Andreas Winkelman … is repairing the roof of the cottage in which he lives as a literate hermit. At one point, he stares off at the sun that hangs low and dim—with its edges made ragged by a telephoto lens—in the Scandinavian sky. Suddenly the sun disappears into the gray-blue haze, but it’s as if Andreas had willed it invisible, much as he has tried to will himself invisible without taking the ultimate step. With this lovely image, Ingmar Bergman begins The Passion of Anna…”A little more than halfway through For the Love of Movies, Gerald Peary’s enthusiastic and authoritative documentary about the history of film criticism, the above passage is quoted. While the narrator reads Canby’s words aloud (and they are as “lovely” as the film he’s describing), we are treated to Bergman’s images and even more importantly, the evocative, delicate soundtrack – Andreas’ hammer on the rooftop, the sheep-bells tinkling – which the critic does not describe. Prose – at once intelligent and impressionistic – is fused with solid yet elusive image and simple yet vaguely abstract sound; criticism meets art and the two shake hands in the light of Bergman’s, and Canby’s, disappeared disc. All in all, it’s a stirring tribute to the movies and to those who love them, both being the subjects of this film.
Vincent Canby, The New York Times, May 29, 1970
Although the film is titled For the Love of Movies, one
desires an extra "the." In the documentary's weakest sections,
individual critics attempt to describe a particularly influential movie (the
charms of which tend to escape us), but overall the emphasis is not on specific
movies, but on the movies, that great, romantic, semi-lost object of desire.
Such a description conveys the magic which captivated both the early years of
cinema (when what you saw mattered less than the wonder of seeing anything at
all on that dark screen) and the Indian summer of giddy movie-love, the 1970s,
an era Peary captures in the phrase "When Criticism Mattered," a
bittersweet moniker with forebodings for the film's troubled conclusion.
In distinguishing between the cinemaniac and the cinephile,
and after noting that the cinemaniac usually only likes certain kinds of
movies, the film scholar David Bordwell writes, "The real crux, I think,
is this. The cinephile loves the idea of film." That observation may
strike at the heart of Peary's deep-seated ambivalence - if not antipathy -
toward bloggers and other amateur film-writers, though he himself never says so
much (focusing instead on more troubling and stereotypical stigmas). At any
rate, Peary's unease with the contemporary state of cinematic celebration only
rears its head near the end of the film. Prior to that, For the Love of Movies
is bright-eyed, thorough, and surprisingly ecumenical.
Even Bosley Crowther, who wrote for the New York Times from
1940 to 1968 and was the bete-noir of many edgy up-and-coming critics, gets his
due, albeit more for his liberal politics and playfully verbose stylistics than
for his critical insight. The two critics who largely replaced - and easily
surpassed - Crowther in the public eye are also given their due, as is,
inevitably, their rivalry. Peary pays respect to both Pauline Kael, the feisty
and extremely gifted critic for the New Yorker from the late 60s to the early
90s, and Andrew Sarris, who wrote for the Village Voice around the same time
and was recently "retired" from the New York Sun (adding one more, particularly
gargantuan, name to the roll-call that closes Peary's film on a worried note).
The two are even allowed to discourse across time, as Peary juxtaposes
particularly emphatic and controversial statements of Kael's with Sarris'
present-day rebuttals - no counter-rebuttals allowed, as Kael passed away about
eight years ago.
Inevitably then, Sarris seems to come out with the upper
hand, which may also reflect a preference on Peary's part (since Kael's heyday,
there's been a bit of a backlash towards her take-no-prisoners, extremely
impressionistic style). But it's clear, as it has been for years, that Sarris
relishes the memory of his rivalry (he even refers to Kael as a fallen enemy,
ala ancient Rome). Not only did it bring the two of them to greater prominence
than they may have otherwise received, but it also reflected a deep and
passionate love of the movies - at the time, the cinema seemed something worth
fighting over, even to the extent of building up alternate armies who would
clash at yearly critics' circles (Kael's followers were dubbed
"Paulettes", Sarris' "Sarrisites" - and no, I'm not making
this up).
