I remember discovering the show “Siskel & Ebert” sometime in the mid to late 80s. They were the ones who introduced me to the concept of evaluating a movie critically. Even when I disagreed with their assessment of a movie, I could understand perfectly why they had the position that they did. The show was never the same after Siskel died. The chemistry between them–which I do not doubt was partly fueled by the fact that they worked for rival newspapers–could not be recreated with any of the replacement hosts.
In addition to his film criticism, I admired Ebert for his passionate advocacy of movies, and his willingness to evaluate a movie based on its own context, rather than judge it against the entire spectrum of film. He evaluated science fiction movies against other science fiction movies, action movies against other action movies, etc…
His “Great Movies” columns introduced me to many films that I otherwise would likely have never tried to sample. His blog was always a fantastic read. He was a writer of exceptional caliber.
Yup, that’s what I was thinking. He’s finally back in the balcony with Gene. I remember Roger and Gene way back on “Sneak Previews” on PBS. R.I.P., Roger.
If anybody is interested in the history of Siskel and Ebert and their TV show(s) and if you have a Kindle I can highly recommend a Kindle Single (it’s like a very long magazine article) called Enemies: A Love Story. Two bucks, you’ll love it.
I know there is a ton of stuff to read about (and by) Roger Ebert today, but I’ll assume that readers of this thread are interested in doing so.
Here is a nice piece by Michael Moore about his first encounter with Ebert at the Telluride film festival where his film, “Roger & Me” had its premier showings.
In inject some positivity and fun memories, one of my favorite Siskel & Ebert moments was when they reviewed Jurassic Park and Siskel said he didn’t like it because he didn’t feel like he could have a Dinosaur as pet. Roger just looks at him like he had lobsters crawling out of his ears. Just too funny.
Not a cornball move so you shouldn’t feel like one. Mr. Ebert was, by all accounts, a truly terrific human being and so many of us are better off for having him on the planet that his passing is bound to reverberate strongly for some time.
You want to see what a terrific person he was? Check out this excerpt from his memoir: Roger loves Chaz.
Well, this sucks. My favorite movie reviewer. The wife’s too. What news to wake up to. Yeah, fuck cancer. Now I feel guilty about being annoyed he’d slowed down on his reviews in recent weeks.
I would prefer to say that an out and proud atheist died, instead of using the fuzzy, and very religious sounding euphemism “passed away”. People die, and he described his own inevitable death as entering a state of non-existence. I’d prefer to give him the dignity of that.
And I really wish he had died while watching a favorite film. Ideally, Citizen Kane.
I only met him once, as he and Chaz were looking around the floor of the Consumer Electronics Show, back when it was held in Chicago as well as Las Vegas. I asked him what cool stuff he had seen so far, and he said that they had just gotten there. It was not that long after my wife and I had moved to Chicago, and I guess I thought that running into Roger Ebert was going to happen fairly frequently.
