5001 Nights at the Movies : Expanded For The '90s With 800 New Reviews

Rating:
Summary: Bitter SWF critic seeks equally bitter SWM critic
Review: Is Pauline Kael married? If not, would someone please introduce her to critic John Simon. Since they are both pompous bores who hide their lack of knowledge concerning movies (or "fillim" as they would likely prefer to call it) behind mean-spirited sarcasm, these two should really be a pair. Kael knows as much about film as Brian DePalma does about originality (that's right, the man who built a career by feeding on the bones of Alfred Hitchcock is a second rate talent, as is Pauline Kael herself).

Rating:
Summary: Every ones got a worthless opinion
Review: Kael may be a great writer, and she is also notoriously snotty(and snooty). Furthermore, she lets her political opinions often affect her reviews. Read her Dirty Harry Reviews. She can be quite cruel and rude critiquing actors and actresses and seems fixiated on actors and esp. actresses(?) external appearances. And she doesn't like Star Wars! Mrs. Kael obviously was in the wrong line of work. If you can't sit back and let the child in you enjoy 2 hours of well-crafted imagination than you can't be a legitimate critic of mainstream movies, can you? Jaded pretentious bores like Kael should just review "Art" films. I've enjoyed only a few of Kael's reviews. Skip her and Maltin. I recommend Ebert and Rick and Marsha.

Rating:
Summary: Knowledgeable, largely confident, original film criticism
Review: Kael, in her long career as a movie critic, was not only a lover of the film medium, but she was practically a professor of it as an art form. Whether she loved, hated, begrudgingly accepted, dismissed, or was bored with a film, there was never any doubt as to her passions. Where Kael really excelled at was in analyzing why or why not a film worked. She was a genius at pointing out the exact cause(s) of a film's success or failure - whether it was due to a bit of casting, direction, editing - or even the way the film is scored - Kael was able to sum up easily, spontaneously of those contributing factors. It doesn't matter to me in the slightest that I disagree with her here and there, it's the fact that she so succinctly expressed her opinions and views: I feel as if I've been privy to a keen, endlessly unlimited mind. Sometimes my disagreements are quite strong (she thinks LAST TANGO IN PARIS is a masterpiece, I think it's an idiotically stupid-ass movie) but that's why I find her so entertaining. And what an unstuffy, unpretentious writer she was, never any dull, self-preening pomposity anywhere to be found. Sometimes she was belly-laugh hilarious: GORILLAS IN THE MIST: "This is a feminist version of KING KONG - now it's the gorillas who do the screaming." Lana Turner: 'She's not Madame X, she's brand X." She wasn't always free of clichés - occasionally I'll see here in this compilation, remnants of New York Elitist Cool surfacing, and definitely, her one big drawback is that she often wrote like and lived up to the sterotypical, prevailing notion of female critics as being catty toward other talented women. Certainly, no other critic I've ever read was so sneeringly contemptuous regarding so many sterling actresses. Also, and most importantly, I pick up several instances where Kael (despite her natural proclivities to going against the common grain) was not willing to give up her preconceived notions in exceptions to a rule. For instance, I agree with Kael absolutely that Joan Crawford was a ponderously over-the-top, mannered actress, but Kael is not willing to give Crawford her due for oustanding work in MILDRED PIERCE(a true classic of the Forties) and THE WOMEN. And then there is Kael's review of Doris Day in LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME; Kael dismissed Day with a disdainful, "(she)is a little less butch than usual, though you can't tell what makes her Ruth Etting a star." The fact was, Day was outstanding in this role, taking a big risk by allowing herself to be cast against type, and succeeding rather brilliantly. My point is, would Kael ever endanger her image of the Cool Cat New York Critic by praising "popular" Doris Day, of all people (even if Kael had definite criteria for what she construed as a good performance, she doesn't explain so)? I highly doubt it, and this attempted masking of insecurities is my only serious reservation about Kael as a critic. Roger Ebert, for example, is not as sharply engrossing as Kael was, but he's far more confident of exposing his weaknesses and giving in to populist enjoyment. I don't think Kael was confident enough to risk her shrewdly handed-out image. At this, Kael herself would vehemently deny pandering to her readers, but I can't for a moment believe that someone exists who doesn't want to be taken seriously. Let's face it, anyone (including myself) who writes for a public is ASKING to be read, wanting to be accepted. No problem there; Kael was undoubtedly one of the most engaging and original writers there was, and I can be counted as one of her many faithful readers.

