Ebert sucks. Again.
I knew it. The man who gave Old School 1 Star, and Napoleon Dynamite 1.5 Stars, gave Wedding Crashers 2 Stars.
Idiot. A long time ago I saw a woman on Oprah, or some such show, and Oprah's guest was the cast of A Fish Called Wanda. A woman in the audience stood and said "I don't get British humor" into Oprah's mic. The cast sat, slightly nonplussed, while the woman waited for a response. How do you respond to such an assertion? If you don't get something you don't get it- and if it has to be explained you won't get it. (I don't actually remember the response, btw.)
I thought the woman was rude (why attend an Oprah show filled with people who made a movie you don't get?) but I appreciated that she knew her limitations. She didn't say British humor was unfunny- she said she didn't get it.
Ebert simply doesn't get Old School, nor Napoleon Dynamite, nor Wedding Crashers, nor Fight Club. There is a common thread here, obviously. These are the movies which resonate with X-and-later-generation males. These are movies they view repeatedly, quote incessantly, and, for better or worse, indentify with on some level Ebert simply does not have.
Maybe you had to grow up watching Caddyshack and Animal House over and over on video or on HBO to get the X-gen male movies. Maybe you have to be disgusted by PC culture in general. I'm not saying it is Ebert's fault he doesn't "get" these movies, but it is certainly his fault that he doesn't recognize he, not the movies, is the problem.
If Ebert didn't "get" British humor I'm sure he would change, recuse himself from reviewing movies that featured it, or at the very least try to appreciate British humor for what it is. But when it comes to the movies listed above he does none of these things. Rather he writes the same sorts of reviews, all of which attack these movies for not doing things well that they never intended to do at all. Or worse yet, (see the Napoleon Dynamite review linked above) for thinking a movie does the exact opposite of what it does.
Ebert sucks.
Click Here for the first "Ebert Sucks."
Idiot. A long time ago I saw a woman on Oprah, or some such show, and Oprah's guest was the cast of A Fish Called Wanda. A woman in the audience stood and said "I don't get British humor" into Oprah's mic. The cast sat, slightly nonplussed, while the woman waited for a response. How do you respond to such an assertion? If you don't get something you don't get it- and if it has to be explained you won't get it. (I don't actually remember the response, btw.)
I thought the woman was rude (why attend an Oprah show filled with people who made a movie you don't get?) but I appreciated that she knew her limitations. She didn't say British humor was unfunny- she said she didn't get it.
Ebert simply doesn't get Old School, nor Napoleon Dynamite, nor Wedding Crashers, nor Fight Club. There is a common thread here, obviously. These are the movies which resonate with X-and-later-generation males. These are movies they view repeatedly, quote incessantly, and, for better or worse, indentify with on some level Ebert simply does not have.
Maybe you had to grow up watching Caddyshack and Animal House over and over on video or on HBO to get the X-gen male movies. Maybe you have to be disgusted by PC culture in general. I'm not saying it is Ebert's fault he doesn't "get" these movies, but it is certainly his fault that he doesn't recognize he, not the movies, is the problem.
If Ebert didn't "get" British humor I'm sure he would change, recuse himself from reviewing movies that featured it, or at the very least try to appreciate British humor for what it is. But when it comes to the movies listed above he does none of these things. Rather he writes the same sorts of reviews, all of which attack these movies for not doing things well that they never intended to do at all. Or worse yet, (see the Napoleon Dynamite review linked above) for thinking a movie does the exact opposite of what it does.
Ebert sucks.
Click Here for the first "Ebert Sucks."
posted by Harkonnendog @ 3:00 PM
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