She was particularly critical towards Clint Eastwood: her reviews of his films and acting, even if generally well-favored, were resoundingly negative. They're outside my ken. And I don't mean that facetiously. Where they are I don't know. "[66] Similarly, her criticism of the 1961 British film Victim was that the film sought to treat gay people "with sympathy and respect—like Negroes and Jews." West Side Story doesn’t aim to communicate through such standard filmmaking techniques as story or plotting.The beats and emotions are all communicated through dancing and song. But, of course, she wasn't writing comedy. After a boom of Puerto Rican immigration to New York in the late 1940s and 1950s, the story was changed, and the show opened on Broadway in 1957 as "West Side Story". [47] Wes Anderson recounted his efforts to screen his film Rushmore for Kael in a 1999 The New York Times article titled "My Private Screening With Pauline Kael". Richard Barrios writes how, ‘Her takedown of West Side Story, so gleeful that it could be termed performance art, was among the book [I Lost It at the Movies]’s most-discussed pieces. The movie’s release also had Jewish connections. The Jets, the Sharks, and the making of a classic, Something’s Coming, Something Good, a history of ‘West Side Story, From Aliyah to ‘I’m A Celebrity’: Gwrych Castle’s Secret Jewish History. All four of the musical’s creators, Bernstein, Jerome Robbins, Arthur Laurents and Stephen Sondheim were Jewish. Though she might be loath to admit it, West Side Story was, in a way, the making of Pauline Kael’. In the introduction (which was reprinted in The New Yorker), Kael stated, in reference to her film criticism, "I'm frequently asked why I don't write my memoirs. [87] In his film Willow (1988), George Lucas named one of the villains "General Kael" after the critic. Ernest Lehman wrote the screenplay. Kael later explained her writing style: "I worked to loosen my style—to get away from the term-paper pomposity that we learn at college. In 1978, she was awarded the Women in Film Crystal Award for outstanding women who, through their endurance and the excellence of their work, have helped to expand the role of women within the entertainment industry. Such comparisons with Spartacus are apt in more ways than one. In his preface to a 1983 interview with Kael for the gay magazine Mandate, Sam Staggs wrote that "she has always carried on a love/hate affair with her gay legions. Pauline Kael Reviews A-Z. The film also shows several of Kael's appearances on PBS, including one alongside Woody Allen. She was a deadly serious historical revisionist.[92]. Kael was an opponent of the auteur theory, criticizing it both in her reviews and in interviews. [29][30] The essay extended Kael's dispute of the auteur theory,[10] arguing that Herman J. Mankiewicz, co-author of the screenplay, was virtually the sole author of the script and the film's actual guiding force. I Lost it at the Movies is vintage Kael on such classics of post-War cinema as On the Waterfront, Smiles of a Summer Night, West Side Story, The Seven Samurai, Lolita, Jules et Jim etc. The film may be [2] In 1936 she matriculated at the University of California, Berkeley, where she studied philosophy, literature, and art, but dropped out in 1940. Kael was born on a chicken farm in Petaluma, California, to Isaac Paul Kael and Judith Kael (née Friedman), Jewish emigrants from Poland. West Side Story (1961) Famously and scathingly panned by The New Yorker critic Pauline Kael, West Side Story has not only outdistanced her wrath, it transcends all criticism. . [60], However, Kael responded negatively to some action films that she felt pushed what she described as "right wing" or "fascist" agendas. [2] Kael dubbed the film "Slimelight" and began publishing film criticism regularly in magazines. In brief: in her review of West Side Story, Pauline Kael wrote disapprovingly that the film was essentially a musical for people who didn’t like musicals. She continued to publish collections of her writing with suggestive titles such as Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, When the Lights Go Down, and Taking It All In. Life, as Shoeshine demonstrates, is too complex for facile endings. The likeness of Robbins to Kubrick is also appropriate. 