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The Weekly Goes to the Movies

When writing about them really mattered

A A A Comments (5) By Scott Foundas Wednesday, Dec 3 2008

...continued from page 3

On our best weeks, I hope the same can still be said, owing less to my own contributions than to those of our rich pool of freelancers (some of them now quite a bit younger than myself), and to the indefatigable Ella Taylor, who is forever looking out there and reporting back on her finds. Will the Weekly and its film section still be around at 40? If so, I’d wager that they will no longer be things you hold in your hand (unless you happen to be holding your iPhone or BlackBerry). But with any luck, at some distant star date, when print media seems as far from our collective experience as cave paintings do to us now, some intrepid editor of the version of this paper that you download directly into your brain, faced with yet another daunting anniversary project, will delve into some considerably less dusty archive and exclaim: “The L.A. Weekly at the dawn of the 21st century — wasn’t that a time!”

—30—

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Scott Foundas 12/25/2008 9:30:00 AM

Well, I hope I'm not "outing" anyone by saying this, but to the best of my knowledge, David Chute, Lance Goldenberg, Robert Koehler and John Patterson are all over the age of 40, while Chuck Wilson and Ernest Hardy, if not 40 yet, are in the ballpark. So, no age discrimination here, but it does get harder to find fully-grown adults willing to work for the glorified slave wages that freelance film journalism pays nowadays.

You Know Who I Am 12/19/2008 8:56:00 AM

Foundas writes: "On our best weeks, I hope the same can still be said, owing less to my own contributions than to those of our rich pool of freelancers (some of them now quite a bit younger than myself)" Part of what is so ineffably gross (not to mention boring) about all these "critics" who are "quite a bit younger than" a 30-year-old, is that their writing isn't only bad, it's nearly identical and indistinguishable. You don't want to make the same mistake, Scott, that Dennis Lim did--stocking the pool with junior clones of yourself. Why don't you get some freelance critics who are over the age of 40? People who've actually lived some, certainly more than the whippersnappers at the hem of your garment, and who have a broader frame of reference to contribute? Or do you practice age discrimination? Really, I'd like to know -- where are YOUR over-40 arts critics?

Chortle Chortle 12/18/2008 1:30:00 PM

"our rich pool of freelancers" yee gadz, you have *got* to be kidding.

Matthew Sigl 12/06/2008 5:14:00 AM

Please pardon my misspelling of "Manohla Dargis" in the previous comment.

Matthew Sigl 12/06/2008 4:54:00 AM

Echoing the chorus of voices lamenting the imminent demise of film criticism, Foundas makes an impassioned case for the salad days gone by. Personally, I wonder just how much validity there is in this particular meme. Without question the number of full-time paid film critics, those able to make a living from their writing, has dwindled- perhaps, lamentably, reaching a vanishing point in the not-so-distant horizon. That is a fact beyond debate. What I question in Mr. Foundas' article is whether or not the current critical establishment is any less in talented or socially motivated than before. While Lim and Lee's removal from the voice was a serious blow, we still have the always great and socially conscious J. Hoberman (and Lim and Lee can still be read elsewhere). This paper features the insightful Ella Taylor and Mr. Foundas himself, a accomplished and gifted writer at any age (as this article proves). Manholia Dargis, who Mr. Foundas praises in his piece, is hardly without a voice, sharing head reviewer duties with A.O. Scott at the New York Times. Finally, Anthony Lane at The New Yorker has to be one of wittiest critics in the history of the art (and an art it is, make no mistake.) And that is just the print media. While vast oceans of dreck deluge the information superhighway, finding the islands of first-class criticism is but a Google search away. Matt Zoller Seitz's The House Next Door is but one invaluable resource, compiling the work of diverse writers and letting them expound in long free-form essays unhindered by the blurb length templates of modern print publications. There are many many more sites worth a visit if one has an interest (and Mr. Foundas admits as much in his article). It would be a fool's errand to attempt to prove that there is less good criticism happening these days; in fact, by any objective standard, there is probably more. But that brings me to my second doubt about Mr. Foundas' thesis, that criticism used to "matter." The obvious question here is: with what criteria can we judge whether or not a critic matters or doesn't? I don't think an analysis of box office receipts throughout history will help-Pauline Kael hated The Sound Of Music after all-nor will comparing critical thought with Academy gold, good critics have always championed movies that were doomed to have little recognition from the Hollywood establishment. No, what Mr. Foundas and most critics mean when they say that "criticism used to matter" is that amongst a relatively small cadre of liberal counter-culture boomers there was real and passionate interest in cinema as a reflection of social attitudes and a vehicle for social change. Given the structure of information dissemination in the time (60's and 70's) as well as the way that films were distributed, critics were chosen and willing to act as a voice for this movement - exemplified by writers such as Ventura or Robin Wood. Kael (the go-to critic when seeking an example of one who mattered) blazed a trail proving that film critics can have significant cultural importance and status. The cult of personality around Ms. Kael was as much about perception as reality, after all, it was still the bougie chattering classes that read her. The masses could care less. Maybe the only critics that had true mainstream influence were Siskel and Ebert, with the advertisment-ready, mind knumbingly reductive thumbs-up, thumbs-down rating system. (Both men were smarter than this simplistic pop-culture friendly device let on.) Everything in the culture of the late 60's and 70's carried with it the portent of revolution or apocalypse (the left preferring the former to the latter and the right, well...) and this was no less true of the cinema, a medium which has always acted like a reflective surface for western and American civilization. Those outside this counter-culture, which is to say "the culture" (perhaps Nixon's "silent majority") ,were no more impressed by critics any more than they are now. Sure, maybe even fewer people care about such things now but it's true that we live in an apathetic age; the yippie first gave way to the yuppie and now has devolved into the hipster, a creature awash in irony, nonchalance an ethical code. It is not that film criticism ceased to matter-EVERYTHING ceased to matter. Combine this new detached posture (though perhaps a bad choice of words as posture implies the ability to stand up straight) with a technological revolution that makes the transition of information all but effortless -especially textual, moderately short information (like a review) - and the need for the "film critic" as a tentpole of culture and thought is vanquished. individual critics were once stars in their own right; now we have constellations of opinions, connected to each other link by hyperlink. I am not suggesting that this is a positive development, only a real one. The internet has brought the democratization of film criticism and with that all the messy, noisy, confusing reality that comes with any such egalitarian system. They may be no barriers to entry but the dog-eat-dog realities are no less vicious. Yet, in true American fashion, the cream does tend to rise to the top and the best critics, the ones dedicated to sharing their voice with the world can usually be easily found by those willing to listen. For those with whom criticism falls on deaf ears, it probably always was that way and always will be. The more things change...you know the rest.