A very English dissection of Tarkovsky's Stalker
Among the many tributes that the film critic J Hoberman received after he was fired by the Village Voice last month came one from a former student named Matt Singer. Now a writer and TV host, he compiled a list of the most important things he'd learned from a seminar Hoberman had taught as a side gig at New York University. It contained a good deal of sound advice – "Watch for excess words. If there's a shorter word, use it"; "Vent your spleen. In criticism, it's better to be angry than depressed" – but the most basic and important message was this: "Plot synopses automatically ruin a review."
Rightly or wrongly, the synopsis is regarded as one of the lowest forms of writing. Two-thirds of the way into Zona, his characteristically singular book about Andrei Tarkovsky's Stalker (1979), Geoff Dyer declares: "There are few things...
Among the many tributes that the film critic J Hoberman received after he was fired by the Village Voice last month came one from a former student named Matt Singer. Now a writer and TV host, he compiled a list of the most important things he'd learned from a seminar Hoberman had taught as a side gig at New York University. It contained a good deal of sound advice – "Watch for excess words. If there's a shorter word, use it"; "Vent your spleen. In criticism, it's better to be angry than depressed" – but the most basic and important message was this: "Plot synopses automatically ruin a review."
Rightly or wrongly, the synopsis is regarded as one of the lowest forms of writing. Two-thirds of the way into Zona, his characteristically singular book about Andrei Tarkovsky's Stalker (1979), Geoff Dyer declares: "There are few things...
- 2/16/2012
- by Sukhdev Sandhu
- The Guardian - Film News
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