Rating: 
Summary: Kael was great, but biased against European film
Review: A few short comments about Pauline Kael's movie criticism.Like most people who are serious about film, I, too, believe Pauline Kael was a brilliant and irrreplaceable critic -- but this does not mean that she didn't have her flaws. Kael was a superb critic in any number of ways. She was outstanding in her ability to write about screen acting, today one of the most neglected areas of film criticism. (Stanley Kauffmann writes better about acting than anybody else around; but then, he is the best serious film critic writing today.) Kael was superb at detecting new and important talent, at understanding the ways in which movies reflect and interact with cultural currents, at conveying her ardor and passion for directors and actors, at the potentiality of film for exploring human sexuality. She was also simply a hell of a good writer, and the depth of her knowledge of film, books, theatre, dance, etc., all played importantly in making her a great critic. But Kael was not perfect. Some of her reviews simply run on long after she has made her point; and although I love the hyperbole of her writing, sometimes it seems hyperbole for hyperbole's sake. Also, and I think this was her chief flaw as a critic, she displayed a bias against certain non-English-language directors and their work. In this regard, the brilliant Penelope Gilliatt was Kael's superior. Gilliatt was a brilliant film critic (part of the great team of Ken Tynan and Gilliatt at the Observer [London] before she moved to The New Yorker), a dazzlingly talented writer of screenplays, short stories, novels, television and radio plays, and profiles; she was also an opera librettist and writer of nonfiction (her books on movie comedy and on Tati and Renoir are invaluable), theatre criticism, book reviews, and essays. (Her IQ was higher than Einstein's!) Gilliatt had a far deeper understanding of that elusive element in the arts -- style. Her criticism is vastly better than Kael's on films from Europe (she was notoriously better at writing about films from Eastern Europe), Asia (Ozu, for a supreme example), about science fiction (Gilliatt was the "only" major critic to stand up for 2001), about directiors experimenting with stylistic devices (Fassbinder, for another supreme example), and simply had a wider view regarding the possibilities of film as an art form. Gilliatt also was better at writing about the films of Godard (though, Kael, too championed his work of the 60s, Gilliatt's criticism today stands higher), Bresson, Bergman, Fellini, and many, many more foreign-language directors. Of course, no critic is perfect. Even Agee had a severe flaw --he couldn't write worth a damn about acting, and often contradicted himself. So, Kael, in perspective, was a great, if deeply imperfect critic -- and god knows I miss her writing terribly. Denby and Lane, compared with Gilliatt and Kael, are but pale comparisons to The New Yorker's once great women thinkers -- Gilliatt (whose talents were panoramic) and Kael, who could make your pulse race with excitement.
Rating:
Summary: Kael never lost her edge
Review: Afterglow gives Pauline Kael fans a chance to hear her opinions on the big films that were released after she stopped reviewing them. You miss her great long prose in an interview like this, but you still get the insight in little capsules. Most surprisingly is her love of the television show, Sex and the City. She makes a good point about how TV shows filmed in New York like Law and Order and Sex and the City have better actors and guest stars because they can easily get them from New York theatre. There's a funny moment in the story where the author tries to convince Kael to watch the independent movie CROUPIER. He can't admit that he has already seen it, because Kael wouldn't hear of him watching it twice, she herself being famous for watching a movie just once. Kael does later admit that she has seen just a few movies twice but it's rare. Like always, Kael's movie taste surprises you. She's always been good at pointing out the flaws of movies that you like, and sometimes forgiving of movies that you didn't get. Here she sums her thoughts up with a sentence or two. The book acts as a nice epilogue to an enjoyable career.
Rating:
Summary: Kael never lost her edge
Review: Afterglow gives Pauline Kael fans a chance to hear her opinions on the big films that were released after she stopped reviewing them. You miss her great long prose in an interview like this, but you still get the insight in little capsules. Most surprisingly is her love of the television show, Sex and the City. She makes a good point about how TV shows filmed in New York like Law and Order and Sex and the City have better actors and guest stars because they can easily get them from New York theatre. There's a funny moment in the story where the author tries to convince Kael to watch the independent movie CROUPIER. He can't admit that he has already seen it, because Kael wouldn't hear of him watching it twice, she herself being famous for watching a movie just once. Kael does later admit that she has seen just a few movies twice but it's rare. Like always, Kael's movie taste surprises you. She's always been good at pointing out the flaws of movies that you like, and sometimes forgiving of movies that you didn't get. Here she sums her thoughts up with a sentence or two. The book acts as a nice epilogue to an enjoyable career.
Rating: 
Summary: An absorbingly written memory of wit, wisdom, and wonder
Review: Afterglow: A Last Conversation With Pauline Kael by Francis Davis (Contributing Editor of Atlantic Monthly magazine) is an absorbingly written memory of the wit, wisdom, and wonder of a truly great actress, and the memorable chat she had with author Francis Davis shortly before her unfortunate death. Written in question-and-answer format, Afterglow preserves this remarkable woman's keen insights on movies, television, literature and much, much more in her own words.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Conversation
Review: Don't be put off by the slim page-count. This is a dense and enthralling "last conversation" with the movies' best critic. Davis really does make it feel as if we're sitting down and chatting with an old friend - and for those who love Pauline, this alone makes the book a powerful experience. If you've never encountered her, try this book along with her "1001 Nights At the Movies" (instead of the choppily edited, "For Keeps"). You'll never look at movies the same way again, which is not to say that you'll look at them Pauline's way. Her greatest gift to any moviegoer is that she sharpens our own perceptions, allows us trust our own instincts. It's a gift I'll always be grateful for.
