Posted on 05/03/2005 2:13:25 PM PDT by Pikamax
Very smug and arrogant. It was only a ten minute encounter several years ago, but he was a tool during it.
Not really. Mostly just sigh in exasperation.
It's a personal statement. So?
He hasn't been at his best in over ten years but when he was I think he was an outstanding critic and writer. He was sort of a less pompous Pauline Kael.
Considering how unreliable Ebert's reviews are (payola?) and his delusional hysterics over "Gods and Generals," it is no wonder he has switched to reviewing comics.
Darwin as a young boy developed an interest in natural history but started his advanced schooling at Edinburgh in medicine, a subject he soon learned to detest. Later at Cambridge, where he went to prepare for a career in the clergy, he showed no interest in his theological studies, but became acquainted with a botany professor, the Rev. John Henslow, who was destined to become his mentor and to have a profound effect on his life.
It was Henslow who encouraged Darwin, following his graduation from Cambridge, to take an extended sea voyage and exploration of the world outside of England. Darwin took advantage of the opportunity -- without pay - and became expedition naturalist and gentlemen's companion to Capt Robert FitzRoy, on the HMS Beagle. The intended 3-year voyage stretched to 5 years, and Darwin had wonderful experiences as he circumnavigated the world, spending over 3 years of the 5 exploring the coastline, flora and fauna of southern South America.
It reminds me of the unbelievable reaction to Laura Bush's comedy routine. People need to lighten up and stop taking themselves so seriously.
Looks like it has little bit of something for everyone.
If Rog stops after the first two panels, I'm sure he would be happy.
Even the ending can be taken to have more than one meaning.
Pretend that he is subtle, even an atheist can read a satisfactory meaning into it.
I don't have the perspective to make that call.
It strikes me because I just watched Jules et Jim again this weekend, and as I usually do after seeing a well-made movie, I check imdb and other sites for reviews and compare my reaction to others'.
Ebert's review was so simplistic and facile - drawing ridiculous comparisons to crap like Thelma and Louise and embarrassingly misquoting one of the key pieces of dialogue in the film - that I couldn't believe this guy gets paid to put on airs.
My favorite one:
First frame; three large boulders on high cliff
Second frame; character struggles and pushes one off
Third frame; character and friend at the bottom of cliff
next to boulder. friend asks 'why did you do that?'
first character replies,'in one million years they will try to figure how we got the other two to the top'
I always liked BC. Good job Mr. Hart! If the liberals can attack our Lord. We shall attack theirs, Charles Darwin.
Thanks for that view, kabar! Darwin was an extraordinarily brilliant man, a very great scientist. People who deny that are much, much less impressive, imho. But the whole topic has become way too politicized for me!
He does get slack from critics who aim for a more film savvy audience that he's too populist. He's a genunine film buff however unlike most 'entertainment journalists' who call themselves film critics despite the fact that they don't have a clue who Howard Hawks or Vincent Minnelli were much less Dreyer or Ozu.
Oh there's a crybaby stance: Only stupid people disagree with me.
Gee...that's something for your obituary:
"Robert Ebert, noted comic strip reviewer, unreliable one time movie reviewer, and raunchy film maker."
A real testament to the ages.
I was responding to the commic you posted and remembering the criticism it generated. Sorry that I didn't make myself clear.
I did not say you disagreed with me, I said you read into my statement something that wasn't there. Obviously, from this latest post, it wasn't an isolated incident.
NOT an oxymoron! Look at the great Christian theologians: Aquinas, Augustine, etc. Anyone who thinks those guys are stupid . . . well, 99.99% of such people couldn't understand them, even if they tried. Hart was just making a little pun: Darwin turned us into monkeys, 'ya see, hahahaha!
Well the film obsessives can get way too esoteric, but Ebert's review wasn't so much populist as sloppy.
JeJ is a film full of powerful symbols and he doesn't scratch the surface.
He's a genunine film buff however unlike most 'entertainment journalists' who call themselves film critics despite the fact that they don't have a clue who Howard Hawks or Vincent Minnelli were much less Dreyer or Ozu.
Speaking of which, have you seen Criterion's reissue of The Passion of Joan of Arc? - expensive, but worth every penny.
Robert Ebert is the largest POS in newspapers, after the 2000 Election was finalized, he wrote a scathing article about the neanderthal, knuckle-dragging, bible thumping, NASCAR loving rednecks who were going to destroy this Country now that W is President.
A couple days later he wrote "I shouldn't have wrote it, but I don't regret thinking it" mea culpa.
He's the biggest pompous @ss I can think of, period.
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