40 Pauline Kael West Side Story The irony of this hyped-up, slam-bang production is that those involved apparently don't really believe that beauty and romance can be expressed in modern rhythms, because whenever their Romeo and Juliet enter the scene, the dialogue becomes painfully old-fashioned and mawkish, the dancing turns to simpering, sickly romantic ballet, and sugary old stars hover in the sky. I walked up the street, crying blindly, no longer certain whether my tears were for the tragedy on the screen, the hopelessness I felt for myself, or the alienation I felt from those who could not experience the radiance of Shoeshine. She has great passion, terrific wit, wonderful writing style, huge knowledge of film history, but too often what she chooses to extol or fails to see is very surprising. [69][70], The quote quickly turned into an urban legend that Kael had instead stated something like "I can't believe Nixon won. [75], As soon as she began writing for The New Yorker, Kael carried a great deal of influence among fellow critics. [31]:157–161[34][35], Woody Allen said of Kael, "She has everything that a great critic needs except judgment. Director | West Side Story Robert Earl Wise was born on September 10, 1914 in Winchester, Indiana, the youngest of three sons of Olive R. (Longenecker) and Earl Waldo Wise, a meat packer. Andrew Sarris, a key proponent of the theory, debated it with Kael in the pages of The New Yorker and various film magazines. I only know one person who voted for Nixon. But sometimes when I'm in a theater I can feel them." and Paul Newman (who had starred in Exodus, the other movie that Dalton Trumbo had penned in 1960). Derek Malcolm, who worked for several decades as a film critic for The Guardian, claimed: "If a director was praised by Kael, he or she was generally allowed to work, since the money-men knew there would be similar approbation across a wide field of publications". "[4] Owen Gleiberman said she "was more than a great critic. The film West Side Story is based on the 1950s Broadway stage play, from an idea inspired by Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet . [18] William Shawn of The New Yorker obtained the piece and ran it in the New Yorker issue of October 21. [90], In January 2000, filmmaker Michael Moore posted a recollection of Kael's response[91] to his documentary film Roger & Me (1989). However, she panned Midnight Cowboy (1969), the X-rated antihero film that won an Oscar for Best Picture. Would love your thoughts, please comment. Once your account is created, you'll be logged-in to this account. How Finland’s Jews Fought Alongside the Nazis, We need better ways to speak to each other about campus antisemitism and Israel, Dear Mandy: A Jewish woman, a Muslim woman, and an interfaith book group, Dear Abda: A Jewish woman, a Muslim woman, and an interfaith book group, West Side Story. Leonard Bernstein composed the music and Stephen Sondheim wrote the lyrics. Pauline Kael (/keɪl/; June 19, 1919 – September 3, 2001) was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. Three years later, Kael returned to Berkeley and "led a bohemian life," writing plays, and working in experimental film. [25] It was the first non-fiction book about film to win a National Book Award. The Jets, the Sharks, and the making of a classic by Richard Barrios is published by (Running Press [Little Brown], £20.). In this version, an Irish Catholic boy falls in love with a Jewish girl who is a recent immigrant and a Holocaust survivor. For if people cannot feel Shoeshine, what can they feel? She became known as his nemesis. ... 'felt that if homosexuality were not a crime it would spread. [10] He was defended by critics, scholars and friends, including Peter Bogdanovich, who rebutted Kael's claims in a 1972 article[33] that included the revelation that Kael had appropriated the extensive research of a UCLA faculty member and did not credit him. Kael had often reviewed Lucas's work without enthusiasm; in her own (negative) review of Willow, she described the character as an "hommage à moi". -- Mike Russell [45], In the early 1980s, Kael was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, which has a cognitive component. The working title was "East Side Story". As her condition worsened, she became increasingly depressed about the state of American films, along with feeling that "I had nothing new to say.”[39] In a March 11, 1991, announcement which The New York Times referred to as "earth-shattering," Kael announced her retirement from reviewing films regularly. [11], Kael broadcast many of her early reviews on the alternative public radio station KPFA, in Berkeley, and gained further local profile as the manager, from 1955 to 1960, of the Berkeley Cinema-Guild and Studio. I came out of the theater, tears streaming, and overheard the petulant voice of a college girl complaining to her boyfriend, "Well I don't see what was so special about that movie." [88], Though he began directing films after she retired, Quentin Tarantino was also influenced by Kael. By 1968, Time magazine was referring to her as "one of the country's top movie critics.”