Rating:
Summary: Sweet but Short
Review: For those of us who loved Kael, having a chance to hear some of her final words is a real gift. That being said, it's important to note that the length is comparable to a padded magazine article, i.e., it's pretty short, and that part (a good part?) of the interview was published online last year on the New Yorker's website. I gobbled up the chance to read this, but I was disappointed by the brevity and by the realization I'd seen a lot of it already.
Rating:
Summary: Nice---but all too short
Review: Having read and loved Kael's work for years, it was a pleasure to see a final publication of her thoughts published a year after her death. While I enjoyed reading her thoughts on the state of contemporary films - including a few final digs at Kubrick (cf. Eyes Wide Shut: "I thought it was preposterous from the start") - I often wanted more of her and less of Francis Davis' at times lengthy interjections. Moreover, at ... list, its almost as [costly] as her compendium "5001 Nights at the Movies" and would only probably take up about 30 pages in a normal magazine (the book's dimensions are rather small and the typeface a bit large - indicating a layout editor's struggle to get this to a publishable length).
Rating:
Summary: Nice---but all too short
Review: Having read and loved Kael's work for years, it was a pleasure to see a final publication of her thoughts published a year after her death. While I enjoyed reading her thoughts on the state of contemporary films - including a few final digs at Kubrick (cf. Eyes Wide Shut: "I thought it was preposterous from the start") - I often wanted more of her and less of Francis Davis' at times lengthy interjections. Moreover, at ... list, its almost as [costly] as her compendium "5001 Nights at the Movies" and would only probably take up about 30 pages in a normal magazine (the book's dimensions are rather small and the typeface a bit large - indicating a layout editor's struggle to get this to a publishable length).
Rating: 
Summary: i am a paulette
Review: if you have been lucky enough to have had a meal with pauline kael as a young man, then where ever you go, it will stay with you, for she was a moveable feast. i dined with ms. kael one fall evening in nyc for a cover story of a literary magazine i was launching. she was so mesmerizing, with total recall of virtually ever movie she had ever seen. it would be incorrect and limiting to say that she had a photographic memory; she had a cinematic memory. moreover, she conversed in full, complete, self-edited sentences as if she were reading from a script. what fire-breathing intelligence! i felt privileged for those two hours we spent together. that was 16 years ago, when she was still in full throttle at the new yorker. last night, after quickly reading afterglow, and savoring every morsel from ms. kael, the experience left me both uplifted and sad. no one will ever fill her sensible shoes again. not anthony lane, not rex reed--two of my current faves. a tiny woman, ms. kael was a towering giant. we still, and will always, live and watch in her shadow. i have collected all her books, some of which are out of print. but with dvds, i imagine these books will come back to life. we need her to make sense of it all, even if these reviews are 20, 30 years old. still, they read fresh, vibrant, alert, right on the mark. and so, in afterglow, we still see and recognize traces of the young-at-heart but ailing kael still plying her craft--which is a love affair with movies. and like so much of what passes for love, it is obvious that this love has soured over the years, like a bad marriage awaiting for the final annulment. the over-hyped blockbusters, the ceaseless studio pandering to the male high school popcorn-munching crowd, simply broke her heart and spirit. perhaps she felt like an abandoned lover. yet, in this slim book, it is so easy to feel at home with her brainy zingers. and though, she rambles a bit and in a few places repeats herself (perhaps a cause of sloppy editing--also, there is an egregious copy-editing snafu on the copyright page), all i can say, is so what. i will take this book, all 126 pages, over the faux television ramblings of the siegels, eberts, et al--all of whom are part of the hollywood movie machine.
Rating:
Summary: A Short, Fascinating Glimpse at the Queen of Film Critics
Review: In September, 2001, film critic Pauline Kael passed away. She had written and spoken with sometimes brutal honesty on actors, directors, and all types of movies. Kael didn't really care who she offended or upset. It's not like she tried to offend or upset, she just called them as she saw them. She unflinchingly says of Stanley Kubrick's `Eyes Wide Shut,' "It was ludicrous from the word go." She calls Spielberg "uninteresting" and melodramatic. But she also handed out glorious praise when it was due, especially when other critics were ignoring good films and performances. She states that "Paul Mazursky hasn't been given his due," and that actresses such as Debra Winger have been wrongfully overlooked. Kael mentions several wonderful films that have all but fallen into obscurity, all because most critics are afraid to take a stand and swim upstream against the tide of their colleagues. If the book concerned film criticism only, it would be worth purchasing. But interviewer Francis Davis also asks Kael to address writing, her days at The New Yorker, television, and the reason why so many awful films are made these days. `Afterglow' is a fascinating look into the thoughts of Pauline Kael, but it's far, far too short at 126 pages.
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