Gehring Beside Himself by Wes D. Gehring
'Gehring Beside Himself: More Selected Essays' by Wes D. Gehring
Wes D. Gehring taught at Indiana’s Ball State University for many years, and even though he once gave a lecture at the Sorbonne, he never succumbed to the “cultural studies” craze that infected academic film studies after the ‘70s. In other words, he has always been a historian grounded in facts, analyzing movies without recourse to quasi-lofty obscurantist “theory.” Put it another way: he was probably a good teacher.
Gehring has also been a prolific writer, an indefatigable researcher as well as an essayist. He didn’t write to impress but wrote to be understood, serving that goal as a columnist for USA Today. Two new books collect a file cabinet of miscellaneous writings, Gehring Lost & Found: Selected Essays and Gehring Beside Himself: More Selected Essays.
Some of his pieces dial down on particular films. His article on The Third Man sorts through misstatements over who was responsible for one of cinema’s masterpieces by Orson Welles and the pioneering oral historian of Hollywood’s golden age, Peter Bogdanovich. Welles provided the film with a charmingly sinister persona, but Gehring ascribes most of the credit to director Carol Reed with help from writer Graham Greene. The Third Man was noir in the ruins of post-World War II Vienna, and unlike most Hollywood noir, Britain’s Reed refused to paste a happy ending to the final scene.
Other essays explore broader pictures. “Charlie Chaplin & Buster Keaton: Comic Antihero Extremes During the 1920s” contrasts those silent stars who made the world laugh without uttering a word. “Play It Again Sam: Bogey as a Fairy Godfather” analyzes Woody Allen’s use of “fantasy established in terms of physical reality” as well as that writer-director’s view of fantasy as a steppingstone to maturity. Our role models should enable us to become ourselves, not an imitation.
Gehring wears his knowledge without a show of pretense and doesn’t assume knowledge from his readers. Like a good teacher, he helps his readers understand his points through clarity and a careful marshaling of information. Both books are published by BearManor Media.
