Ebert is Giving Out Stars Like Hotcakes!

Roger Ebert really loves watching movies. The poor man has been battling illness the last few years with real courage and dignity, and he's clearly missed the big screen. The smell of the popcorn maker as he enters the lobby, with it aching to clog one artery at a time; Goobers and Raisinetts boxes laminated in plastic, scientifically designed to crackle through the auditorium like a thunderstorm when unwrapped; the squishy sound his feet make on the linoleum flooring as he takes his seat, the gum stuck under his shoes unearthed one last time as he relaxes his ankles, crossing one over the other; the just-barely-audible squeaky noise as he sits back and reclines in his chair, his favorite seat four rows back and ten spaces in. Ah, yes, this is Ebert's temple. When he came back to his critical powers a couple months ago and started reviewing films again regularly, no one was more delighted than me. I look up to him the way I look up to my favorite writers (minus the hatred). He is my favorite writer of films this side of Outlaw Vern. With so many critics these days, too often I feel their love to be pompous, witty or hyperbolic. Never so with the Thumb Man. He is one of the great ones.

Yet, madness in great ones must not unwatched go. As an avid reader of my hero, I could but stand silent for so long. And so here it is...

What in Merlin's beard is up with all of the three-and-a-half to four star reviews the guy has been handing out? They're being bandied about like propaganda-full campus pamphlets so often I can barely hold onto them. The streets are littered with them, I say, and something has to be done.

It has even reached a point where I'm surprised Ebert's given a film a negative review and oh, this will not do. Take note: for 54 of the last 78 movies he's reviewed he has given a positive review. And of those 54 movies, 32 of them were three-and-half to four stars! I don't know about you guys, but there ain't that many good movies out there this year. And I'm not going to single any of these movies out. But I will say one of the films starts with an "R" and ends in "endition."

Now I know a some of the movies are ones he's been catching up with from last year or earlier films of 2007 but still, it's a little jarring and I wonder if maybe the critic formerly known as Ebert is a little too happy to be back in the saddle again. Maybe it's the medication. I once took Dayquil before watching Save The Last Dance and made odd phone calls at one in the morning telling people how surprisingly good it was. "Trust me, I don't normally like these types of movies. Oh ... yeah, yeah we could talk about this tomorrow ... "

It really must feel good sitting in a theater once again, though, doing what you love after such a long hiatus. Hey, I remember how much I loved Iron Eagle when I was free from a grounding.

O Ebert of old, Ebert of kinder distinction, when shall we three meet again? Alas, I'm sure the positive reviews will be toned down at least a tad. I'm sure this is all just a phase. Hell, I'm just glad to have the guy back.

Source: www.cinema-pedia.com

Ebert to Be Honored at Gotham Awards

Roger Ebert will be honored at the 17th annual Gotham Awards for a career of championing independent cinema.

The 65-year-old film critic will receive the honor at the Nov. 27 event at Brooklyn's Steiner Studios. The Gotham Awards celebrate independent movies and films set in New York. An official announcement of the Ebert tribute was planned for Monday.

"Through his columns, books and television show, Roger Ebert has almost single-handedly introduced independent film to American moviegoers," said Michelle Byrd, executive director of the International Film Project, which presents The Gotham Awards. "His championing of high-quality, undiscovered films has put countless films, filmmakers and actors on the map."

Ebert is only the second film critic to receive the Gotham Awards Tribute. In 1995, Gotham honored Pauline Kael.

Ebert underwent a series of cancer surgeries, most recently in June 2006 when he had a growth on his salivary gland and part of his right jaw removed. Two weeks later, he had emergency surgery after a blood vessel burst near the site of the operation.

A tracheostomy, a procedure that opens an airway through an incision in the windpipe, left him unable to speak, a condition he has said would have to be remedied by further surgery. But he is cancer-free, he told the AP in August.

He is expected to attend the Gotham Awards for the tribute.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, actor Javier Bardem and director Mira Nair will also receive a Gotham Awards Tribute this year.