I think I was a huge Stanley Kubrick fan long before I even knew it. I loved The Shining, 2001: A Space Odyssey and Doctor Strangelove, enjoyed A Clockwork Orange (though I was probably way too young to fully appreciate it when I first watched it), and the first part of Full Metal Jacket is one of my favorite half-movies ever. So when I put it all together that one dude directed all those films and more, I was as disbelieving as Homer Simpson discovering that bacon, ham AND pork all come from one maaaagical animal.

Anyways, my Kubrick radar was peaked again recently after reading an essay by Jon Ronson about visiting the Kubrick estate, where he discovered the meticulous and obssessive years of planning that went into movies both realized and not. It was fascinating, and I decided I should find out more about one of my favorite directors.

This book was the one I could my hands on the fastest, and despite my 2 star rating, it was fairly enjoyable ("it was ok!"). Well, it's too short to really get on one's nerves I guess, though I could see myself getting annoyed if it had gone on any longer. It's a bit too fawning, a bit too defensive, and far too focused on Eyes Wide Shut. Sure, the author throws in a few criticisms of Kubrick and his films, though they're mild enough that I think he just put them in for the sake of a bit of objectivity. I guess that's not a bad thing either. Herr and Kubrick were buds, and you should defend your buds and talk about all the good times you had.

I'd describe this book as a good appetizer for a bigger meal in the form of a deeper biography. I imagine Kubrick fans would enjoy it for its conversational and light tone, and for an anecdotal friend's perspective rather than a historical one.

Books Kubrick recommends to people, comments on, or is reported to have read, by Herr within the first few pages:

The Destruction of the European Jews
The entirety of The Golden Bough
Absalom! Absalom!

And of course Traumnovelle, The Short-Timers, Dispatches, as well as comments on Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. There’s more but I only noted these.

The goat. Clockwork was the first movie I watched where I turned the DVD case around to note who directed it (other than Spielberg of course). I probably have him to thank for everything, for my overall lifelong commitment to art. Over the last decade or so, I’ve run the gambit on cinema, from the furthest reaches of the avant-garde, like Bruce Elder, Jorge Honik, and Rose Lowder, to the forgotten masters of silent cinema, like Urban Gad. I’ve tried to be a smart ass and name names most people won’t know, to bring home my point: throughout thousands of films, Kubrick remains on top. Some come close (Brakhage is on equal footing I’d say), but no matter how far I tunnel, it just further solidifies Kubricks genius for me, while the other formative filmmakers drift away, become far less interesting and basic. Even revisiting his early work has been illuminating in newfound ways, and is not at all the student film embarrassment its reputation suggests.

But while I’ve always known Kubrick was a genius, his comment on his average IQ and lack of any sort of college degree (plus generally being a terrible student) I think makes people think of him solely as a “movie genius”, with amazing intuition for images. If you’ve read his interviews, you know just how book smart he really is, but Herr’s account really puts his amazing auto-didacticism into perspective; he is unbelievably well read. All his autobiographical accounts mention his hunger for info, his long phone calls and philosophical plumbing, his constant movie watching and reading, his hunt for the perfect story - but never have I seen the real scope of the net he cast. A bonafide inspiration, a realist who never lost his optimism and lust for life, a man who never slept. I’ve read (and own) Eyes Wide Open and Stanley & Me, but this is definitely the superior Kubrick relationship memoir, by far the best written, and the most clear-eyed & psychologically honest. The comment about his voice never aging - too good.

A beautiful, slender apostrophic volume to a dear friend that takes out a few dipshits along the way. An encomium to a true cinematic talent from a master writer who hardly writes, alas! (By the way, see Herr's Dispatches for the source of all that is good about Apocalypse Now and Full Metal Jacket). I read it every other year or so. The sincerity, the kindness, the simple yet elegant writing. A masterpiece.

A very brief memoir of a great film director written by a friend who also happened (he died the day before I read it) to have been an excellent writer. Kubrick appears to have been in the same set as Napoleon and Kurosawa, people who see quite a few moves ahead of those around them and who are completely focussed on manipulating their environment for their own long term ends. In his case it resulted in a number of movies that are both striking and disturbing. I am a fan of Herr's and enjoyed the book except for two things. Because it was so smooth it was finished quickly and so I didn't savour it as much as I could have. As a consequence, the day after I finished it I started to re-read it. I also came to the conclusion that Herr's style is very effective for communicating experience but it is not very convincing when it comes to judgements of other people's point of view. The last chapter is a summing up of the posthumous response to Kubrick and his last, posthumously released film "Eyes Wide Shut" and I did not feel it was credible.
This book is suitable for people interested in strange geniuses.

