... but then this is about film criticism, not really the love of the movies.
It tries to break out the areas of film criticism by eras, but eras overlap and some years are just left out entirely. Still, if you want a good overview of how movie critics began and how the craft changed through the years, this will fit the bill. It starts out in 1909, when films were just a little more than actualities, with maybe the first prototypical film critic, Frank E. Woods. Interesting bit about Mr. Woods - he cowrote the script for "Birth of a Nation" and became wealthy via buying up real estate in southern California. There is lots of footage of individual important film critics. Funny excerpts include Kenneth Turan talking about how James Cameron tried to get him fired over his bad review of Titanic. I have always agreed with Turan's assessment that the plot is ham fisted. But then that seems to be a hallmark of Cameron - make something that is technically dazzling yet empty. But I digress.
Then the documentary turns to the invention of the internet (oddly Al Gore is never mentioned) and how suddenly everybody is a movie critic. I don't think that they mentioned that Amazon initially hired paid reviewers for products - including movies - but soon realized that there are plenty of us willing to do this work for free.
You can't fit 100 years of history - this documentary was made 12 years ago - in one 80 minute film. Things left out? The documentary mentioned James Agee and his mid twentieth century piece on silent comic Buster Keaton. It is not mentioned that this one piece resurrected Keaton's career from the dead. He was a gag writer at MGM at the time, and suddenly he had offers rolling in from early television for guest appearances.
What did it mention that I did not know? Elvis Mitchell's personal journey in film criticism, and him mentioning a 1964 film I had never heard of before called "Two Thousand Maniacs" in which a back water town takes revenge for the loss of the Civil War out on complete strangers. Yikes! That will stay with me.
There are not too many documentaries on this subject, so if you are interested in the subject, it will be worth your while. Just realize it is broad but not very deep.
It tries to break out the areas of film criticism by eras, but eras overlap and some years are just left out entirely. Still, if you want a good overview of how movie critics began and how the craft changed through the years, this will fit the bill. It starts out in 1909, when films were just a little more than actualities, with maybe the first prototypical film critic, Frank E. Woods. Interesting bit about Mr. Woods - he cowrote the script for "Birth of a Nation" and became wealthy via buying up real estate in southern California. There is lots of footage of individual important film critics. Funny excerpts include Kenneth Turan talking about how James Cameron tried to get him fired over his bad review of Titanic. I have always agreed with Turan's assessment that the plot is ham fisted. But then that seems to be a hallmark of Cameron - make something that is technically dazzling yet empty. But I digress.
Then the documentary turns to the invention of the internet (oddly Al Gore is never mentioned) and how suddenly everybody is a movie critic. I don't think that they mentioned that Amazon initially hired paid reviewers for products - including movies - but soon realized that there are plenty of us willing to do this work for free.
You can't fit 100 years of history - this documentary was made 12 years ago - in one 80 minute film. Things left out? The documentary mentioned James Agee and his mid twentieth century piece on silent comic Buster Keaton. It is not mentioned that this one piece resurrected Keaton's career from the dead. He was a gag writer at MGM at the time, and suddenly he had offers rolling in from early television for guest appearances.
What did it mention that I did not know? Elvis Mitchell's personal journey in film criticism, and him mentioning a 1964 film I had never heard of before called "Two Thousand Maniacs" in which a back water town takes revenge for the loss of the Civil War out on complete strangers. Yikes! That will stay with me.
There are not too many documentaries on this subject, so if you are interested in the subject, it will be worth your while. Just realize it is broad but not very deep.