Film Review: Life Itself (2014)

The first time I remember reading one of Roger Ebert's reviews was when I was in my first year of University in early 2005. It wasn't a review of a current release, but one of George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead, and it made a pretty big impression on me. Mostly, this was because it featured a ton of plot details which probably would have bothered me had I not already seen the film, and did piss off a friend of mine who read the review without seeing the film first. But it also stuck with me because it was unlike any film review I'd read before. It was less a review of the film itself than of the screening Ebert attended, and of the broader culture in which the film was made. It was also unabashedly personal, and offered a pointed critique of a wrongheaded certification system which allowed young children to see acts of horrific violence purely because there was no nudity in Romero's film. It was a man speaking his mind, plainly and forcefully, and it was a mind I returned to countless times over the next decade.

Shot/Reverse Shot: Episode 25 - Roger Ebert

The world of film criticism - if not the entirety of cinema - lost of one of its greatest friends last week with the passing of Roger Ebert at the age of 70. Like pretty much anyone who writes about film, Joe Gastineau and I admired and respected Ebert's wit, insight and passion as a film reviewer and his consummate skill as a writer. We felt that we should pay a modest tribute to him. In this episode of Shot/Reverse Shot we discuss what Ebert meant to film criticism, what he meant to us personally, and try to gets to grips with his awe-inspiring body of work.

On a personal note, I owe pretty much any skill I have as a reviewer to reading Mr. Ebert's work over the years, both in terms of learning about films and how to write about films, and found his grace and strength in the face of the illness which robbed him of his voice genuinely inspiring. More than that, though, his love of cinema and the way he acted not just as an arbiter of taste but as an advocate for films he loved, regardless of style, genre or budget, made him someone I respected greatly and aspired to be. I never met the man, but his brilliant writing and boundless enthusiasm certainly had an incalculable influence on my own style and attitude towards cinema. I'm certain this is the case for most people who loved film and loved Ebert, and I will miss the intelligence and vigour of his writing a great deal.

Thank you, sir. See you at the movies.