modernity *
The book is a delicious treat, and serious film students will appreciate it as a penetrating primer on the cinematic comic artisdt at work. * Choice *
Play Time: Jacques Tati and Comedic Modernism must be warmly recommended reading for all lovers of Tati, particularly since it is written by one of them, which shows. And my recommendation gets only warmer for all those who, like myself, are interested in understanding comedy and its mechanisms. -- Gianni Barchiesi * Alphaville Journal *
Malcolm Turvey’s exhilarating study of Jacques Tati is a precise, loving appreciation of the unique style and worldview of a great filmmaker. It’s also a history of avant-garde humor and a deep analysis of techniques of slapstick and satire. Turvey, one of our finest scholars of modernity in the arts, shows in detail how Tati’s comedy turned modernist experimentation into popular entertainment. -- David Bordwell, author of Reinventing Hollywood: How 1940s Filmmakers Changed Movie Storytelling
Malcolm Turvey’s Play Time is the best extended critical study of Tati I’ve encountered: persuasively argued, scrupulously observed, and beautifully illustrated. The writing is clear and graceful, and the research is impressive, especially regarding the relation of slapstick films to avant-garde movements of the early twentieth century and Tati’s critiques of modern architecture. Most critical books about Tati have been short on close analysis, but this one beats them all. -- Jonathan Rosenbaum, author of Cinematic Encounters: Interviews and Dialogues
Few films deserve a book-length study as much as those of Jacques Tati. Malcolm Turvey has done them justice. His explanation of their context in the slapstick and modernist traditions is fascinating. Turvey takes Tati’s work seriously, not by spoiling the fun but by respecting its extraordinary complexity. His title comes from Tati’s masterpiece. No matter how many times you have seen Play Time—and it is a film made for many viewings—Turvey will reveal something new and make you want to see it yet again. -- Kristin Thompson, Honorary Fellow in the Department of Communication Arts, University of Wisconsin-Madison
This book is an excellent, detailed study of the films of Jacques Tati that establishes how Tati’s work draws upon classical “comedian comedy” while also connecting with the interwar European avant-garde. Moreover, the author insightfully discusses Tati’s love/hate relationship with modernity as well as his passion for creating a participatory style in which the spectator works to find humor in his films and also in the real world. -- Lucy Fischer, Distinguished Professor Emerita, University of Pittsburgh
Malcolm Turvey’s Play Time is a completely joyful and entirely refreshing account of the films of Jacques Tati. It is also one of the finest, most nuanced accounts of comedic form that we have, a work that no one who studies comedy, or simply enjoys it, should be without. In tending so carefully to the structure of Tati’s gags—a seemingly infinite amount of them—Turvey does something that is as extraordinary as it is subtle. With Tati, he shows us how intelligence and popularity, structure and participation, aesthetic excellence and ordinary life, cannot be easily or gainfully opposed. -- Brian Price, University of Toronto
Play Time wonderfully, succinctly, precisely points to Tati’s liberating filmmaking that ultimately hails the outcast as the only true observer . . . [Turvey] leads us to a much more refreshed Tati. * Projections *