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This is a repost of something I wrote long ago (in web years, anyway). Despite its somewhat more personal slant (it was originally in a more personal section of the site), it seems to belong here now.
I read Roger Ebert's book Questions For the
Movie Answer Man last night. That is to say, I bought the book
yesterday afternoon, started reading it, and kept reading until I had
finished.
I am fortunate to be a very fast reader. (I am also a very fast
walker and a very fast eater.) In the case of the books, at least, I
have an excellent rationale; experience has shown me that if I don't
finish the book in one go, I may not come back to it.
I used to read books while riding the subway to work in the
morning; however, the brief reading time that afforded me was not very
constructive, since by the time I rewound the plot sufficiently in my
head, I had reached my stop. I now read The
Economist on the train instead. One or two articles at a
time. A single issue lasts me a week.
My reading habits have two notable side effects. First, I
read fewer books than before, which I do not regard as a good
thing.
Second, in the day or so immediately following my having devoured a
book anaconda-style, I find that the book swims around in the
forefront of my brain, coloring my thoughts until I have filed its
body of information into the appropriate folders and can move on to
something else. As with my eating habits, I have resigned myself to a
period of mild indigestion following the rapid intake. Unlike my
eating habits, I don't necessarily consider this a problem.
All of which, in my usual roundabout way, is meant to explain why
I've been considering this morning whether or not I'd make a good film
critic.
I don't have Ebert's book in front of me as I write this, but there
is an answer somewhere in there where he lists, indirectly, the
characteristics he considers desirable in a film critic. I agree with
Ebert that it's silly to try to make film criticism "objective," that
the whole point is for the critic to give a single human's
opinion. All opinion is subjective. When writing about controversial
items in these pages, I try to look at everyone's point of view before
proceeding, but I do not claim to be objective - I have generally
picked which horse I want to back before I begin writing.
A film critic, Ebert notes, should be able to write about film
entertainingly, and again I agree. Through good opinions and bad, a
film review should not be tedious to read, which is why I have avoided
many "film studies" books which are basically film criticism, but
couched in deep impenetrable language. My theory is that the language
is designed to give the books a veneer of "respectability" that was
neither needed nor desirable in the first place.
Inside every good film critic, I think, is the excitable kid
who just plain loves movies - all movies - and I think that attempting
to conceal this joy so that the other professors will take your work
seriously is a mistake. (Or maybe they're trying to obscure the fact
that they didn't get much joy from movies in the first place, in which
case they need a new line of work. Hmmmm.)
My problem is, I can't imagine anyone who would want to read what I
think about a given film. Ebert refuses to review films according to
anyone's tastes but his own - and good for him! Anything else is
pandering. But (and there is no slight to Ebert meant here) who
decided, way back when, that this guy's opinions on films were worth
placing before the public, back when no one knew who he was and his
words therefore did not carry the cachet of fame? How do you win that
particular lottery? And what kind of hubris does it take to assume
that other people are interested in hearing what you think about a
particular movie?
I love to read film reviews. I read all the reviews I can find,
including electronic ones, and I usually read them after I've
seen the film. I'm always interested in what someone else got from the
film, and how it compared to what I got.
But I do not consider my behaviors representative.
It's my understanding that most folks read the film review to help
them decide whether or not to see the film, in which case we go back
to the same question: Why does Ebert's opinion, or Siskel's or any
other public critic, matter? Why do people let it matter?
I recognize that I'm showing a certain amount of hubris myself by
assuming that anyone cares to read my thoughts on random numbers, or
the Woodward trial, or advertising excesses, or any of the other
subjects among the 3000 words I drop into these pages every week. But
I am not being read by people as a presumed decision-maker. No one is
reading my thoughts on the nanny trial and using them to help
determine whether they agree with the verdict or not. At least I hope
not. Oh, heavens.
I have been known to let film critics influence my decision on
seeing a film, but it's more of a group consensus thing. If a majority
of people think the film is bad, it reduces the chances I'll see
it. An isolated bad review is not going to alter my course very
much.
There are movies, such as James Bond films, which I will always see
no matter what the critics say; conversely there are movies which I
will not see no matter how many people love them. (I wonder why this
latter mulishness disqualifies me from being a film critic, but the
former does not? Ebert apparently feels that a film critic has a
responsibility to see everything, or die trying.)
And then there is that peculiarity known as the guilty
pleasure.
The true guilty pleasure, in the sense that I mean, is very hard to
find. It will probably be easier to give an example.
Burt Reynolds is an easy target for sneering. He basically always
plays the same character, even in Boogie
Nights (where he was excellent). This isn't a problem with
me. I happen to like that particular character - an expansive,
easygoing, somewhat overindulgent good ol' boy - and I think he does
it well. The Reynolds films I have a problem with are the ones where
he was reduced to playing a character which was a parody of that one,
like a memorandum which has been photocopied so many times that the
words are now nearly illegible.
Hooper is, to my mind, the film which
shows off Burt Reynolds' good ol' boy style to the best effect, and
over the course of my adult life to date, I have successfully talked
about ten people into overcoming their anti-Burt prejudices and seeing
it. Most were pleasantly surprised. Yes, large portions of it do cover
the same ground as The Stunt Man, an
edgier movie which I find tedious to watch in places. And yes, it does
have Jan-Michael Vincent in it. I don't find either of these a fatal
flaw, however.
There is also a Burt Reynolds movie called Stroker Ace. It's about auto racing, and also
has Loni Anderson, Ned Beatty, Jim Nabors, and John Byner. I find this
movie fairly hilarious - and I dislike lowbrow humor; Beavis and
Butt-head are not funny to me. Admittedly, a lot of the charm of this
movie is in watching the supporting cast swirl around Burt, but never
mind that.
Hooper is not a guilty pleasure
because I will gladly defend its merits to others. Stroker Ace is, because when I watch it, I
watch it in secret and do not attempt to convince everyone else that
it's worth watching.
When sizing myself up as a potential film critic, I am
not sure how to properly deal with guilty pleasures. I agree that
keeping them closeted is wrong, but is it not equally wrong to try to
lead the witness by indicating that "although I like it, I don't expect
you to?"
It can be argued that the best course is for the critic to present
her opinion without disclaimer, saying only that she liked the movie
and why - but then the critic sets herself up for people who think
she's an utter fool for liking the thing, that she is unaware of how
many people don't like it.
Although it's probably a side effect which comes with being a film
critic in the first place, I don't like the idea that there might be people
out there who think I'm an utter fool.
Which, come to think of it, is probably the best reason of all why
I shouldn't be a film critic.
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