Roger Ebert Tagged Articles at Cinematical

(Full disclosure: current Cinematical Managing Editor Scott Weinberg and Cinematical co-founder Karina Longworth, now editor of Spout.com, make brief appearances in this film.)

Some documentaries demand to be seen on the big screen; others are best discovered while channel surfing. Gerald Peary's For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism falls into the latter category.

On the film's official site, Peary declares his doc to be "an unapologetic defense of a profession under siege." It's filled with talking head interviews with critics whose bylines are more familiar than their faces: A.O. Scott, J. Hoberman, Lisa Schwarzbaum, Owen Gleiberman, Kenneth Turan, and many others. It's a treat to see the best-known film critic on the planet, Roger Ebert, give a never-before-seen interview. The sound bites are distinctive, the insider's perspective is refreshing, the historical overview is welcome, and the overall impression is positive.

Here's the sticking point: For the Love of Movies features an academic approach to the subject. Unless you have a great interest in film criticism, it feels like you're watching a term paper. Peary is both a long-time film studies professor at Suffolk University and a film critic for The Boston Phoenix, an alternative weekly, and is obviously not the first film critic to direct a movie.

Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut were critics before they made movies; so were fellow French New Wave directors Claude Chabrol, Eric Rohmer, and Jacques Rivette. The difference is that they were younger men in rebellion; Peary is an older man more interested in defending his longtime colleagues from charges that film criticism is no longer relevant or needed.

As someone who watches most new releases, I wind up listening to critics on the margins. If the logline and advertising make a movie look brutal, and I'm not obligated to see it, I'll sometimes skip the screening (if there is one) and wait for the critics to weigh in. If the reviews are middling-to-decent, I'll bite the bullet and go. If they seem to confirm my initial impression, I might let that particular film pass.

Except sometimes that method fails me. As I've learned over the years, and as an experience last week proved for me beyond a shadow of a doubt, the mainstream critical establishment is not to be trusted when it comes to comedies; in particular, when it comes to the type of comedy that conceals intelligence under a sophomoric facade. Time and again, I've seen comedies panned, gone anyway, discovered a smart and funny gem, and wondered what the hell everyone's problem is.

An example. James Berardinelli introduces Fired Up! with this horrifying line: "Move over, Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer!" "No one in this movie has an idea in their bubbly little brains," moans Roger Ebert. The Detroit News' Tom Long calls it the latest in "a million-mile-long line of purposely dumb adolescent sex comedies" (though he does give the film a C+ for not being "painful"). On and on like that, to 30% on the tomatometer.

Ebert's 'Answer Man' column has gotten kind of weird over the years; Ebert's developed a weekly tendency to bust out at least one answer that ranges from cryptic to completely incomprehensible. But I still read it religiously. I also watched Ebert's television show religiously until he departed, and even then I still tried to tune in when someone interesting sat across the aisle from Roeper -- A.O. Scott, say.

This week on Answer Man, a reader asks our host to track his show's ever-changing titles throughout the years, starting with "Sneak Previews," becoming the unwieldy "Siskel & Ebert & the Movies," and meeting its inglorious end as "Doofus & His Guest," or something like that. Ebert dutifully responds, appending this to the end of his answer: "Another chapter to this saga will begin when Richard and I shortly announce a new movie review program."

Fantastic! How? Ebert's made no secret of the fact that he is unable to speak. And the Roeper-and-rotating-stand-in schtick led to declining ratings and the show's demise. I'm envisioning bizarre alternatives like Ebert reading his reviews through his voice synthesizer, Hawking-style, or hiring a troupe of actors to theatrically interpret them. More realistically, I suspect there might be a rotating panel of critics, with Roeper a regular presence, with a special "A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney"-style segment where someone reads some always-welcome thoughts from Roger.

Anyway, I'll certainly give it a shot. I do think there's room for a smart, Ben-Lyons-free movie review show -- and though I take my share of digs at Roeper, and though I wouldn't go out of my way to watch him, I don't dislike the guy. Would you watch another Roeper-led affair? And, any thoughts on how Ebert might be involved?

Apart from the filmmakers themselves, I can't think of many people who have championed directors more than Roger Ebert, who for 40 years has been an outspoken supporter of filmmaking not just as entertainment but as an art form. And the Directors Guild of America agrees: The group announced today that on Jan. 31, Ebert will receive its Honorary Life Member Award.

