Play like a pro with expert knowledge from a champion of the game

If you don't know the ins and outs of play, bridge can seem like an intimidating game--but it doesn't have to be! Armed with the techniques and strategies in the pages of this book, you'll be bidding and winning hands like a boss! A good book for beginners, it has lots of advanced techniques useful to experienced players, too. This is as  close to an all-in-one bridge book you can get.

 

 

About the Author

H. Anthony Medley holds the rank of Silver life Master, is an American Contract Bridge League Club Director, and has won regional and sectional titles. An attorney, he received his B.S. from UCLA, where he was sports editor of UCLA's Daily Bruin, and his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law. He is the author of UCLA Basketball: The Real Story and Sweaty Palms: The Neglected Art of Being Interviewed and The Complete Idiots Guide to Bridge. He was a columnist for the Southern California Bridge News. He is an MPAA-certified film critic and his work has appeared nationally in Good Housekeeping, The Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Magazine, The Hollywood Reporter, and other publications. Click the book to order.
 

  

 

Emma (9/10)

by Tony Medley

117 minutes.

PG

I see lots of repugnant movies, some so bad that were it not for the joy of writing a scathing review, I would turn in my cleats. This is one that were I not a critic I never would have viewed. A Jane Austen novel published in 1815?

So I thank my lucky stars that I’m still a critic because this is an entrancing film, even if it is set in the 18th-19th century. Directed by Autumn de Wilde from a screenplay by Eleanor Catton, Anya Taylor-Joy is a, well, joy in the titular role. She is beautiful and haughty and self-possessed, dominating the lives of everyone around her.

While it might be hard to believe that the story about four families who live in the English countryside would be anything but mundane, this movie surprises at every level. Even though it’s over two hours long, it is so well-directed that time passes quickly. Added to the enjoyment are delightful music (David Schweitzer and Isobel Waller-Bridge) and wonderful cinematography (Christopher Blauvelt) of Tetbury, a small town and civil parish within the Cotswold district of the locations in Gloucestershire, England, and Chavenage House, an Elizabethan era house northwest of Tetbury. The house was built in 1576 and is constructed of Cotswold stone, with a Cotswold stone tiled roof.

One of my favorite scenes in all of film is when Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer fall in love dancing “The Leandler” in The Sound of Music (1965). That is replicated here when Emma and Mr. Knightley dance together near the end of the film. It is a beautiful, touching scene that I could watch over and over.

But what is probably the most captivating is the polite dialogue that permeates throughout the film. Maybe the proper way these people act towards one another isn’t as catchy as the highly accented Fargo (1996), but it is enchanting. Bravo Eleanor Catton! This movie just sailed by with outstanding performances also by Johnny Flynn as George Knightley, who is constantly criticizing Emma, Mia Goth as Harriet, Emma’s great friend whom she dominates but who worships her, the always special Bill Nighy as Emma’s father, Mr. Woodhouse, and a distinctive performance by Gemma Whelan as Mrs. Weston, who Emma finds so terribly annoying. Of all the performances, and I was enthralled by them all, I think that Whelan’s is the best, and that’s not to diminish Taylor-Joy, who carries the movie, or the others. In fact, I foresee Oscars® in Taylor-Joy’s future. I’m not going out on a limb to say that this is already one of the three best films I will see this year.

 

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