Film review
stone reader
The documentary, like the musical (I refer to "Chicago," which won Best Picture at the Academy Awards last month), might be making a comeback.
While no documentary is likely to do as well at the box office as did "Bowling for Columbine" (which won Best Documentary last month) for some time, "Stone Reader" is a worthwhile documentary film.
In "Stone Reader" filmmaker Mark Moskowitz chronicles his self-admittedly obsessive search for Dow Mossman, the author of the obscure and out-of-print 1972 coming-of-age novel The Stones of Summer. Despite having received good reviews for his first novel, Mossman dropped out of sight and never published again. When Moskowitz started his quest, he was not sure whether Mossman was still alive (I ain't saying whether Mossman is still with us or not).
While he searches for Mossman (I ain't telling whether he ever finds him or not), Moskowitz interviews a variety of people about Mossman, The Stones of Summer and the phenomenon of the novel.
On the film's Web site Moskowitz comments, "While some see Mossman’s silence as an abandonment of talent, others see it as part of a larger dilemma: the course American literature has taken over the last thirty years, the demise of the novel in the digital age, and, as reading wanes, the conversion of the book from reading object to collectible."
Even a mildly bibliophilic individual should enjoy "Stone Reader," which takes us back to our youth, when we didn't have to slave for The Man to support ourselves and had time to read books.
Probably the largest flaw of "Stone Reader" is that Moskowitz tells us that The Stones of Summer had a profound impact upon him, but he does tell us in any real detail why that is. Indeed, for a documentary revolving around a novel, Moskowitz does not even give us a sketchy plotline of the novel; all that he shares with us is the novel's first paragraph.
Nor can we easily discover the plotline for ourselves because the novel is, as Moskowitz tells us, nearly impossible to obtain. (I checked amazon.com and e-bay; unsurprisingly, the novel is not available on amazon, and as I write this only one paperback copy and two hardback copies are available on e-bay, with starting bids ranging from $100 to $500.)
Still, Moskowitz keeps us interested in his quirky search for Dow Mossman for more than two hours, and given that "Stone Reader" is competing with war-as-entertainment, that's a remarkable achievement.
I highly recommend "Stone Reader." Don't wait for the book.
My grade: A
Note: "Stone Reader" is in limited release. See the film's Website for cities in which it is playing.
2:58:56 PM 
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