Friday, November 20, 2009

Ebert vs. Twilight



When I think about it, Roger Ebert has to be among my top influences as a writer. Those who just know him as a TV thumb guy are missing out on his fantastic career as a reviewer and film essayist for the Chicago Sun-Times. It's a sign of Ebert's quality that he can really bring a movie to life with his words because you can tell just how much this guy loves the cinema....and, as such, when this love is tarnished by a particularly crappy film, he pulls no punches.

Case in point, his review of the new Twilight movie. Ebert has been known to cut some genre movies some slack under the logic that he isn't their target audience, and thus he just judges them if they accomplish their goal of satisfying that audience. It's almost like a teacher who gives a student a D rather than a fail because he can at least see that the kid is trying hard. In this instance, however, it's clear that 'New Moon' is just too shitty to be given a pass. With 630 words, Ebert manages to point out everything that's wrong with both the movie and basically the entire 'Twilight' franchise itself. It's fantastic.

If you ever see that Ebert has given a movie one star or less, track down that review post-haste and get ready to laugh. The only thing better are his responses to fanboys/fangirls who send him angry e-mails bashing his taste when he dares to write a review saying that (gasp!) the movies starring their favourite characters are shite. His exchanges with Transformers fans upset at his pan of 'Transformers 2' is so amusing that it would even make a sullen teen vampire crack a smile.

No comments: