'Siskel & Ebert' at 50

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Siskel & Ebert, the folks over at RogerEbert.com asked a bunch of writers and critics to reflect on the show's legacy. You can read my thoughts, and everyone else's, here. 

What Great 2015 Movies Are Flying Under the Radar?

Over at Criticwire, I contributed to the latest survey, which asked, "Before we drown in award-season heavyweights, what should you see?" It's a question at the forefront of many critics' minds, as we're all in heavy catch-up mode with movies we missed from earlier in 2015. (I'm particularly panic-stricken this year.) My responses, as of those from my colleagues, can be found right here.

What Non-Horror Movies Scare You the Most?

For this week's Criticwire survey, we were asked to name the movie that scares us the most -- that isn't a horror movie. I'm down with all the people that picked Safe, but I decided to cheat and name a music video from my youth that still gives me the willies. Read the whole survey here.

Giving the Greatest Directors a Filmmaking Challenge

For the latest Criticwire survey, Sam Adams asks what directors we'd love to see be forced to put aside their usual tricks when making their latest film. (Yes, the question is reminiscent of the great Five Obstructions.) I tweaked the question slightly for my response, writing about my fascination with filmmakers who go to foreign lands to tell their stories. You can read my answer (and everyone else's) here.

Movies for Hard Times

With the recent events in Ferguson and Staten Island, what films should people watch to work through their grief and anger? That's the question posed in this week's Criticwire survey. I answered it in a sorta roundabout way. You can read my response -- as well as other writers' -- right here.

What Movie Would I Want to See Over and Over Again in a Theater?

This week's Criticwire survey asks the question: If you had the clout to have one movie screen at a theater whenever you wanted, what would it be? "None," I would probably say: I don't like seeing the same movie (even my favorites) that often. But then I thought about it some more, and I arrived at an answer. You can read my response here -- along with my fellow critics'.

What Are the Year's Most Underrated Movies?

This week's Criticwire survey asks for people to pick their top films of the year so far. I decided, instead, to focus on five films I think have been overlooked. You can read my answer (and everyone else's) here. (I'm on Page 2.)

How Should a Critic Handle Spoilers?

Recently, I wrote about The Raid 2 and mentioned that the main character's brother dies. This happens in the first minute of the film. And yet, a commenter fumed, "Ugh. What the f***. Thanks for the spoiler(s?) - stopped reading after the finding out his brother was dead." Readers care a lot about spoilers, which is why this week's Criticwire survey was of particular interest. The question: How should critics treat plot spoilers in their reviews? My response, as well as my colleagues', is here.

The Best Non-2013 Discovery of 2013

This week's Criticwire Survey asks the question, "What's the best piece of non-2013 culture you discovered in 2013?" This seemed like a perfect opportunity to write about seeing the revival of Einstein on the Beach in Los Angeles this year. Hope you enjoy.

My Most Anticipated Movie of 2014

A lot of films could fit this description, but in the latest Criticwire survey, I went with one I've already seen -- but had real reservations about. (By the way, last year for this question, I selected 12 Years a Slave. Pretty decent pick, yes?)

When the Soundtrack Is Better Than the Movie

For this week's Criticwire survey at IndieWire, writers were asked to name a movie in which the soundtrack/score was superior to the actual film. This was a pretty easy one for me to answer, but there are lots of fun responses, all of which you can read here. (For the record, I actually have a fondness for TRON: Legacy, so the great Daft Punk score wasn't a contender for me.)

Stanley Kauffmann, Film Critic, 1916-2013

Stanley Kauffmann, in 1974 from "Why I'm Not Bored," on the value of movies:

"Concurrent with our lives runs this muddied, quasi-strangulated, prostituted art, so lifecrammed and responsive and variegated and embracing, so indefinable no matter how long one strings out phrases like these, that to deny it seems to me to deny the worst and the best in yourself, a chance to help clarify which is which, and which is in the ascendant on any particular day. No matter how much I know about a film's makers or its subject before I go, I never really know what it's going to do to me: depress me with its vileness, or just roll past, or change my life in some degree, or some combination of all three, or affect me in some new way that I cannot imagine. So I like being asked whether filmgoing ever gets boring: it makes me think of what I don't know about the next film I'm going to see."