He will be the 43rd person (and the first film critic) in the DGA's 61-year history to be given the award, which is "for recognition of outstanding creative achievement, or contribution to the Guild, or the profession of directing." Michael Apted, current president of the DGA and a frequent recipient of Ebert's praise for his own films, said in a press release, "From the blockbuster to the tiny independent film, Roger Ebert has devoted his career to sharing his love of film with generations of moviegoers. In doing so, he's kept directors on their toes for more than 40 years. I am very pleased to welcome him as an Honorary Life Member of the DGA."

Ebert said, "It is a great honor to be chosen by those men and women who are the creators of the art form I love above all others," though I suspect we'll see a more detailed response in his blog.

With the mild controversy of "Minutegate" now behind him, Roger Ebert now turns his sights on a much more welcome target -- Ben Lyons. Not that Ebert ever calls him out by name, mind you, but this cata-blog of professional guidelines for fellow and fledgling critics resembles a list of do's and don'ts for those less than eager to resemble a certain someone whose contributions to the field are so very often deemed worthless.

On the flipside, it's also an opportunity for readers to consider what a critic does, how (s)he does it, and what they should expect from any reasonable reviewer. For example, Ebert acknowledges that we're not here to tell you what you might like/love/hate, but rather to assess what we like/love/hate and its greater context in the medium or culture, and while that may seem selfish, to be an objective consumer guide is more an ideal than the idea behind our occupation. On the other hand, our reviews should be adequate enough for even those who disagree to make their own consideration beyond "whatever critics say, I'll do the opposite."

He also makes suggestions both reasonable -- mind the hyperbole -- and relatively tougher -- revealing though they may be, actively avoiding trailers on my part would be a handicap more than anything. Towards the end, Ebert's last suggestion is to "sit down, shut up, and pay attention", which isn't to say that we can't enjoy ourselves as well. (It IS saying "stop asking for so many damn pictures.")

The necessary background is here. Last week, Roger Ebert posted a one-star review of the indie drama Tru Loved. At the end of the scathing piece, he revealed that he had only watched 8 minutes of the film -- and that "after that, you're on your own." In a blog entry, he defended the review on aesthetic grounds: he placed the revelation at the end because it worked there. That post generated some 500 comments, and Will's post here a somewhat less impressive 17, splitting pretty evenly between commenters who sympathized with Ebert's life's-too-short impulse, and those who thought giving one star to a film he quit on, and hiding his dereliciton of duty at the bottom of the review, was not cool.

In a follow-up entry, Ebert agrees that it wasn't cool. He insists it wasn't unethical, but admits he shouldn't have done it. As penance, he watched the rest of the film and added a section to his review. "I will never, ever, again review a film I have not seen in its entirety," he says. "Never. Ever."

It seems to me that there has to be a middle ground here. There's nothing wrong with quitting on a film and then writing about it, perhaps shedding light on why you walked out. But you have to front it. And you can't claim it's a review -- that means no star ratings. I walked out of The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor and wrote about how awful it was. I don't think I did anything wrong. But I didn't pretend to be reviewing it.

That said, Ebert's addendum to his original "review" is characteristically insightful and well worth reading. And by the way: has anyone actually seen Tru Loved? What's its deal?

Earlier this week, Roger Ebert posted with his new batch of reviews one for the indie film Tru Loved, of which I personally know little aside from its opening in limited release this past Friday. Ebert's review is included among the six currently constituting that film's dead-even Tomatometer.

The twist is, Ebert admits to only having made it through the first eight minutes of the film before shutting it off. Normally, that's not exactly cricket, but considering how many movies he's seen, how many reviews he's written, how many Pulitzer Prizes he's won (and occasionally brandished), for him to say within that span of time that "I'm sure its heart is in the right place, but it fails at fundamentals we take for granted when we go to the movies" carries an appropriate heft. After all, he admits that "the rating only applies to the first eight minutes. After that, you're on your own."

He has subsequently linked to a lively blog discussion in which he defends his decision, while others chime in (most with careful consideration; others insist that Ebert should quit for such shenanigans). How about you guys: what's the earliest that you've ever given up on a movie (let's stick with theatrical experiences, as opposed to flippant channel surfing)? Are you cool with any reviewer pulling something like this, so long as they're open about it? What about when it's such an illustrious critic as Ebert throwing in the towel?

