Manohla Dargis. We agree on almost every film.
Seconding Manohla Dargis. (My own favorite critic).
Also recommending: Jonathan Rosenbaum, David Thomson, James Agee.
i’m not positive that it necessarily counts as criticism, but mark peranson, the editor of cinema scope, is an amazing interviewer of filmmakers. his questions are often insightful statements which allow those being interviewed to expand upon them in a myriad different directions, which, in the end, create very interesting companion pieces to the films themselves.
it seems a bit iconoclastic in this day and age for a critic to allow a director to openly respond to/refute critique. and it opens the door for viewers to have a similar dialogue with the work. although at times it can take on an air of pretentiousness, he is still always a good solid read.
Peranson counts. I’m not being pedantic or academic about it, I just want peoples thoughts on who’re the worthwhile film writers/journalists out there at the moment. People who aren’t just glorified gossip columnists. There’s so much negative out there i wantto redress the balance a little here. Some of these writers have had a huge effect on our lives I think – but not many people ever say it. No one tells them how appreciated they are. Glorious islands in a sea full of crap that we cling to and swim for desperately, looking for the nuggests of gold (geez that metaphor went a bit wonky).
Ranting is easy. And swooning over directors etc, all too common. I’d like the people who write about film and who do it well, to know they’re apppreciated, and just how important they can be.
Amy Taubin and Jonathan Romney and Kent Jones who are critics but for not for dailies and so have the luxury or opportunity to make claims about the films that are thoughtful and articulated and not done simply to give a sense of whether or not people should risk shilling out their hard earned money for a particular movie. Dargis is my fave amongst those who write for the papers. I also like Elvis Mitchell. Wilonsky both infuriates me and makes me think he’s refreshing.
Jonathan Rosenbaum, J. Hoberman, Manohla Dargis, Jonathan Romney, James Naremore (if we can include writers a bit more academic-orientated), Amy Taubin, Nicole Brenez, Adrian Martin, Alexander Horwath, Michael Atkinson.
Gotta mention Anthony Lane.
Philip Strick, Kim Newman, David Thomson, Jonathan Rosenbaum, Tom Milne
Brian Orndorf is my favorite critic now.
Used to be Statler and Waldorf when they were on movies.com…can’t beat them.
Philip French should get a more than honorable mention, just won critic of the year award, been the observer’s film critic for nigh on five decades. His style is classic, but his writting is rich in context and often alludes to cinema history and culture in general, a intelligent and authoritative writer. http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/philipfrench
Oh yes, French is very authoritative and knowledgeable, no fancy dan, quite classic tastes. I didn’t know Manohla Dargis but this thread rang a bell when i came across her fine review of Oliveira’s Um Filme Falado yesterday; shall check out more
I grew up reading Derek Malcolm’s Guardian reviews and highly recommend his ‘A Century of Films: Derek Malcolm’s Personal Best’ book. Bradshaw in comparison (as his successor) I find pretty awful. Malcolm managed to be academic without alienating his audience.
Kenji,
Dargis is excellent, and her writing about Oliveira’s films are particularly insightful. She started out as a Hoberman disciple writing about avant garde films at the Voice, then went to LA to right for the Los Angeles Times and the LA Weekly before coming back to New York to write for the Times.
I like Donald Richie
Neil Snowdon
In an effort to push the postive, and give more credit where credit’s due who are your favourite film writers out there? You know, the ones you grew up reading. The ones who helped you understand that there were other people out there who thought just like you… the ones who helped to deepen your passion for film… who are they? What in particular did they write that made the difference?
For me right now: Tim Lucas (see my Lucas thread for a little more love) and Kim Newman. Tim’s Bava book and his writings for Video Watchdog and Sight & Sound keep me going. I can’t afford a subscription to Watchdog, and it’s hard to get ahold of where I live in the UK, but the handful of copies that I have i go back to time and time again. Kim Newman wrote a piece for a book that was given away free with Empire Magazine (back when Empire was still good), called Tales Of The Overeducated and Underemployed, about his days after Uni but before he made a living from his love, that I cherish and go back to, likewise his BFI Classics book on the original Cat People.
Others include Chas. Balun (I was a big horror fan growing up – still am though I’ve gotten pickier as I’ve got older), and John Martin, who wrote and edited Giallo Pages (back when fanzines not the internet were the thing) and did a lot of writing for UK horror mag The Darkside (for a while it seemed like he was single-handedly keeping them afloat). His passion for Italian cinema was contagious. He was a great interviewer too. He did an interview with Guillermo Del Toro when Cronos was still on the festival circuit that absolutely changed my life (which seems weird to think and say) – that was the article that made me finally seek out foreign films as a teenager. The first foreign language movies that i bought (and the average HMV back then didn’t stock too many) were Cronos and The Killer. In fact they might well have been the first foreign language movies that i saw. They blew me away. And more importantly they blew away the boundaries that had existed in my head up until that point. Cronos remains a favourite film. Everything about the story that it tells and the way it tells it hold a very special place in my heart. I would not have found that movie at that time if not for John Martin. Wherever he is now, I want him to know that.
I interviewed John for a fanzine i wrote for a while, and he was generous and good humoured to a fault. Reading his stuff was like sitting down the pub with the most passionate and engaging film fan you could know and having a great excited talk over a beer. He didn’t condescend and he wasn’t ever pretentious in his writing, but always incisive and full of energy.
These people deserve our applause I think. To be a film critic/writer is an odd position. And too often they get treated like shit. C’mon people, let show a little love.