Film critic Roger Ebert passed away today. He was 70 years old.
For a lot of people, Roger Ebert was American film criticism. They waited to hear his opinion of every new film and that opinion was often cited as if it was gospel. I think most people are like me in that they couldn’t tell you when they first heard the name “Roger Ebert” or when they first learned he was a film critic. Instead, he was one of those pop cultural figures whose existence we took for granted. Just as there would always be movies, there would always be a review from Roger Ebert.
I have to admit that it was rare that I ever agreed with Ebert’s opinion. I once posted a comment to that effect over on the AwardsDaily website and I ended up getting yelled at by the site administrators. I really shouldn’t have been surprised by the reaction. Ebert was (and is) a hero and an inspiration to a whole generation of film bloggers and online critics but very few of them seem to understand what made Ebert a great critic.
Roger Ebert was a great critic not because he was opinionated but because — unlike so many other self-proclaimed film critics — he sincerely loved film and that love came through in his reviews. When Roger Ebert was critical, it wasn’t because he was trying to show how clever or sardonic he could be. Instead, it was because he understood what film was truly capable of achieving.
(Incidentally, when you see certain pompous and self-important online film critics promoting themselves as the logical heir to the legacy of Roger Ebert, remind them that Roger not only wrote the script for Russ Meyer’s Beyond the Valley of the Dolls but that he was also never ashamed to admit it and that it was a pretty good screenplay to boot! Film snobs may have embraced Ebert but Ebert rarely embraced them.)
As I said, I often did not agree with Roger Ebert. He was rarely a friend to the horror genre and he was critical of a lot of films I loved and he gave positive reviews to a lot of films I hated (like Rod Lurie’s Straw Dogs, for example). I usually tuned him out whenever he started going on about politics. Within an hour of his death, the political ghouls over on twitter were already quoting him, not about the films that he loved but, instead, on his views about President Obama, as if the only thing that mattered was that they had lost a vote in the next election. Politics are temporary. Films are forever.
However, the great thing about Roger Ebert was that you didn’t have to agree with him in order to enjoy and respect him as a film critic. Ebert was opinionated but he was rarely shrill. Unlike a lot of the critics who claim to have been inspired by him, Ebert didn’t talk down to readers. Ebert may have been the most prominent film critic in America but he never stopped writing like a guy who just happened to love movies. In a world where every critic with a web site is currently bragging about how powerful she believes herself to be, this humility made Ebert a pleasure to read. He was a witty and knowledgeable writer and his brave battle with cancer was both heart-breaking and inspiring.
With the passing of Roger Ebert, the world has lost a man who truly loved films.
A lot of the current wave of self-proclaimed film critics and award divas could learn a lot from his example.
Roger Ebert, R.I.P.
Through the Shattered Lens 
This is the first that I have read about the passing of Roger Ebert, and it is indeed sad news.
Sometimes I shook my head in disbelief at some of the things he wrote about films. When he wrote something with which I disagreed strongly, it would agitate me more than the usual opinion contrary to my own.
But that was a credit to Mister Ebert.
You see, because he had such a tremendous knowledge of cinema, you felt that you expected better from him, because at least he was coming from a certain position of authority, and it was obvious that he really loved films. At the same time, he never made you feel as if you weren’t allowed to disagree with him.
At the moment I have a book of his reviews on loan from the library. Agree or disagree with his critiques of this film or that film, there is no denying that he was definitely a talented writer.
Being an Australian, I was never fortunate enough to see his celebrated television programme “Siskel and Ebert”. We didn’t even get “At The Movies with Ebert and Roeper”. If you know what passes for “quality entertainment journalism” on Australian television these days, pause to consider what a travesty that was.
Even after he was no longer able to appear on television, Roger Ebert continued to write as if nothing else happened. He was basically Just A Guy Who Loved Films.
A lot of folks who write about the movies seem to view the practice as a stepping stone to “serious” journalism. As far as Roger Ebert was concerned, writing about the movies actually was serious journalism. He knew that just as films themselves could reveal more truth about the world than whatever was in the frontpage headlines, so to could an observant film review. Not only did Roger Ebert really appreciate films, he really appreciated being a film reviewer. He was never cynical about the nature of his job. He wasn’t doing it just so that he could rub shoulders with so-called celebrities and score himself a bigger job and bigger fame for himself. He was Just A Guy Who Loved Films. That came across in his writing.
The wheels of the motion picture industry shall continue to turn, but in coming years there shall be an empty space next to Leonard Maltin’s annual film books on the library shelf. However, Roger Ebert has left behind enough film review literature to last a lifetime, and those old books shall always find a space on a library shelf somewhere.
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One way or another, most of us who opine on films endlessly on the internet are here because of Roger Ebert (whether he deserves thanks or scorn for that I leave up to you). Ebert, you see, along with Gene Siskel, were the first “star critics” who made modern practical film criticism available to the masses in a way that his predecessors such as, for example, Pauline Kael, never could. Like his political views, Ebert’s style of writing on film was essentially populist, and he could opine at length on the most minute details of any movie in a way the masses could readily relate to, understand, and appreciate. He set the table the rest of us are dining (or starving) on, and if it wasn;t for Ebert, a lot of people wouldn’t think that writing about movies was a fun — and respectable — way to spend your free time. Everyone’s a critic these days, it’s true, but Roger Ebert is the guy who got that ball rolling and every one of us “armchair Eberts” out here in internet-land owe him for that. Plus, the guy wrote a screenplay for Russ Meyer. What more can one man possibly hope to achieve in a single lifetime?
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Amen
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Ebert’s commentary for “Beyond the Valley of the Dolls” is a lot of fun. Though, and this is my only problem with him, he never explained how he could deride film A for its misogyny, after penning a script that has a woman fellating a gun in its first five minutes.
But, like I said, that is my only misgiving. As for disagreeing with his opinions, isn’t that a film critic’s main task? To get people talking about films? He was my go-to guy when trying to figure out how middle America felt about a film.
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