Somehow I missed this on Thursday, but apparently so did everyone else, since I didn't see it linked anywhere. Roger Ebert was hanging out at a post-production studio in Chicago, watching the restored new print of The Godfather, when he was unexpectedly joined by Larry and Andy Wachowski, the famously inaccessible duo behind The Matrix, Speed Racer, and (people forget) Bound. Afterward, he got a chance to chat with them -- not in a conventional interview setting, complete with a hovering publicist (the brothers don't do that, remember?), but over a beer.

Ebert was impressed with the "zillionaires": "Nice people. Friendly. No Hollywood attitude." He writes that "[t]he blogosphere paints them as mysterious recluses, which may add to the legend but doesn't match the reality." But their being nice and friendly doesn't make them any less mysterious and reclusive: I'd wager that Ebert only ran the piece because of their reputation for not giving interviews or talking to anyone in the press.

Anyway, it's really interesting to "hear" them speak, though they mostly talk about the difficulties of keeping a moving 35 mm shot in focus and the brilliance of Coppola's Godfather shot selection. It's funny how keeping silent for a while will make such brief, mundane snippets into objects of arcane fascination. (Though since I think the Wachowskis are pretty formidable visual artists themselves, I find their perspective on that sort of thing interesting in its own right.)

No photo, of course; all you get is that old shot of the two admiring a Matrix comic book.

It must be said, right off the bat: We all have bad days, we all behave obnoxiously sometimes, and (once in a while) we all do really stupid things that we regret big-time three seconds later. Having said that, it simply must be asked: Lou Lumenick ... what the &%!#$ing &$)# were you thinking? I hesitate to even write about this story, but since a dozen other movie sites have picked up on it, we'd be a little tacky if we just brushed it under the carpet. Plus, hey, it's interesting.

Anyway, according to various sources, NY Post film critic Lou Lumenick got into a brief altercation with Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert during a press screening at the Toronto Film Festival. More specifically (and allegedly, I suppose I should say), it seems that Lou ignored numerous shoulder taps from Roger, and then -- in a fit of full-bore film critic snittiness -- whirled around and landed a half-solid pop on Ebert's noggin, er, knee. The weapon was some sort of portfolio or rolled-up program.

For his part, Roger Ebert has been (as usual) the epitome of class. At first he tried to keep the situation quiet, but once word got out, he penned this explanation. And since the guy already has a Pultizer, I say he now deserves a nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize. Because let me tell you right now: If I was struck silent by a throat malady and the PROFESSIONAL FILM WATCHER in front of me refused to turn around and at least acknowledge my simple request, well, then I suspect we'd be reading blog posts about how "Cinematical Film Critic Scott Weinberg Just Wrapped a Fire Hydrant Around the Head of an Unidentifiable Man."

And for HIS part, Lou Lumenick has remained distressingly silent. Whether or not the guy was dead-wrong or drop-dead apologetic, there's no excuse for him not addressing the story by this point. Something along the lines of "Dear sweet lord, was I an asshole the other morning. I'm really, truly sorry" published on the New York Post editorial page should just about do it. Me? I'd have written that email six minutes after the incident occurred. Before sending it to every movie site, blog, and message board in the universe.

As an opinionated cinephile, Roger Ebert has every right to dislike 3-D movies. And recently, on his blog, Roger Ebert's Journal, he wrote about such disfavor. Basically, in response to accidentally missing the press screening for the new animated 3-D flick Fly Me to the Moon, he admits that, because of a certain prejudice against the format, he likely wouldn't have enjoyed the movie anyway.

My issue here is not to attack Ebert's opinion or his belief that after half a century of dissatisfaction with the format he's never going to change his mind about it. He's free to express both. And while I disagree and am disappointed, I would never claim that Ebert doesn't know what he's talking about. He's certainly smarter about film than I'll ever be, and his opinions are far more respected than my own.

However, Ebert is also one of the most widely read film critics in the world, and therefore he is a pretty influential person when it comes to the subject of movies. And I would hate for moviegoers to dismiss the new wave of 3-D movies simply because of Ebert's stance on the format. So, I merely intend to respond to his opinion with an opinion of my own, as apparently one of the wider read gushers on the topic of digital 3-D.