“Moving Pictures” Book Review

Review: “Moving Pictures”

This 1990 book is the 10th in the 42-book Discworld series by Terry Prachett.

I’m only “reviewing” it here because Prachett has so many wonderful perspectives. The plot of the book is the (re-)discovery of cinema at Holy Wood, which leads to hijinks.

So here you go!

1. There’s a saying that all roads lead to Ankh-Morpork, greatest of Discworld cities. At least, there’s a saying that there’s a saying that all roads lead to Ankh-Morpork. And it’s wrong. All roads lead away from Ankh-Morpork, but sometimes people just walk along them the wrong way.
2. Wizards were just as uncooperative, but they also were by nature hierarchical and competitive. They needed organization. What was the good of being a wizard of the Seventh Level if you didn’t have six other levels to look down on and the Eighth Level to aspire to? You needed other wizards to hate and despise. 3.
3. Look,” said Silverfish, “the whole area’s been deserted for centuries. There’s nothing there. No people, no gods, no nothing. Just lots of sunlight and land, waiting for us. It’s our chance, lads. We’re not allowed to make magic, we can’t make gold, we can’t even make a living—so let’s make moving pictures. Let’s make history!”
4. Of course, it is very important to be sober when you take an exam. Many worthwhile careers in the street-cleansing, fruit-picking and subway-guitar-playing industries have been founded on a lack of understanding of this simple fact.
5. Take up carpentry, why don’t you? Holy Wood always needs good wood butchers.
6. The arrival of advertising: “And the sale of sausages leads you to believe you can make better moving pictures?” said Silverfish. “Anyone can sell sausages! Isn’t that so, Victor?” “Well…” said Victor, reluctantly. No one except Dibbler could possibly sell Dibbler’s sausages. “There you are, then,” said Silverfish. “The thing is,” said Victor, “that Mr. Dibbler can even sell sausages to people that have bought them off him before.” “That’s right!” said Dibbler. He beamed at Victor. “And a man who could sell Mr. Dibbler’s sausages twice could sell anything,” said Victor.
7. In the hot breathless darkness of a clapboard shack, Ginger Withel dreamed of red carpets and cheering crowds. And a grating. She kept coming back to a grating, in the dream, where a rush of warm air blew up her skirts . . .
8. Where a thousand elephants want to go, boss, they don’t need no roads.
9. Back to the Future came out in 1985.
10. And the inhabitants had done something, some sort of unspeakable crime not just against Mankind or the gods but against the very nature of the universe itself, which had been so dreadful that it had sunk beneath the sea one stormy night. Only a few people had survived to carry to the barbarian peoples in the less-advanced parts of the Disc all the arts and crafts of civilization, such as usury and macrame.
11. The whole of life is just like watching a click [movie], he thought. Only it’s as though you always get in ten minutes after the big picture has started, and no one will tell you the plot, so you have to work it all out yourself from the clues.
12. He grinned in the dark, and a sparkle of light twinkled on a tooth. Nothing created by Holy Wood magic was real for long. But you could make it real for long enough. Hooray for Holy Wood.

FIVE STARS 🙂