Roger Ebert, in 1997 from Roger Ebert's Book of Film, on Kauffmann's skill as a critic:

"He is the sanest of critics and the one most likely to place any film within its wider context of literature, philosophy, art, or politics. I read other critics for their insights, their writing, or simply to see what they think; I don't much care whether I agree with them or not. But when I read Kauffmann, who became a regular weekly destination for me five years before I wrote my own first reviews, more is at stake; on important films, if we agree, I am gratified, and if we disagree, I am likely to go back to my own review and have another uneasy look at it. It's not that I assume he is right and I am wrong; it's that after Kauffmann disagrees, I wonder if he was perhaps more right."

Stanley Kauffmann, the longtime film critic for The New Republic, died this morning. 

What Movie Would You Consider a Game-Changer?

That's the question posed in this week's Criticwire Survey over at IndieWire. I knew what my answer would be immediately. You can see my response, as well as my critic colleagues', right here.

francis ford coppola doesn't want critics calling him pretentious

In an interview with Movieline's Kyle Buchanan, Francis Ford Coppola talks about how he deals with criticism:

What I look for with critics is more that they’re going to write about something I did and I’m gonna read it and not make those mistakes again, I’m gonna learn something from it. Often, though, they don’t do that: they say, “It’s a muddled mess.” “It’s pretentious.” I can’t learn a lot from someone saying “It’s pretentious.”

(I'm sure most people will be more interested in the part of this interview where Coppola says there should have only been one Godfather film.)

away we go: what other critics had to say

I already linked to my own review of Away We Go, the forthcoming Sam Mendes film. Let's take a look at what the other trades had to say -- and what I thought of what they thought.


Dennis Harvey of Variety:

Burt's a bit immature, and Verona, the grown-up of the couple, occasionally impatient (partly explained by the discomforts of advanced pregnancy). But the protags are essentially blank slates, despite the skill and charm Krasinski and Rudolph bring to the roles. It's their job simply to represent "normal" against so many illustrations of bad parenting, worse marriages and damaged adulthood. But given they're such harmlessly pleasant folk, why don't they have any non-messed-up friends?

Because that would un-stack the deck in a script that needs to paint them as two lonely souls in a hostile world. But in positing normal as special, the pic requires caricaturing almost everyone else.

While handled by resourceful actors, the foibles of the supporting characters are less funny than they are forced and unpleasant. Janney and Gyllenhaal in particular play figures venomously conceived.

I think Dennis is right about the caricaturing that goes on in some of the supporting roles. It's worse early on in the film, which doesn't make the road trip look all that promising for the viewer. But I do think Away We Go eventually eases up on the freak-show exhibits and starts getting into some honest emotions.

And while I agree about Janney, I thought Gyllenhaal was dead-on as the smug, more-enlightened-than-thou New Wave hippie. I've met these people, and she got it exactly right.

Michael Rechtshaffen of The Hollywood Reporter:

Obviously each destination offers a snapshot of the various challenges inherent in carving out the family unit one would like to create as opposed to the family into which one was born. But though it's nice to see Mendes take a looser, not quite so studied approach to his filmmaking, some stops along the way -- like a detour to visit Burt's suddenly single brother (Paul Schneider) -- feel dramatically off-course.

Production values have a nice, grassroots texture, including Ellen Kuras' cinematography and John Dunn's costume design, though musically the film could have packed a bit lighter where the extensive and occasionally intrusive acoustic song selection is concerned.

Michael's review hits on something important -- that while Away We Go represents a stylistic shift for Mendes, it's not that different from some of his other films when it comes to its study of domestic stability. I would say, however, that the couple's scenes with Schneider were some of my favorites, even if I didn't quite love the resolution to that sequence.

And I agree about Alexi Murdoch's score -- must every American mini-major independent film now come equipped with earnest acoustic-guitar doodlings?

steven soderbergh nails the critic's dilemma

Steven Soderbergh, a rather smart fellow, articulating the problem critics face when trying to write at length about movies or any other kind of art...

On the one hand, in theory, if you write about movies you can go on the Internet and write a 5,000-word piece on something if you're so moved. The question is whether anybody will get to word 500 before they go, 'Oh Jesus, just tell me how many stars.' Culturally, that kind of question of whether there is a place for that kind of ruminative, complex criticism, that's an open question, and not just for cinema, for everything.

I'm, by nature, a letter-grader. When I started watching films as a kid, I would assign them a certain amount of stars. (When Entertainment Weekly came along, if memory serves, I switched to letter-grades.) I see the value in it, but I also think a writer's analysis is more important. That's one of the reasons why I like the format of Consumables -- I don't list my grade, so I have to try my best in the write-up to approximate my level of love or hate for the movie/album/TV show/single I'm covering. Which is what a critic is ultimately supposed to do, right?