A night at the movies, or, You must remember this : fictions

From Publishers Weekly The interlocking stories in this collection by the author of Gerald's Party follow the program of an old-style afternoon at the movies, with an adventure, a comedy, a musical and shorts. PW found that ''although too many of his imaginings are sophomoric and vulgar, a good deal of this book is as thrilling as a striking dream.'' Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Library Journal Coover here presents a series of short, connecting fictions associated with the cinema. Thus, we are given contrivances titled ''Adventure,'' ''Comedy,'' and ''Romance,'' but they violate our expectations of these time-honored forms: ''Shootout at Gentry's Junction'' is a typical Western, but the good guys lose; in ''Charlie in the House of Rue,'' a sort of funhouse, the tricks turn nasty, even murderous; and the romance in ''You Must Remember This'' sours into sordid adultery. These longer fictions are framed by shorter ones carrying out the cinematic conceit: there are previews, shorts, cartoons, even an intermission. Coover's style is viciously witty, so that one must finally ask ''What's the point?'' A brilliant but empty tour de force, though librarians should still consider this new work by the author of the well-received Gerard's Party ( LJ 2/1/86).Susan Avallone, ''Library Journal'' Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Hollywood B-movies to Hollywood classics, A Night at the Movies invents what "might have happened" in these Saturday afternoon matinees. Mad scientists, vampires, cowboys, dance-men, Chaplin, and Bogart, all flit across Robert Coover's riotously funny screen, doing things and uttering lines that are as shocking to them as they are funny to the reader. As Coover's Program announces, you will get Coming Attractions, The Weekly Serial, Adventure, Comedy, Romance, and more, but turned upside-down and inside-out.

"Robert Coover has made literary art out of a total immersion in the movies. He isn't merely recycling old movie plots or drawing on the glamorous atmosphere of Hollywood. Rather, what he's doing is enlarging his literary technique by forcing it to assimilate cinematic conventions and to approximate filmic style. . . . Vivacious and entertaining." (Edmund White, New York Times Book Review 2-1-87)

"Brazenly witty." (John Clute, Times Literary Supplement)

"Vintage Hollywood nostalgia, pure and potent, unsullied and safe, like sex in some back row of the cinema of the mind . . . a brilliantly malicious tribute to the mesmeric powers of film." (Lorna Sage, The Observer)

"As thrilling as a striking dream." (Publishers Weekly 10-31-86)

"All our darkest wants, fears, dreams and myths are here in that magnificent celluloid palace no VCR will ever replace. . . . Coover's molded sentences and dire sentiences awe me." (James R. Frakes, Cleveland Plain Dealer 3-87)