Roger Ebert's review

[deleted]

I understood your OP - you're whining about critiques you consider reactionary and hypocritical, in the most hypocritically reactionary terms possible. If you're going to criticize a professional critic, your own critical skills should be at least in the ballpark.

Pauline Kael was a cow. Her opinions mean nothing. For some reason people were told her reviews were important.

Criticism you don't agree with, for whatever reason, then, equals "bad criticism?"

"Pathetic," actually, is when people get so worked up over an opinion they disagree with that they feel like they have to resort to ad-hominem abuse and white knighting on the internet.

I love 'The Devils,' but I can read, and disagree 100% with Ebert's review without getting personally upset, calling names, etc. (For the record, I think Ebert's review of 'The Devils' is one of his worst, not because I disagree with it, but because although he advances a critical argument, it is flimsy and dismissive enough to suggest that he was actually offended by the film and responding to it emotionally while perfunctorily trying to appear to be criticizing it on intellectual grounds — but this isn't about Ebert. I'm not here to white knight Ebert, but to criticize the poor quality of your "criticism.")

What I see here from you and a few others is:

a) failure to distinguish between criticism and abuse (spectacularly complete failure)

b) ignorance or misunderstanding of the actual function of criticism (i.e., an apparent, very mistaken, belief that it is intended to tell people "what to think" or to simply negate any opposing opinions)

c) lack of understanding of what distinguishes quality or lack thereof in criticism (apparently "good" criticism is criticism you agree with and "bad" criticism is criticism you disagree with)

d) the seeming belief that abuse is an appropriate or equivalent response to criticisms or opinions you disagree with (which seem to be regarded as tantamount to a personal attack)

e) complete obliviousness as to how immature and out-of-proportion such a response actually is

While there are older people who exhibit the attitudes I outlined above, it it strikingly prevalent in the Millennial Generation, raised to have high levels of self-esteem whether they had anything to warrant it or not (and people who grow up believing they are fine the way they are generally develop much less to offer than people raised believing they must always strive for improvement). One of the many unfortunate side-effects of that conditioning is that they seem to be extremely thin-skinned, interpreting anything that disagrees with their own opinions as an attack on those opinions, and perhaps on them personally — so they tend to react emotionally, entirely inappropriately.

Granted, all of this falls into a special category of criticism known as personal criticism, which bears a higher likelihood of the subject taking offense. But the fact remains, people with any strength of character at all aren't threatened by opposing opinions. It's a serious weakness that seems, unfortunately, to be on the rise in this culture, but it would be a mistake to assume that normalization equals acceptability. It will always be a clear sign of small-mindedness and immaturity.

For the record, good criticism is generally accepted to be the expression of a personal opinion, well thought-out and advanced, that will also hopefully give the audience an idea of whether or not the work in question would appeal to them regardless of the opinion of the reviewer. There's more to it than that, but that's basically it. Bad criticism advances no argument for the opinion, and, at worst, insults the audience for the work, e.g., "This movie sucked and only idiots or perverts would like it." (Compare this with your own expressed opinions on Ebert and you will see a great deal in common.) Naturally, there are varying degrees of quality in between that, and critics can achieve the former in one review and drift toward the latter end in another.

Considering how gratuitous Ebert's own depiction of psychedelic bourgeois orgies is in his movie "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls" (sex AND crude violence well included) I really can't see how or why he could have been shocked by "The Devils"'s intense scenes of mock-possessed nude nuns and torture. His review does not show outrage, but rather sheer despise. "The Devils" went beyond his head, clearly. It's one thing to be shocked to disgust, it's another to fail recognizing that Russell displayed pure genius all over this movie.

That's why I pay little importance to whatever Ebert thinks about any movie. He does have brilliant remarks and insightful ideas here and there, but on the whole, I don't see consistency. The man drifts away with the prevailing currents, as someone aptly pointed out in different words.