The mutual loathing began when Sarris imported, and
modified, the "auteur theory" beloved of French critics (which held
various Hollywood directors responsible for the achievements of their work,
treating them - despite the collaborative nature of filmmaking - as the
equivalent of painters and novelists). Kael responded with "Circles and
Squares," a withering take-down not just of Sarris' ideas, but of Sarris
himself - implying that the auteur theory was little more than a way to make
intellectual, immature young men seem tough and assertive. The essay's
arguments have not aged well, particularly as Kael herself became something of
an auteurist (wags referred to Brian De Palma as a "filmmaker by Pauline
Kael"), but it continues to delight and provoke for its sparkling prose
and withering wit, and for, as always, the germ of truth contained within its
unfair assumptions and ungenerous bad faith.
Lost in the dust-up, and unfortunately in Peary's film as
well (despite occasional caveats, usually offered by Sarris himself), is the
fact that Kael and Sarris agreed on a great deal, probably more than they
disagreed on. Since enough time has been spent on the two for this review, we
won't go further with this observation (I've discussed the matter elsewhere),
but their most important connection was, of course their extreme passion for
movies and for the movies. At one point, Sarris describes himself as an
"amateur" in the classic sense of the word - he writes about film for
the love of it, not for the money (which doesn't hurt, but was not forthcoming
for many years before he hit his stride).
Given that eloquent defense of a much-maligned term, it's a
pity that Peary at times takes the easy road in dismissing latter-day amateurs.
Such a tone first begins to suggest itself in the section on the 90s, when the
narrator rhetorically contrasts the critics of yesteryear, "Pauline
Kael" and "Andrew Sarris", with the critics of self-published,
small-circulation fanzines, on a first-name basis with readers as
"Max" and "Andrew." Ostensibly, the observation has to do
with new-found informality, but there's a trace of condescension in the choice
of two great names to contrast with the humbler ones. ("Max,"
incidentally, turns out to be my best friend, who has co-authored a terrific
little fanzine called Samurai Dreams, now defunct).
When the focus shifts to the Internet, all masks are dropped
and Peary's scorn reveals itself full-stop. Offered up as the representative of
the blogging generation is Harry Knowles, the amiable, overweight, red-bearded
proprietor of "Ain't It Cool News." Between his stereotypically
disheveled appearance, the title of his website, and his passionate defense of
Michael Bay's distracted and fragmented style, the very likable Knowles
nonetheless makes a unfortunate - and unrepresentative - spokesman for the
fast-developing world of online criticism. Some of the juxtapositions are also
cheap shots in every sense of the phrase: alongside pictures of Knowles lying
on a rug, with a laptop resting on his arm (triggering easy sniggers from the
audience), a narrator informs us that Knowles started his website from his
bedroom in Austin. (Would it be more legitimate if his first reviews were
written from his mother's home, ala Andrew Sarris' celebration of Psycho?)
To be fair, in a Q & A following the screening, Peary
stated that he had no intention of attacking the blogosphere, and that his
major regret was not including one more interview with another articulate,
erudite blogger (there are several onscreen already, including Spout's Karina
Longworth, who seems to be the media favorite among her crowd). More
importantly, the overwhelmingly negative introduction to online criticism is
followed in the film itself by a rebuttal of sorts - print stalwarts like Roger
Ebert and Jonathan Rosenbaum (both of whom have become bloggers in the past few
years) step in to defend the democracy and diversity of online discussions. Yet
this line of optimism doesn't quite seem to be shared by Peary, whose heart is
more in the mourning of professional print criticism than in the celebration of
a new age.
The movie ends with the cautious note of hope barely holding
out against the tributes to the fallen (one laid-off critic is shown at home,
playing with her cats), the proper disgust with press junket whores who'll
write a blurb on commission, and the correct sense that audiences are less
reliant than ever on critics' voices. The melancholy mood is appropriate in a
sense, since the world For the Love of Movies so eloquently encompasses between
the silent-era moonlighters and the 70s gunslingers will soon be gone with the
wind.
