RIP Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert Dies at 70 Following Battle with Cancer

Famed movie critic Roger Ebert died Thursday in Chicago after battling cancer. He was 70.

An opinionated writer, but also a movie fan, Ebert reviewed films for the Chicago Sun-Times for 46 years. He was perhaps best known, however, for his 31 years reviewing films on television.

Ebert experienced health problems over the past ten years, suffering illnesses including thyroid cancer and cancer of the salivary gland. In 2006 he lost part of his lower jaw, but -- as his obituary in the Sun-Times points out -- it didn't drive him out of the spotlight.

70 isn't a bad innings considering all the health problems he endured. RIP.

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And a tribute by Doug Walker from a few years back:
http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thatguywiththeglasses/nostalgia-critic/13453-sande

RIP. I kinda knew him from his TV stuff. Was pretty shocked about his jaw thing when it happened some time ago.

An updated tribute from Doug:
http://blip.tv/nostalgiacritic/nostalgia-critic-farewell-to-roger-ebert-6564382

At least someone referenced The Critic episode in all these RIP threads on the internet.

I've never particularly understood why Ebert was so revered other than his persistence to watch everything. But if we are to speak well of him...his North review:

I have no idea why Rob Reiner, or anyone else, wanted to make this story into a movie, and close examination of the film itself is no help. "North" is one of the most unpleasant, contrived, artificial, cloying experiences I've had at the movies. To call it manipulative would be inaccurate; it has an ambition to manipulate, but fails.

The film stars Elijah Wood, who is a wonderful young actor (and if you don't believe me, watch his version of "The Adventures of Huck Finn"). Here he is stuck in a story that no actor, however wonderful, however young, should be punished with. He plays a kid with inattentive parents, who decides to go into court, free himself of them, and go on a worldwide search for nicer parents.

This idea is deeply flawed. Children do not lightly separate from their parents - and certainly not on the evidence provided here, where the great parental sin is not paying attention to their kid at the dinner table. The parents (Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Jason Alexander) have provided little North with what looks like a million-dollar house in a Frank Capra neighborhood, all on dad's salary as a pants inspector. And, yes, I know that is supposed to be a fantasy, but the pants-inspecting jokes are only the first of several truly awful episodes in this film.

North goes into court, where the judge is Alan Arkin, proving without the slightest shadow of a doubt that he should never, ever appear again in public with any material even vaguely inspired by Groucho Marx. North's case hits the headlines, and since he is such an all-star overachiever, offers pour in from would-be parents all over the world, leading to an odyssey that takes him to Texas, Hawaii, Alaska, and elsewhere.

What is the point of the scenes with the auditioning parents? (The victimized actors range from Dan Aykroyd as a Texan to Kathy Bates as an Eskimo). They are all seen as broad, desperate comic caricatures. They are not funny. They are not touching. There is no truth in them. They don't even work as parodies. There is an idiocy here that seems almost intentional, as if the filmmakers plotted to leave anything of interest or entertainment value out of these episodes.

North is followed on his travels by a mysterious character who appears in many guises. He is the Easter bunny, a cowboy, a beach bum, and a Federal Express driver who works in several product plugs.

Funny, thinks North; this guy looks familiar. And so he is. All of the manifestations are played by Bruce Willis, who is not funny, or helpful, in any of them.

I hated this movie. Hated hated hated hated hated this movie. Hated it. Hated every simpering stupid vacant audience-insulting moment of it. Hated the sensibility that thought anyone would like it. Hated the implied insult to the audience by its belief that anyone would be entertained by it.

I hold it as an item of faith that Rob Reiner is a gifted filmmaker; among his credits are "This is Spinal Tap," "The Sure Thing," "The Princess Bride," "Stand by Me," "When Harry Met Sally" and "Misery." I list those titles as an incantation against this one.

"North" is a bad film - one of the worst movies ever made. But it is not by a bad filmmaker, and must represent some sort of lapse from which Reiner will recover - possibly sooner than I will.

I give this news two thumbs down

An updated tribute from Doug:
http://blip.tv/nostalgiacritic/nostalgia-critic-farewell-to-roger-ebert-6564382

Doug looks like he is gonna tear up any second. Great tribute and one of the moments where it felt HE is actually out of character.

I've never particularly understood why Ebert was so revered

This.

I'm not to judge his life and I'm sure he did good things as a person but I'm not sure if he even contributed greatly or offered something of significant importance to the 'art' of cinema.

It's like the veneration of him is focusing on the art critic instead of the artist.

That clip with the part of satan is hilarious.

I guess it's like Doug said in his video, people respected and admired his insight and approach to criticism, the fact that he enjoyed movies and wasn't just out to bash them because he was a critic, and found him to be an entertaining personality with the back and forth with his co-hosts.

Too bad the same can't be said to his (Ebert's) critical approach to videogames (even though I agree a little bit to what he expressed).

I'm not to judge his life and I'm sure he did good things as a person but I'm not sure if he even contributed greatly or offered something of significant importance to the 'art' of cinema.

It's like the veneration of him is focusing on the art critic instead of the artist.

I think people loving him is mostly tied to his struggles in recent years, the Oprah appearance for example, he was kinda the butt of jokes along with Siskel otherwise, as the Critic clip shows. (Both were very good natured in playing themselves there and elsewhere though.) Siskel got a similar elevation with his cancer. And there's a familiarity. The concept of a popular movie reviewer is basically dead. A lot of those 90s cartoons get mileage out of showing or using parodies of Ebert/Siskel or Gene Shalit. When Siskel died and Ebert couldn't do his show it collapsed even if the talent might have been better. (I doubt the show would have survived the two just retiring.)

I don't have any evidence about Ebert as a person, he was kinda a dick every time I saw him go outside his field. I don't know if this was because of the shit he was going through or if that was always his deal.

But he and Siskel are in many ways a standard to look towards as a reviewer. I wouldn't call Ebert a critic though I haven't read his books, I hear one of his late ones about bad movies is quite good. But as a reviewer he had two of the keys, his opinion was sound and he also writes well. Look at that North review, it's fantastic, it's short but expressive. At a time when random dopes on the internet get paid a near million to make documentaries about themselves becoming "critics" on crappy websites you wish they could convey half as much even when they write four times as much. ("You literally don't know what you're talking about!")

Of course, in our day and age, we love to flit between the deaths of this or that royalty and use it as a chance to express ourselves against one another with a flimsy justification.

Just look at my posts in this thread for an example.

Speaking of Gene Shalit can you believe that dude is 87.

Wish I could find this old Ebert/Siskel clip where they just savage some now really popular movie and then go right into another segment and praise some dreck nobody remembers. But I can't remember either movie so I can't find the fucking youtube clip which probably has tens of thousands of views!

This is maybe why the two were so well regarded, they knew how to write about their opinion and how that's the most important factor if you even want to pretend your opinion is valid and thus your reviews matter:

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Watch this and go read a fucking video game review for a perfect example about missing the point on the value of reviews.

Unless you went and read Tom Chick. If you did, go and seek help. Or swing by my place.

Too bad the same can't be said to his (Ebert's) critical approach to videogames (even though I agree a little bit to what he expressed).

Yeah, I guess he didn't fully appreciate or understand the medium, so while he had a point he didn't really give them their due. Still, films were his passion and what he reviewed, so it's understandable.