“B movie” had a precise meaning back in the day when a night at the cinema meant a newsreel, a cartoon and a double bill of feature films. The B was the bottom half of that bill, made on a tight budget with actors on their way up the ladder or heading back down again.
The B List: The National Society of Film Critics on the Low-Budget Beauties, Genre-Bending Mavericks and Cult Classics We Love (published by Da Capo Press) defines it subject broadly. Editors David Sterritt and John Anderson separate As from Bs not only by virtue of budget and cast but according to “their visions, their grit, and frequently—sometimes essentially—their lack of what the culture cops call ‘good taste.’”
That gives them lots of room to roam. The heart of The B List is a collection of critiques on a disconcertingly wide array of films. Some are Hollywood classics from the days when Bs usually served as warm-up acts for prestige pictures—great Bs such as Kiss Me Deadly and I Walked With the Zombie. Fifties science fiction (Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Red Planet Mars) makes the list, as do midnight movies from the ‘70s (PinkFlamingos, Eraserhead). On the other hand, some selections were prestigious in their day (To Live and Die in L.A., The Conversation) made by filmmakers of unmistakable A-List stature. Unaccountably, Oliver Stone makes The B List twice, for Platoon and Salvador.
One wonders by what coin-toss the selections were made. Fortunately, the reviews from a variety of respected critics (Roger Ebert, Richard Schickel, Jonathan Rosenbaum) are mostly apt and usually interesting. Despite its loose parameters, The B List will trigger readers to think a little more deeply about some of their favorite films and—possibly—discover a few new ones.
