Which film critics do you trust (if any?)

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Steven Seagal cheat sheet:

Any Seagal movie where you can say "Steven Seagal IS..." and then the name of the movie, it's a good one.

I fear I may have lost my film critic trust forever with that one.

haha i have made that exact joke!

It was originally told to me by a surgeon from Philadelphia who was obsessed with Steven Seagal.

Maybe it comes from some standup comedian :(

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steven seagal IS exit wounds

I hardly ever listen to music without doing something else, but I can't imagine watching a movie and doing something else. Last time I tried was with The Life Aquatic, and while I'm pretty sure I wasn't missing out on a cinematic masterpiece by cleaning my living room while the DVD was on, I still can't intelligently talk about that movie at all, since it's just kind of blurry in my mind.

Last night I watched The Host while exercising.

'm pretty sure I wasn't missing out on a cinematic masterpiece

you weren't

Also, I've made the same complaint on ILX about how few film critics really examine acting and was met with "You should read David Thomson."

I listened to music while watching the visual for Seabiscuit on an airplane. Pretty sure I caught everything.

Perhaps it's because acting is more mysterious than the other film crafts? Also, very few readers want a technical breakdown of what you can see an actor doing (even if the critic is capable of one). Which mostly leaves waxing poetic about, eg, the performer's personality.

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Merry Xmas, Morbius.
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I wonder if this is any good? http://www.amazon.com/O-K-You-Mugs-Writers-Actors/dp/0375401016

I only read Ebert out of any of the critics, and I don't often read critics. Prefer to trawl through genres and directors and avoid the reviewers generally.

Predictably, Anthony Lane and AO Scott.

There are some pretty good pieces in there, Ken, but nothing super compelling. You can find it almost anywhere for 4 or 5 dollars, though.

Has anyone read James Naremore's book on acting? I started it but got distracted by other things.

Haha, C0l1n, that's how I became aware of it, I saw it at the Strand on the sale pile. I bought it and gave it to somebody as a present, along with Joseph McBride's Searching For John Ford which was sitting right next to it.

I listened to music while watching the visual for Seabiscuit on an airplane. Pretty sure I caught everything.

-- da croupier, Wednesday, December 12, 2007 6:50 PM (2 weeks ago) Bookmark Link

you missed out on some pretty hardcore sound design. you can really hear the horse sweat.

Rosenbaum soon to retire from Chi Reader:

http://daily.greencine.com/archives/005163.html

That would make amateur1st happy, if he were still around.

i assumed rosenbaum was sub-50

I hope that, without the responsibility of a regular review schedule, his writing will get interesting again.

It's late to say something, but Edelstein's contrast of Boys Don't Cry and Brokeback Mountain in that interview seems a little disingenuous. The hook of Boys Don't Cry is dread, an emotional engine that can overwhelm all other responses to a movie, and it ends in horrifying violence--I loved the film, and don't particularly want to see it again. The violence in Brokeback is offscreen, unexpected (or at least unprimed-for), and comes at the end of a story about one great love, a forbidden love, and romantic regret. Why one movie was the bigger hit is a no-brainer.

Should there have been more bodily fluids in Brokeback (other than spit)? Maybe, but that holds the movie to a standard that virtually no one applies to hetero love stories. And what's wrong with a beautiful backdrop? Ugly-industrial equals realistic? And how is a cowboy milieu automatically phony Americana? I found both pictures pretty painfully credible and recognizable, right down to their respective awkward sex scenes.

I did share Edelstein's revulsion at Natural Born Killers, but if I missed some deeper satire, it was because I'd just been attacked on the street a few days earlier, and had a typical PTS response, pretty much shaking in anger. Maybe the problem is that Stone seems to revel in, and enjoy rubbing our faces in, just about everything he puts on the screen.

I just sat in front of J-Ro at Tati's "Jour de Fete."

<I> Has anyone read James Naremore's book on acting? </i> yes, it's brilliant, read it.

as for rosenbaum, i'm not pleased or displeased that he's retiring. there's no one at the reader who can really replace him. i guess i'd prefer rosenbaum with his increasingly-evident flaws to the relatively anonymous other critics on the paper (pat graham is not anonymous but he can be v. irritating; the others don't strike me as having anything interesting to say).

rosenbaum has trouble with sustained argument. that's probably why he's never written a real book. i suppose this isn't a flaw, since other critics i like haven't written books and are better at pithy reviews... but in rosenbaum's case there seems to be (esp. over the past 15 years) a real problem with basic reasoning, or the lack thereof. he doesn't seem to pose counterarguments to himself and so his positions on things seem barely thought-through. sometimes, as with the big bergman flap, it can be really embarrassing.

"in rosenbaum's case there seems to be (esp. over the past 15 years) a real problem with basic reasoning, or the lack thereof. he doesn't seem to pose counterarguments to himself and so his positions on things seem barely thought-through."

Yeah, you should talk to someone who has had to edit him sometime (or so I've heard).

what Edelstein interview is Pete referring to?

Ha, that makes me feel better about my tiny Rosenbaum anecdote

I like ebert to be honest

Rosenbaum retirement anthology page:

http://www.chicagoreader.com/features/stories/jrosenbaum/

Being able to retire the moment you turn 65 seems like a rare luxury.

That's some dynamic YouTube video right there.

i literally couldn't even bear to read him for the last 3-4 years but he was right on about AI and i still have a few of his books lying around.

Cinematic "So Not Gonna Happen"

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OMG, I just realized J.Ro =

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damn, you ARE heartless...

He sat in front of me at a Tati film 2 months ago, and I never came close to throwing him from the train. (maybe if he'd been in a bathrobe)

more and more bad news for dead-tree film writing in NYC... Newsday is letting its 2 chief critics go, and now Nathan Lee has been fired by the Voice.

"I am, as they say, 'looking for work,' though presumably not as a staff film critic as such jobs no longer appear to exist."

http://www.thereeler.com/the_blog/lower_your_voice_nathan_lee.php

fuck. one of the best dudes out there. VV love dem penny-a-line 22-year-olds.

why why why would they fire nathan lee? i hope he keeps his film comment gigs.

According to the comments at The Reeler and The House Next Door, Luke Y. Thompson is not a film "critic" to be trusted on a personal level, to say nothing about his taste or lack thereof.

luke y thompson should get clocked with a 2x4 imo

According to the comments at The Reeler and The House Next Door, Luke Y. Thompson is not a film "critic" to be trusted on a personal level,

Why's that -- he'll squeeze your cock and talk about it at the water cooler the next day?

Lolololol

writer/critic/actor/director/pundit

bummerz. i like nathan lee if only for making southland tales his no. 1 movie of '07. (which even i agree is sort of an insane thing to say, but i respect the impulse.)