Rating:
Summary: Knowledgeable, largely confident, original film criticism
Review: Kael, in her long career as a movie critic, was not only a lover of the film medium, but she was practically a professor of it as an art form. Whether she loved, hated, begrudgingly accepted, dismissed, or was bored with a film, there was never any doubt as to her passions. Where Kael really excelled at was in analyzing why or why not a film worked. She was a genius at pointing out the exact cause(s) of a film's success or failure - whether it was due to a bit of casting, direction, editing - or even the way the film is scored - Kael was able to sum up easily, spontaneously of those contributing factors. It doesn't matter to me in the slightest that I disagree with her here and there, it's the fact that she so succinctly expressed her opinions and views: I feel as if I've been privy to a keen, endlessly unlimited mind. Sometimes my disagreements are quite strong (she thinks LAST TANGO IN PARIS is a masterpiece, I think it's an idiotically stupid-ass movie) but that's why I find her so entertaining. And what an unstuffy, unpretentious writer she was, never any dull, self-preening pomposity anywhere to be found. Sometimes she was belly-laugh hilarious: GORILLAS IN THE MIST: "This is a feminist version of KING KONG - now it's the gorillas who do the screaming." Lana Turner: 'She's not Madame X, she's brand X." She wasn't always free of clichés - occasionally I'll see here in this compilation, remnants of New York Elitist Cool surfacing, and definitely, her one big drawback is that she often wrote like and lived up to the sterotypical, prevailing notion of female critics as being catty toward other talented women. Certainly, no other critic I've ever read was so sneeringly contemptuous regarding so many sterling actresses. Also, and most importantly, I pick up several instances where Kael (despite her natural proclivities to going against the common grain) was not willing to give up her preconceived notions in exceptions to a rule. For instance, I agree with Kael absolutely that Joan Crawford was a ponderously over-the-top, mannered actress, but Kael is not willing to give Crawford her due for oustanding work in MILDRED PIERCE(a true classic of the Forties) and THE WOMEN. And then there is Kael's review of Doris Day in LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME; Kael dismissed Day with a disdainful, "(she)is a little less butch than usual, though you can't tell what makes her Ruth Etting a star." The fact was, Day was outstanding in this role, taking a big risk by allowing herself to be cast against type, and succeeding rather brilliantly. My point is, would Kael ever endanger her image of the Cool Cat New York Critic by praising "popular" Doris Day, of all people (even if Kael had definite criteria for what she construed as a good performance, she doesn't explain so)? I highly doubt it, and this attempted masking of insecurities is my only serious reservation about Kael as a critic. Roger Ebert, for example, is not as sharply engrossing as Kael was, but he's far more confident of exposing his weaknesses and giving in to populist enjoyment. I don't think Kael was confident enough to risk her shrewdly handed-out image. At this, Kael herself would vehemently deny pandering to her readers, but I can't for a moment believe that someone exists who doesn't want to be taken seriously. Let's face it, anyone (including myself) who writes for a public is ASKING to be read, wanting to be accepted. No problem there; Kael was undoubtedly one of the most engaging and original writers there was, and I can be counted as one of her many faithful readers.

Rating:
Summary: I've read it again and again
Review: My review echoes what a lot of previous reviewers have stated: Pauline Kael makes you THINK about the movies, pure and simple. When you are generally in agreement with her review, you become excited to go back and view the film in question because you want to look anew at certain aspects of it that she has brought to your attention. When you disagree with her, and it is very easy to disagree vehemently with Ms. Kael, you become an advocate for or a prosecutor of the movie she comments on, and this makes the movie-going experience all the more fruitful. Ms. Kael makes a great number of "big" comments about movies, and, because of "5001 Nights"' condensed nature, these opinions are magnified. Most critics narrowly focus on the film they are reviewing, but you feel that Ms. Kael brings a thoroughly historical perspective to each review, and she doesn't shy away from turning a single review into a lesson in comparative film history. Finally, Ms. Kael is notoriously unsentimental when it comes to the movies, and at times the you can feel that she has missed an important, emotion-inducing quality of a film because of this personal and/or stylistic rigidity. Usually, though (but not always!), upon further reflection, you realize that your emotional reaction to the film was actually more ephemeral than you remember, and that this reaction was probably induced more by the dilute but still powerful medium of film itself rather than by any particularly cogent aspect of the individual movie in question. This realization teaches you to value the films that truly "stay with" you more than ever.

