An Army of Phantoms: American Movies and the Making of the Cold War

By "tell[ing] the story not just of what's on the screen but of what played out behind it” (The American Scholar), Hoberman orchestrates a colorful, sometimes surreal pageant wherein Cecil B. DeMille rubs shoulders with Douglas MacArthur, atomic tests are shown on live TV, God talks on the radio, and Joe McCarthy is bracketed with Marilyn Monroe. From cavalry Westerns, apocalyptic sci-fi flicks, and biblical spectaculars, movies to media events, congressional hearings and political campaigns, An Army of Phantoms "remind[s] you what criticism is supposed to be: revelatory, reflective and as rapturous as the artwork itself" (Time Out New York).