Or will it?
The very fact that this movie exists is encouraging and,
truthfully, may not have been conceivable ten years ago, when critics were
taken for granted: griped about rather than grieved over. The past few years
have actually seen a glut of critical historiography, not least among them the evocative
obituaries greeting critic Manny Farber's passing (a notorious prose stylist,
Farber invented the term "termite art" to describe a filmmaker's
exquisite and rewarding focus on seemingly extraneous detail). Then there was
the anthology American Movie Critics, edited by Phillip Lopate. A marvelous
round-up of critical voices from across the century, the book could serve as a
kind of prose companion to For the Love of Movies.
What's more, the much-maligned (or at least skeptically
observed) blogosphere seems to be fueling much of this hunger for the history
of criticism; and not just by way of inferior contrast. Indeed, since we
bloggers are supposed to be so self-promoting, I might as well turn your
attention to my own site, which was the hub of a wide-ranging celebration of
movie books this past summer. Point being, many amateur
film writers are deeply aware of the tradition they're working in; the old
world passes away, but not without fanfare. Indeed, perhaps we're witnessing a
transfiguration rather than a death - an interpretation borne out by Ebert and
Rosenbaum re-emerging online. The Internet certainly allows for new
developments in criticism, including those which take Peary's inventive pairing
of Bergman's images with Canby's words a step further. On Shooting Down
Pictures, for example, Kevin B. Lee records critical narrations which are
intended to be played over the image - like DVD commentaries, but allowing for
selection of the particular clips moment to moment. This is just one among many
concepts re-imagining criticism - and movie love - for the 21st century.
By the way, Gerald Peary himself is a critic, having written
for the Boston Phoenix (his brother, Daniel, wrote the books Cult Movies and
Guide for the Film Fanatic, both of which were very popular choices on the
aforementioned movie-book lists). For the Love of Movies is his first film and
it's an accomplished piece of work; he's made a film about critics - whose job
it is to sit at a computer and fill up a blank page - which crackles with
spirit and energy. Nonetheless, the documentary does have some organizational
flaws. The back-and-forth between historic recaps and self-contained interviews
(what film made you want to review movies? how did you become a critic?) is a
nice idea. However, as executed, the pattern interrupts the flow of the
material.
Such interruptions can become frustrating when you're
getting wrapped up in a particular stretch of history; say, when we leave
Pauline Kael's trajectory to the New Yorker to hear Liza Schwarzbaum rave about
The Boy With Green Hair. The long stretches of black between such segments only
hurts; Peary has stated that his intention was to allow us to digest what we
just heard - but while this could work in theory, it comes off as an aesthetic
misfire. Onscreen something either works or it doesn't - a fact which Vincent
Canby no doubt understood with his delicate evocation of Bergman's subtle
artistic triumphs. Yet despite the occasional miscalculations and intermittently
overbearing pessimism, For the Love of Movies is a definite accomplishment and
is highly enjoyable to boot.
As in Bergman's film - and Canby's review - Peary captures
the disappearance of something we had taken for granted, an object (or an idea)
whose vanishing haunts us more than its presence ever could. For the Love of
Movies arrives at just the right moment to fix this ephemeral evaporation on
the horizon, and for those of us interested in carrying on the tradition, in a
new, perhaps isolated, and unfamiliar capacity - we "literate
hermits," so to speak - there's something oddly soothing about the
shimmering ghost of our ancestry, winking at us as it fades from the afternoon
sky.
Two months later, I conducted an interview with the film's director Gerald Peary.
This review was originally published at the Boston Examiner. Comments appeared on Wonders in the Dark, where the piece was linked.
Two months later, I conducted an interview with the film's director Gerald Peary.
This review was originally published at the Boston Examiner. Comments appeared on Wonders in the Dark, where the piece was linked.
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