Life, Itself

Last night CNN broadcast the movie Life, Itself about film critic Roger Ebert, focusing both on his career as well as the difficult final months of his life.

I greatly enjoyed the retrospective, and getting a stronger sense of his place within film criticism, particularly as a populist critic in counterpoint to cerebral critics such as Pauline Kael.

There were wonderful stories from the producers of both Sneak Previews and At the Movies. Siskel and Ebert debuted on PBS (hurray, again, for public television as an incubator of quality programming) and after some initial difficulties and smoothing out their stiffness, they were broadcast all over the country—except New York and Los Angeles.

Because, of course, New Yorkers expected that sort of critical national programming to emanate locally. And Los Angeles—why, they had Hollywood, of course. Why would anyone want to watch movie critics from Chicago, of all places?

Until the show got so many “thumbs up,” the New York and Los Angeles affiliates had to recognize it, and finally picked it up.

For the first decade or so, I generally preferred Siskel, actually. I just found myself agreeing with his take on the movies, and got a kick out of how passionate he could be. The film has touching and amusing stories of Ebert’s early career at the Sun-Times, of Ebert and Siskel’s early rivalry (each felt the other superfluous), and of how gradually they became such good friends.

Martin Scorsese is among those interviewed, including his response to negative reviews, and the difference between negative takes that were constructive and others’ solely destructive reviews. Ebert’s wife Chaz is also stellar in her support of him, and as they discuss their interracial marriage and what it meant for their families.

As it is filmed over the final months of Roger Ebert’s life, there are some tough scenes in the hospital, which he insisted be included in the documentary. Keeping it real, I guess. Which is an interesting twist on how he felt about movies and movie reviews – they should be accessible and not leave readers or viewers scratching their heads.

If you value film criticism, and the contributions of Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert to movies, it’s very worthwhile—this thumb is definitely up.