Cool!
I look forward to this as I know very little about her.
Thanks!
Signature: To any BluRay/DVD distribution company: please release No Retreat No Surrender sequels on BluRay!
There is a sharp difference between a mere reviewer, which is some online asshole posting on the internet and most other assholes who still have access to print media, and an actual critic, who has studied and learned formal art criticism, the guidelines of which eliminate the writer’s personal tastes and prejudices from the equation and focus ONLY on the art as it is objectively. A critic does NOT consider the intentions of the movie. That is the Intentional Fallacy, and remember that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. A critic ignores the movie’s origins, who directed, who did the script, IT’S FROM MARVEL!!!, etc. That is the Original Fallacy. Formal criticism MAKES the critic look at the work with new eyes. Then s/he renders a decision.
For example, I despise the movie Fight Club, but I know it’s an excellent film.
Pauline Kael may well be the Dean of film critics: a real Dean, not a CPA.
You and I have had our differences in the past, but I applaud each and every word you wrote on the great Pauline Kael. In the 90s, I was suffering through a really bad rut. It was Pauline Kael's movie review books that lured me out of a depressed stupor. This doc on her didn't exactly tell me anything about her criticism that I didn't already know, but it's worth watching for the archival footage and showing things I'd never seen before, such as her home in Connecticut. Those new to Kael would be wise to seek out her collection "For Keeps" which she estimated is about a quarter of everything she wrote and contains her most famous reviews from roughly 1965-91, a period with an incredible number of classics and exciting developments in American film. I'm almost glad she isn't here to see the sorry state to which American film has fallen. Kael would have probably regarded it as torture to have to review a comic book movie, and yet we need a strong voice like hers now more than ever.
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