This slim volume sat on my shelf for a couple of years, but I’m so glad to finally rip through it. Instantly, I want to re-read it. Love Kubrick. Of course. But also really love Michael Herr’s way with a word, this is surely one of the most economical biographical tributes - it serves now as tribute, also, to Herr. His style. His way. Brilliant writing. As someone else said, a genius…writing about a genius. No one goes home disappointed!

Herr's "Kubrick" was an enjoyable look behind the scenes at what it was like to know Kubrick as a person - to the extent that was really possible - and what it was like to work with him. As a big fan of Kubrick's movie, I appreciated hearing what it was like to know him, to spend hours on the phone with him discussing philosophy, even to hear about his renowned cheapness.

Herr takes Kubrick down off of the lofty pedestal of cinematic demigod and lets us see that he was an exceptionally talented man who knew exactly what he wanted, one who was willing to take the time and effort to make that happen.

People wanted desperately to work with Kubrick and then hated life while they went through his seemingly endless process, only to say at the end that they would do anything to work with him again. Herr describes how he resisted Kubrick's repeated urging to work with him on the script for "Eyes Wide Shut" - "Come on, it'll be fun!!" - knowing what it would do to his life if he said "yes." He watched with relief from the sidelines as the shooting schedule went months past the deadline. He looked forward to an exclusive interview with Kubrick for Vanity Fair magazine when production wrapped, only to lose Kubrick to a heart attack the week before he was supposed to meet with him.

Herr's dry humor made this an enjoyable read for me. Paraphrasing here, but "one thing you never heard around Kubrick was 'Use your best judgment and don't bother me with the details.'"

Recommended as a quick and enjoyable initial read that also will benefit from repeated, deeper readings. I'm not sure I understand Kubrick's process any better - or what made him a genius - other than that he was willing to let ideas take as much time as necessary to mature.

Basically a long magazine article, a good one, but sketchy on Kubrick. Herr worked with Kubrick on several movies and was a friend and I got a much clearer sense of the director's character and obsessions. There's a great afterword on Eyes Wide Shut that pinpoints the dream logics at work in a film that's radically undervalued. But I wanted more on the films themselves. Clearly, Herr doesn't want to "interpret" or "explain" Kubrick and I get that, but the Eyes Wide Shut section demonstrates what Herr might have offered if he'd chosen to engage Strangelove or Clockwork Orange. Good book, just don't espect anything comprehensive.

Michael knew Stanley; we benefit.

This is an elegant little 96-page rumination on Michael Herr’s friendship and working relationship with filmmaker Stanley Kubrick. However, 80% of the text is essentially a reprinting of a 1999 Vanity Fair profile that Herr wrote at the behest of Kubrick as PR for the release of the director’s final film, Eyes Wide Shut. And the Vanity Fair piece is readily available online: http://bit.ly/1SvNRLm. Which leaves the book’s 20-page “postscript”—a spirited defense of Eyes Wide Shut—as the only new material.

+ There are parts where the writing is so smooth I feel as if someone is talking to me from the page.

The best book about film director Stanley Kubrick there is as an individual. Whereas many biographies tend to simply give you a detailed filmography with little fun facts about behind the scenes events, KUBRICK by Michael Herr gives you a personal viewpoint of the subject rather than an objective viewpoint from someone who didn't know him as a person.

When seen objectively through historic context Kubrick has often been perceived as an odd and socially awkward man. This book being the only published personal recollection of his life, gives us the most truthful as well as personal view on Kubrick so far.
"They say he had no personal life, but that’s ridiculous. It would be more correct to say that he had no professional life, since everything he did was personally done"

The book is short and fun. It is simply Herr remembering several conversations between him and Stanley Kubrick. It reveals Kubrick as a more loving and social person than most people could ever imagine. Kubrick even tells Herr some rather unique jokes every now and then, revealing his social but still unusual character. “Hey Michael, what’s the definition of a neoconservative? A liberal who’s just been mugged, ha ha ha ha.”

(Shelfari review, 2010)

Michael Herr’s Kubrick is a follow-up to his Dispatches. Once a war correspondent, always a war correspondent.