The movie of the week : private stories/public events /

Rapping (Adelphi Univ.), an increasingly prolific writer about television, here addresses fans and intellectuals alike. If not entirely successful, she has nonetheless attained much of her goal, particularly in an introductory essay that is worth the price of the book. She wished to inquire into a mass medium from the angle of feminism and thus chose the made-for-TV movie for its capacity for "the domestication of social issues." She aptly calls herself a "public intellectual," bent upon taking seriously the medium but using an accessible language free of scholarly cant. Rapping likes the genre of made-for-TV movies for its taking up "serious issues" in a form that genuinely affects its target audience, perhaps even moving it to action "affective empowerment," she calls it. As examples she notes both the morning-after actions of viewers reported in the press and testimony such as that of a girl who felt suddenly confident in her sports skills after watching Cagney and Lacey. In this way TV movies become "women's movies" in that otherwise "unrealized political ideals" are set afoot in the minds of viewers as "cognitive mappings" (quoting Frederic Jameson). A small book, it glosses historical antecedents, empirical data, and other scholarly conventions, but engages the reader through anecdotes drawn from responses of the author's students. Useful index and very current bibliography. Both general and academic readers at all levels. T. Cripps; Morgan State University

Made-for-television movies, Rapping argues cogently and thoughtfully, probe serious issues better than most other TV genres. A professor of communications at Adelphi University, Rapping consigns heavy academic discussion to a long introduction, though she makes her feminist and media theories accessible throughout the book. Theatrical films are increasingly aimed at youths who want to get out of the house and at men who usually decide what a couple will view. TV movies, which often are shown only once, can take more risks, Rapping notes, and cater more to women, the primary shoppers. She's aware of the contradictions in TV movies: serious themes are sold through sex and violence, and a concentration on family themes, even in histories like Roots , ``trivialize issues of power and money.'' But some films, like Roe vs. Wade , recreate histories lost to many viewers, including her students. Rapping also suggests that the subtle, psychologically insightful narrative structure of film serves, in contrast to the more straightforward plots of TV movies, to ``deny the existence of a relevant larger community.'' She compares theatrical and TV films in several genres; a TV movie like Lois Gibbs and the Love Canal, she argues, is far more feminist than Silkwood. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved