Erik Childress from Criticwatch responds to the Associated Press article on At the Movies:
The Ben Lyons Quote of the Week is in its sixth month of existence and in that time there hasn’t exactly been a groundswell of disagreement in its position (and the position of many) that Ben Lyons has no business being anywhere but on the publicity machine of E!, smiling away through puff pieces and being their official “film expert.” Which is like Rod Blagojevich winning a follicle award against Otto Kerner, George Ryan and Dan Walker. Congratulations! The only one who has come out with any sort of defense for Lyons has been Cenk Uygar, who was Ben Mankiewicz’s former radio show partner. Way to show that liberals won’t just defend anything, Cenk. Guilt by association is not always the fairest of criticism. Parents will speak up for their children, friends will play devil’s advocate when defending their closest and colleagues will command a professional respect for those in the same field. At least those they believe are professional.
This week, Associated Press writers Lynn Elber and contributor Caryn Rousseau have released a piece called “At the Movies critics dish it out, take it too.” I was interviewed for it several weeks ago, so the timing of it is rather circumspect. During Oscar week, Lyons and Mankiewicz were being trucked out on talk show after talk show giving their picks and having to listen to Joy Behar wonder if The Reader had too much sex for a Holocaust film. Even they don’t deserve such torture. But as the pair have had nearly as many reruns this year (of their Best, Worst and Oscar shows) as new broadcasts, it’s almost as if the Disney powers that be are hoping that getting their boys out there will help swing a little positive publicity their way between the talk show appearances (notice Lteno & Letterman haven’t come calling) and the live chat on their website that they conducted with “fans” who weren’t allowed to get in any tough questions. And Elber’s piece fits right into that mold. With minimal counter from myself and StopBenLyons’ Scott Johnson wedged right into the middle of it, this article is easily the most lengthy “in their own words” feature since they were initially announced (to everyone’s horror) as the new hosts of At the Movies. Lyons, you may remember, was scheduled to be interviewed for the infamous LA Times article, but ducked out at the last moment. But this is their moment. A chance to set the record straight. To answer the criticism and prove that everyone has been wrong about Lyons since they took the reins last September. But no dice. Oh, don’t be mistaken, they are trying to do all of that but in his defense of Lyons, Mankiewicz has sunk an even deeper hole. Lyons is certainly wielding a shovel as well, but Mank has received the benefit of the doubt more often than not, coming off as a reasonably astute television presence next to the head-shrinking banality of his co-star. But that honeymoon comes to an end once and for all as Mankiewicz has aligned himself with the devil and lost, for good, whatever credibility he had maintained up to this point:
"Nobody who meets him is going to doubt that this guy knows a lot about film and is thoughtful about it, is interested and wants to talk about it,” said Mankiewicz. “Everything came through this prism of presuming that he’s young and didn’t know what he was talking about."
Read the rest of Erik's response here
Friday, February 27, 2009
"At the Movies" critics dish it out, take it too
Below is an article published by the Associated Press on the criticism of At the MoviesBy LYNN ELBER
BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. (AP) — At the Movies critics Ben Mankiewicz and Ben Lyons have been taking it as well as dishing it out since joining the show last fall.
That's especially true for Lyons, who's gotten heat from fellow critics and others for hobnobbing with Hollywood insiders and his alleged quest for blurb glory in movie ads. They don't like his reviews much, either.
While everyone's entitled to their opinion, Mankiewicz said, the thumbs-down for his colleague is "just wrong."
"Nobody who meets him is going to doubt that this guy knows a lot about film and is thoughtful about it, is interested and wants to talk about it," he said. "Everything came through this prism of presuming that he's young and didn't know what he was talking about."
Lyons said the attacks are inaccurate but leave him unfazed.
"It hasn't bothered me, hasn't affected me. I'm traveling, working, have a couple different jobs going on. I'm too busy to let it get to me," he said. "I do look at it as I criticize people's work, someone's going to criticize my work."
During lunch in a chic hotel (tuna sandwich for Lyons, chicken soup for Mankiewicz), they're as eager to discuss the Oscars as their show. The pair contrast sharply: Mankiewicz, 41, is low-key and droll, while Lyons, 27, is all boyish enthusiasm.
When Lyons mentions their different opinions of the dysfunctional family drama Rachel Getting Married, which he declares he "loved," Mankiewicz pulls a face.
"It's not over yet. I think it's 98 hours long and it's just about ready to wrap up," Mankiewicz quips.
Lyons, a Hollywood reporter and film critic for "E! News" and others, and Turner Classic Movies host Mankiewicz started last September on the show distributed by Disney-ABC Domestic Television. They replaced Richard Roeper, who'd been working with guest critics since illness took Roger Ebert off the air in 2006. (Ebert's trademark thumbs up-down is gone, too.)
Lyons and Mankiewicz commute from Los Angeles to Chicago, where the show is produced, for tapings.
Viewership initially dipped, with 1.8 million tuning in compared to the nearly 2.4 million it was averaging last season. But there's been a steady uptick, to 2.3 million viewers in January, according to ratings released by Disney.
Lyons and Mankiewicz say their on-air chemistry still is jelling as they move at a fast clip through films, squeezing in an extra review — about six total, along with DVD critiques — in the latest incarnation of the long-running show.
Observers have criticized the revamp as a surrender to lightweight criticism, with Lyons bearing the brunt of the attacks.
"It's kind of mindboggling to me that we're at this point that Ben Lyons basically has become the face of film criticism," said Erik Childress, vice president of the Chicago Film Critics Association.
He was willing to give Lyons a chance but "it seems every week he's out there saying something completely moronic," Childress said, adding that Mankiewicz is trying "to keep the spirit of the show alive."
Scott Johnson, a blogger who founded StopBenLyons.com, said Lyons "seems more interested in kind of playing into what's the latest vehicle for hype and seeing if he can jump on the band wagon rather than being critical and offering an opinion that's going to challenge people."
Lyons takes issue with claims that he's angling to get quoted in movie ads and panders to the industry.
His reviews have been "blurbed" far less than those of other critics, he said. And mingling with Hollywood insiders is helpful as long as he keeps his reviews honest, Lyons said, insisting that he does.
"In the past, it might have hurt the show a bit that (reviewers) were isolated in Chicago. I enjoy the fact that I'm out here in L.A. and I know writers and directors and actors. I'm young and I'm going to be out and social and to meet people and develop genuine friendships with them and understand the (artistic) choices they've made," he said.
Mankiewicz's wry aside: "I'm not young, I'm not social and I don't enjoying going out. But I want to establish that we get along really well."
It's the latest twist in the journey of At the Movies, which had its roots in a 1975 PBS series with Chicago newspaper critics Ebert and Gene Siskel (who died in 1999) and became the leading national TV forum for film criticism.
Ebert, a Pulitzer Prize winner, and Siskel offered brief but trenchant TV assessments of movies that they analyzed in greater depth and detail in print.
That was then and this is now, Mankiewicz and Lyons said.
"This is a TV show and the notion that only people who qualify to talk about film criticism are people who have written for a newspaper seems silly," Mankiewicz said.
Look at it this way, he adds: Would anyone suggest that NBC anchor Brian Williams write "750 to 2,500 words on the stimulus package before he discusses it on the air?"
That does not signal any less respect for films or those who make them, the pair say, and they produce family history as evidence.
Mankiewicz's grandfather, writer Herman Mankiewicz ("Citizen Kane") and great-uncle, writer-director Joseph Mankiewicz ("All About Eve," "A Letter to Three Wives") both are Oscar winners.
Lyons, whose grandfather was New York Post columnist Leonard Lyons, went to screenings as a child with his dad, critic Jeffrey Lyons, who encouraged his appreciation of classic films.
When it comes to movie criticism, Lyons and Mankiewicz say tradition is giving way to the rising chorus of voices online. That gives them a sharp appreciation of their "high-profile platform," Lyons said.
"Everybody can be a critic but that doesn't mean that everybody takes it seriously or responsibly, and that's something we can do. It's our job, it's what we do and love, so we treat it with the utmost respect."
Slumdog Reality?
I loved Slumdog Millionaire, but I thought this was a pretty interesting critique. This article was written by Charles R. Larson and originally posted at CounterPunch.org
After all the international controversy about Slumdog Millionaire, if Hollywood crowns the film with an Oscar for the best movie of the year, Indians, I suspect, are going to have much to crow about. How ironic that a half a year ago the movie's investors feared that they had made a real dog—a film that would interest no one—and were considering dumping it directly on DVD with no release in movie theatres around the world. Can the movie moguls (mughals?) have been so myopic that they had no idea of the film's importance?
Then the slow release, mostly in art-houses in the United States and England, rather than the big cineplexes, and the increasingly positive word-of-mouth (still in the West), followed by the surprise Golden Globe Award as best film of the year along with several other significant awards for music and acting. And at the time Slumdog Millionaire hadn't even been released in India.
I was traveling in India when all the brouhaha about the film exploded. Many Indians were ecstatic about all the attention and the subsequent awards the film rapidly acquired: everything about Danny Boyle's film was happening so quickly. Reviews of the movie (which officially opened in India on Friday, January 23rd) were positive, even glowing. Pirated copies of the film were selling everywhere for as little as 40 rupees, less than a dollar. The Indian press was overflowing with articles about the film, photos of the actors, the director and the composer, and interviews with Vikas Swarup, author of Q&A, the novel that became the basis for the film.
A typical review—for example, Khalid Mohamed's in The Hindustan Times (Jan. 24)—began by proclaiming, "There's reason to dance on the streets." Mohamed gave the film five stars, the highest possible ranking, and ended his glowing evaluation by stating, "Literally every performance rocks. Still, your heart goes out most of all to Ayush Mahesh Khedekar, Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail and Rubiana Ali, the kids who portray the knee-high Jamal, Salim, and Latika. They're extraordinary just like the rest of Slumdog Millionaire. As one of the songs goes, Jai jo!"
Then the attacks on the film began, generally arguing that the unflattering representation of Mumbai—especially the poverty—lock India into stereotypes that Westerners are already too quick to assume. Arindam Chaudhuri, in The Times of India (Feb 2nd), excoriated that the film "sucks," describing the movie as "A phony poseur that has been made only to mock India for the viewing pleasure of the First World!!" The film "illogically shows every negative thing about India happening in the protagonist's life…slums, open-air lavatories, riots, underworld, prostitution, brothels, child labour, begging, blinding and maiming of kids to make them into 'better beggars,' petty peddlers, traffic jams, irresponsible call centre executives…."
The corrective to this barrage of negative attacks had already begun to appear, also in The Times (Jan. 26th). Santosh Desai titled his op-ed essay, "The slum is not the other India." It's the real India. Slumdog Millionaire depicts India as it is—with all its ills and foibles--arguing that Indians are not being honest with themselves if "We genuinely believe that Mumbai can be summed up by the Taj."
Yet, the controversy mushroomed, especially in the Western press. The people who made the film were accused of making a fortune out of India's misery, prompting the same people to announce that a portion of the film's profits will be given to India's poor. Others objected that the child actors in Slumdog Millionaire were given only a pittance for their labor—in effect, exploited. That criticism prompted further good deeds by the film's backers, who promise that the children will be supported in on-going ways.
The entire controversy of the film's phenomenal success pivots on someone making money off someone else's misery, distorting and exploiting another culture. Fortunately, Desai offers clarity here by stating, "If cinematic representations about India are stereotyped, so are those for all cultures." Right on. Desai has summed up the flaw of Hollywood (and Bollywood) itself.
I think of the times when my wife and I have sat through four or five previews of "coming attractions." All the movies blend together, blood and mayhem, everyone gets killed. Bodies are everywhere, which makes me recall the remark from an African student about the day he arrived in the United States, in New York City. Riding in a taxi, he said he was afraid to get out for fear that the streets were filled with gangsters who would kill him. Hollywood films shown around the world, certainly give that impression. Female American students I've talked to overseas have told me that men in the Third World assume that they are interested in the same non-stop sexual activities depicted in American pornographic films.
Well, those images about America are about as accurate as the poverty, violence, and greed depicted in Slumdog Millionaire, which is only to state that they depict certain excesses and extremes of life everywhere: the good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly. If Hollywood crowns the film with an Oscar for the best movie of the year, I suspect that Indians everywhere will rejoice. And maybe we'll all think a little more seriously about the stereotypes we use and confront every day of our lives.
Charles R. Larson is Professor of Literature at American University in Washington, D.C. His books include Under African Skies, Worlds of Fiction, The Ordeal of the African Writer and Academia Nuts. He can be reached at: clarson@american.edu
After all the international controversy about Slumdog Millionaire, if Hollywood crowns the film with an Oscar for the best movie of the year, Indians, I suspect, are going to have much to crow about. How ironic that a half a year ago the movie's investors feared that they had made a real dog—a film that would interest no one—and were considering dumping it directly on DVD with no release in movie theatres around the world. Can the movie moguls (mughals?) have been so myopic that they had no idea of the film's importance?
Then the slow release, mostly in art-houses in the United States and England, rather than the big cineplexes, and the increasingly positive word-of-mouth (still in the West), followed by the surprise Golden Globe Award as best film of the year along with several other significant awards for music and acting. And at the time Slumdog Millionaire hadn't even been released in India.
I was traveling in India when all the brouhaha about the film exploded. Many Indians were ecstatic about all the attention and the subsequent awards the film rapidly acquired: everything about Danny Boyle's film was happening so quickly. Reviews of the movie (which officially opened in India on Friday, January 23rd) were positive, even glowing. Pirated copies of the film were selling everywhere for as little as 40 rupees, less than a dollar. The Indian press was overflowing with articles about the film, photos of the actors, the director and the composer, and interviews with Vikas Swarup, author of Q&A, the novel that became the basis for the film.
A typical review—for example, Khalid Mohamed's in The Hindustan Times (Jan. 24)—began by proclaiming, "There's reason to dance on the streets." Mohamed gave the film five stars, the highest possible ranking, and ended his glowing evaluation by stating, "Literally every performance rocks. Still, your heart goes out most of all to Ayush Mahesh Khedekar, Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail and Rubiana Ali, the kids who portray the knee-high Jamal, Salim, and Latika. They're extraordinary just like the rest of Slumdog Millionaire. As one of the songs goes, Jai jo!"
Then the attacks on the film began, generally arguing that the unflattering representation of Mumbai—especially the poverty—lock India into stereotypes that Westerners are already too quick to assume. Arindam Chaudhuri, in The Times of India (Feb 2nd), excoriated that the film "sucks," describing the movie as "A phony poseur that has been made only to mock India for the viewing pleasure of the First World!!" The film "illogically shows every negative thing about India happening in the protagonist's life…slums, open-air lavatories, riots, underworld, prostitution, brothels, child labour, begging, blinding and maiming of kids to make them into 'better beggars,' petty peddlers, traffic jams, irresponsible call centre executives…."
The corrective to this barrage of negative attacks had already begun to appear, also in The Times (Jan. 26th). Santosh Desai titled his op-ed essay, "The slum is not the other India." It's the real India. Slumdog Millionaire depicts India as it is—with all its ills and foibles--arguing that Indians are not being honest with themselves if "We genuinely believe that Mumbai can be summed up by the Taj."
Yet, the controversy mushroomed, especially in the Western press. The people who made the film were accused of making a fortune out of India's misery, prompting the same people to announce that a portion of the film's profits will be given to India's poor. Others objected that the child actors in Slumdog Millionaire were given only a pittance for their labor—in effect, exploited. That criticism prompted further good deeds by the film's backers, who promise that the children will be supported in on-going ways.
The entire controversy of the film's phenomenal success pivots on someone making money off someone else's misery, distorting and exploiting another culture. Fortunately, Desai offers clarity here by stating, "If cinematic representations about India are stereotyped, so are those for all cultures." Right on. Desai has summed up the flaw of Hollywood (and Bollywood) itself.
I think of the times when my wife and I have sat through four or five previews of "coming attractions." All the movies blend together, blood and mayhem, everyone gets killed. Bodies are everywhere, which makes me recall the remark from an African student about the day he arrived in the United States, in New York City. Riding in a taxi, he said he was afraid to get out for fear that the streets were filled with gangsters who would kill him. Hollywood films shown around the world, certainly give that impression. Female American students I've talked to overseas have told me that men in the Third World assume that they are interested in the same non-stop sexual activities depicted in American pornographic films.
Well, those images about America are about as accurate as the poverty, violence, and greed depicted in Slumdog Millionaire, which is only to state that they depict certain excesses and extremes of life everywhere: the good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly. If Hollywood crowns the film with an Oscar for the best movie of the year, I suspect that Indians everywhere will rejoice. And maybe we'll all think a little more seriously about the stereotypes we use and confront every day of our lives.
Charles R. Larson is Professor of Literature at American University in Washington, D.C. His books include Under African Skies, Worlds of Fiction, The Ordeal of the African Writer and Academia Nuts. He can be reached at: clarson@american.edu
Thursday, February 26, 2009
He's just not that into their movie
Ben Lyons interviews the women from He's Just Not That Into You and asks what guys can take away from the film. Jennifer Aniston responds "What did you take away?" and Ben replies, "To be honest, direct, and to not be afraid to say something that's bad toward somebody."
Ironically, much of the interview is about how women want men to be more honest with them. But Ben--who agrees--refuses to be honest with them about his own assessment of the movie. In his original review, he said:
"For any real insights into relationships or good quality romantic comedy, turn elsewhere. You can skip it . . . To the films credit they [the male characters] are fully developed characters. However, I felt that they compromised most of their ideals that they stood for in the end just to help everything wrap up nicely."
There are also some complaints about text messaging, but little do they know that they are talking to the king of inappropriate text messaging. The rest of the interview has just as little insight into relationships as Ben claims the movie has, and even fewer insights about the film itself.
Ironically, much of the interview is about how women want men to be more honest with them. But Ben--who agrees--refuses to be honest with them about his own assessment of the movie. In his original review, he said:
"For any real insights into relationships or good quality romantic comedy, turn elsewhere. You can skip it . . . To the films credit they [the male characters] are fully developed characters. However, I felt that they compromised most of their ideals that they stood for in the end just to help everything wrap up nicely."
There are also some complaints about text messaging, but little do they know that they are talking to the king of inappropriate text messaging. The rest of the interview has just as little insight into relationships as Ben claims the movie has, and even fewer insights about the film itself.
TONIGHT! Voices of a Peoples History performance in SF
 | Please join HOWARD ZINN for a special performance of VOICES OF A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES Thursday, February 26, 2009 7 PM Mission High School Auditorium 3750 18th Street San Francisco CA 94114 |
With a cast of readers and musicians including:
BENJAMIN BRATT
JOSH BROLIN
DIANE LANE
STAIRWELL SISTERS
CLARENCE THOMAS
KERRY WASHINGTON
ROBIN WRIGHT PENN
and others soon to be announced.
CO-PRODUCERS
Haymarket Books
Voices of a People's History of the United States
MEDIA CO-SPONSORS
KALW 91.7 FM Local Public Radio
KPFA 94.1 FM Pacifica Radio
Special thanks to hotel host and sponsor
HOTEL PALOMAR SAN FRANCISCO
TICKETING
General admission $20.00.
To buy tickets online (major credit cards, PayPal), visit:
http://www.peopleshistory.us
Premium "VIP" reserved seating and the opportunity to make a donation
to the Haymarket Books Young Readers Fund is also available online,
at a variety of levels, including $100, $250, $500, and $1,000. For
more information about VIP ticket and donation options, please
contact ToddChretien@mac.com.
This generous additional support will help Voices of a People's
History to organize performances in more communities and schools
across the country and Haymarket Books to donate educational books to
the students and staff of Mission High School.
Donations at the $250 level and above will also receive a signed copy
of the book Voices of a People's History of the United States by
Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove.
To buy tickets in person in the Bay Area, please visit these fine
independent bookstores:
City Lights Books
261 Columbus Avenueat Broadway
The GreenArcade
1680 Market Streetat Gough
Modern Times
888 Valencia Street
Moe's Books
2476 Telegraph Avenue
CONTACT
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
I bet he didn't text through Jay-Z's show
Ben: Damn Dad, do I really have to go see another movie? I've got a show to check out.
The LA Weekly ran this yesterday--an interview with Ben Lyons about hip-hop. I give these guys great credit--they spend a whole paragraph slamming Ben before they get to the interview. I doubt he will be linking to this over at the Lyons Den. The article begins:
Perhaps if Ben Lyons' movie chops were as obvious as his hip-hop track record, then sites like StopBenLyons.com wouldn't exist. Ever since the E! personality took the helm of the Siskel, Roper and Ebert's beloved At the Movies, Lyons has been berated with more thumbs down than a rookie gladiator in the Colosseum. Whether it's deriding his "frat boy good looks," MySpace photographs with the movie stars he's guarded with critiquing or calling I Am Legend "one of the greatest movies ever made," the critic's critics are numerous.
And while there are no judgments on his film reviewing prowess here, it's official that dude knows hip-hop. He's homies with world famous DJ Clinton Sparks. And working with Duck Down Records, a staple of New York's grimy true lyricism schism, carries a legitimate case of cred among "real" hip-hop heads. Of course, now that he's getting a little older, he's just trying to discover what's the hullabaloo over this Bruce Springsteen guy.
Reading the interview it is clear that his life's calling is listening to hip-hop and hanging out with cool people, with film coming in a distant third.
I hope nobody has a problem with Ben's interest in hip-hop, I certainly don't. And while there are several comments I am sure you can criticize--for example, "for me, Wu-Tang Clan is just the greatest story of, like, it's the American Dream in every weird way"--I was surprised how natural Ben seems in this interview compared to his prefabricated canned blurbs that he awkwardly strings together when he is talking about film. He actually seems like a guy who loves the hip-hop scene and knows what he is talking about. He even avoided mentioning Scene It? Box Office Smash.
He's so comfortable here, he even criticizes Ice Cube for not doing any decent acting since Three Kings--a far cry from his embarrassingly gushy interview with Kristen Stewart. But then you wonder why the hell he went to Sundance at all when he really wanted to be doing something else.
Finally, this article marks the first time that I know of that Ben has responded directly to the criticism of him:
Over the holidays, you, the critic, became part of the story, especially after the LA Times article. How'd you respond to that when word first came out about the story?
I was actually in Shanghai with some friends, celebrating New Year's Eve over there, my friend Clinton Sparks was DJing. It kind of put it all in perspective, when you see news like that in a foreign country with your friends, over the holiday and in a new year. I criticize people's work for a living and if they want to criticize me, then so be it. I love movies and it just comes with the gig, I suppose.
There is also a very bizarre story about Joaquin Phoenix, even more so than you would expect.
Read the entire interview with Ben Lyons here
The LA Weekly ran this yesterday--an interview with Ben Lyons about hip-hop. I give these guys great credit--they spend a whole paragraph slamming Ben before they get to the interview. I doubt he will be linking to this over at the Lyons Den. The article begins:
Perhaps if Ben Lyons' movie chops were as obvious as his hip-hop track record, then sites like StopBenLyons.com wouldn't exist. Ever since the E! personality took the helm of the Siskel, Roper and Ebert's beloved At the Movies, Lyons has been berated with more thumbs down than a rookie gladiator in the Colosseum. Whether it's deriding his "frat boy good looks," MySpace photographs with the movie stars he's guarded with critiquing or calling I Am Legend "one of the greatest movies ever made," the critic's critics are numerous.
And while there are no judgments on his film reviewing prowess here, it's official that dude knows hip-hop. He's homies with world famous DJ Clinton Sparks. And working with Duck Down Records, a staple of New York's grimy true lyricism schism, carries a legitimate case of cred among "real" hip-hop heads. Of course, now that he's getting a little older, he's just trying to discover what's the hullabaloo over this Bruce Springsteen guy.
Reading the interview it is clear that his life's calling is listening to hip-hop and hanging out with cool people, with film coming in a distant third.
I hope nobody has a problem with Ben's interest in hip-hop, I certainly don't. And while there are several comments I am sure you can criticize--for example, "for me, Wu-Tang Clan is just the greatest story of, like, it's the American Dream in every weird way"--I was surprised how natural Ben seems in this interview compared to his prefabricated canned blurbs that he awkwardly strings together when he is talking about film. He actually seems like a guy who loves the hip-hop scene and knows what he is talking about. He even avoided mentioning Scene It? Box Office Smash.
He's so comfortable here, he even criticizes Ice Cube for not doing any decent acting since Three Kings--a far cry from his embarrassingly gushy interview with Kristen Stewart. But then you wonder why the hell he went to Sundance at all when he really wanted to be doing something else.
Finally, this article marks the first time that I know of that Ben has responded directly to the criticism of him:
Over the holidays, you, the critic, became part of the story, especially after the LA Times article. How'd you respond to that when word first came out about the story?
I was actually in Shanghai with some friends, celebrating New Year's Eve over there, my friend Clinton Sparks was DJing. It kind of put it all in perspective, when you see news like that in a foreign country with your friends, over the holiday and in a new year. I criticize people's work for a living and if they want to criticize me, then so be it. I love movies and it just comes with the gig, I suppose.
There is also a very bizarre story about Joaquin Phoenix, even more so than you would expect.
Read the entire interview with Ben Lyons here
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Criticwatch - Less than the average film journalist
Erik Childress sums up his astonishment at a single, incredible comment by Ben Lyons last week. First we get the quote:"This year I saw 5 movies, a few were pretty decent.”
Then the astonishment:
This isn’t an ironic counter to Ben’s insistence that he sees over 300 movies and brushes up on them thanks to xBox Live updates to Scene It: Box Office Smash. Nor is it an opportunity to comment on what Lyons has actually seen in full through all the texting he’s been reported doing time and time again during screenings. No, this week’s quote comes from the online chat that the At the Movies duo conducted with inquiring minds last Monday. (Their show this weekend was the third rerun of 2009.) And it’s in reference to what Junior did at the Sundance Film Festival this year. FIVE MOVIES!!!???
For those uninitiated to the film festival experience, the average journalist probably sees at least 3-4 movies a day. And that’s a conservative estimate. Everyone has different assignments. Some are doing interviews. Some find time to slack off in the evening to take in an industry party. Many are finding time in-between screenings to crank out a blog entry or even an actual review of something. My personal etiquette prevents me from doing much writing at the actual festival as I’m not bound to plunk down every thought I’m having at every moment. I like to let movies sink in as I formulate what I might want to say in a review and then write it at a later date so I can give the filmmaker as best a write-up as I can possibly deliver. I’m also doing live reports from the fest for back home with WGN Radio, so my goal is to manage my schedule to see as many movies as humanly possible. This usually means 5-6 movies a day for me – anywhere from 8:30 AM through sometimes after midnight. Then repeat the next day. This year I saw 26 movies in 6 days – and that includes the opening Thursday when they only show a single film. So that’s 25 movies from Friday-Tuesday. Ben Lyons saw 5.
Read the rest of the Criticwatch Ben Lyons Quote of the Week here.
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