Rating:
Summary: I've read it again and again
Review: My review echoes what a lot of previous reviewers have stated: Pauline Kael makes you THINK about the movies, pure and simple. When you are generally in agreement with her review, you become excited to go back and view the film in question because you want to look anew at certain aspects of it that she has brought to your attention. When you disagree with her, and it is very easy to disagree vehemently with Ms. Kael, you become an advocate for or a prosecutor of the movie she comments on, and this makes the movie-going experience all the more fruitful. Ms. Kael makes a great number of "big" comments about movies, and, because of "5001 Nights"' condensed nature, these opinions are magnified. Most critics narrowly focus on the film they are reviewing, but you feel that Ms. Kael brings a thoroughly historical perspective to each review, and she doesn't shy away from turning a single review into a lesson in comparative film history. Finally, Ms. Kael is notoriously unsentimental when it comes to the movies, and at times the you can feel that she has missed an important, emotion-inducing quality of a film because of this personal and/or stylistic rigidity. Usually, though (but not always!), upon further reflection, you realize that your emotional reaction to the film was actually more ephemeral than you remember, and that this reaction was probably induced more by the dilute but still powerful medium of film itself rather than by any particularly cogent aspect of the individual movie in question. This realization teaches you to value the films that truly "stay with" you more than ever.

Rating:
Summary: Kael Upfront
Review: Other critics may have covered a wider range, and may be of more use to a beginning moviegoer, but I think its plain that no one ever wrote about movies better than Pauline Kael. She still is the best stylist among film critics--funny,jazzy,informal; powered and sometimes blinded by her enormous passion for the art form. Some people here have complained that Kael is bitter or mean. But who would want to go to the movies with these simpering folks? Criticism at its best is a love/hate relationship with the art in question, where you can fall violently in love with a great film one night and violently deplore another one the next. Kael's reviews don't suffer too much in short form. If there is any problem with this book, it's one that has to do with Kael's career as well. Once Kael became well-established at the New Yorker, she tended to become more American-oriented, so that her coverage of foreign films suffered(Compare this with the work of a modern critic like Jonathan Rosenbaum.) 5001 Nights doesn't quite cover films from foreign shores as well as one likes. Lastly, too many of the films in here are so apprently mediocre and poor that you wonder why Kael wasted her talents and paper discussing them. But this is still an essential book, by one of the century's finest critics. IA

Rating:
Summary: A critic of rare intelligence and insight
Review: Pauline Kael (critic, author, scholar), is perhaps the most insightful film critic this century. Her book "5001 Nights at the Movies", though consisting only of short encapsulated reviews, is unparalleled in its witty, sometimes scathing, but ultimately impartial examination of cinema (past & present). Kael, thankfully, did not succumb to popular opinion, chosing to praise or scorn a movie for its artistic quality (or lack there of); she touted films that challenged and invited us to see things another way. This book isn't for the casual moviegoer looking to be pandered to. It is for those of us who still view cinema as an expressive and important art medium, instead of a vehicle for quick-fix, viewer condescension.

Rating:
Summary: A critic of rare intelligence and insight
Review: Pauline Kael (critic, author, scholar), is perhaps the most insightful film critic this century. Her book "5001 Nights at the Movies", though consisting only of short encapsulated reviews, is unparalleled in its witty, sometimes scathing, but ultimately impartial examination of cinema (past & present). Kael, thankfully, did not succumb to popular opinion, chosing to praise or scorn a movie for its artistic quality (or lack there of); she touted films that challenged and invited us to see things another way. This book isn't for the casual moviegoer looking to be pandered to. It is for those of us who still view cinema as an expressive and important art medium, instead of a vehicle for quick-fix, viewer condescension.

Rating:
Summary: An invaluable reference
Review: Pauline Kael inaugurated an integrated, non-dogmatic era of film writing. Never conventional, her jazzy, rhapsodic literary style adorned perfectly her explosive insights. A FIERCE DEFENDER of American filmmaking, she championed also smaller, more fragile European gems that continue to influence contemporary independent film makers.