An Orderly Man

Charming raconeteur Bogarde compiled this verbose series of essays about his "orderly" life straddling Europe and the Unites States...country gentleman and film star. He recounts incidents with wit and candor, such as the decline and deaths of his elderly parents and the struggles in making & marketing his film "The Night Porter." And yet, there is strangely (and disappointingly) very little of the man, himself, revealed in any of this. Other than the fact that he seems alternately laconic and easily annoyed, the reader is never given a sense of what Bogarde the man is really all about. This is certainly a book you CAN put down and pick up again later. I suspect a closer look at the real Dirk Bogarde can be found in his excellent film, "Despair."