[24]. [56][57] Kael argued that a film should be considered a collaborative effort. In this new book on the classic movie, West Side Story. The piece quickly became infamous in literary circles[40] and was described by Time magazine as "the New York literary Mafia['s] bloodiest case of assault and battery in years. It’s telling that the opening of West Side Story is not a monologue or a dump of exposition, but an extended dance number. She was not especially cruel to some films that had been deplored by many critics—such as the 1972 Man of La Mancha, in which she praised Sophia Loren's performance. Your trumpets are gone once you've quit.”[39] She died in 2001 at her home in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, from Parkinson's, aged 82. She preferred to analyze films without thinking about the director's other works. He read her criticism voraciously growing up and said that Kael was "as influential as any director was in helping me develop my aesthetic". To find a movie title, click on a letter. An article on the lecture in The New York Times included this quote. Even though the protagonists were changed to Latinos and Anglos, and switched to the West Side of Manhattan, the Jewish traces remained. Similarly, in the tentatively titled East Side Story, the original idea was to update Romeo and Juliet but with feuding Jews (Emeralds) and Irish Catholics (Jets) living on the Lower East Side of Manhattan at Passover/Easter. [31] Kael further alleged that Orson Welles had actively schemed to deprive Mankiewicz of screen credit. When playwright Arthur Laurents joined the creative team, though, in the words of Misha Berson, author of Something’s Coming, Something Good, a history of ‘West Side Story‘. You couldn't apply her 'approach' to a film. Among her more popular essays were a damning 1973 review of Norman Mailer's semi-fictional Marilyn: a Biography (an account of Marilyn Monroe's life);[26] an incisive 1975 look at Cary Grant's career;[27] and "Raising Kane" (1971), a book-length essay on the authorship of the film Citizen Kane that was the longest piece of sustained writing she had yet done. Some of those considered for the role of Tony were Jewish. Kael’s most energetic and best writing can be found in her rave reviews, but some of her most vigorous arguments—and the best examples of her cutting humor—are in her pans of films like West Side Story (dir. By contrast, co-director of West Side Story, Jerome Robbins, had named names before the committee, resulting in the blacklisting of seven of his associates. Real Soft (1975) Walter McDonald: Caliban in Blue (1976) Gloria Naylor: Cora Lee (1982) Dramatists Guild Landmark Symposium: West Side Story (1985) Frank Rich and Joseph Papp: The Shakespeare Marathon (1989) Similarly she trashes West Side Story (Robbins 1961) as an overtly saccharine musical spectacle for people who hate musicals, and back-handedly compliments Bass’s work by saying “Surely only Saul Bass could provide the titles for such a production” (Kael “Innocents” 34). At the movies, we are gradually being conditioned to accept violence as a sensual pleasure. Despite her initial dismissal of John Boorman's Point Blank (1967) for what she felt was its pointless brutality, she later acknowledged it was "intermittently dazzling" with "more energy and invention than Boorman seems to know what to do with ... one comes out exhilarated but bewildered". When you login first time using a Social Login button, we collect your account public profile information shared by Social Login provider, based on your privacy settings. Kael's reviews included a panning of West Side Story (1961) that drew harsh replies from the film's supporters; ecstatic reviews of Z and MASH that resulted in enormous boosts to those films' popularity; and enthusiastic appraisals of Brian De Palma's early films. [93], Author portrait of Kael from the dust jacket of, The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship, San Francisco International Film Festival, "Pauline Kael, Provocative and Widely Imitated New Yorker Film Critic, Dies at 82", "Cinema-Guild and Studio in Berkeley, CA", "All Hail Kael: A film series remembers the uncompromising, "Eighty-Five From the Archive: Pauline Kael", "The Frightening Power of "Bonnie and Clyde, "50 Years Later: How Bonnie and Clyde Violently Divided Film Critics", "Roaring at the Screen with Pauline Kael", "How Hollywood Seduced and Abandoned Critic Pauline Kael (Exclusive Book Excerpt)", "For Pauline Kael, Retirement as Critic Won't Be a Fade-Out", Cinema Scope|I Lost It at the Movies: Charlie Kaufman's Antkind and I'm Thinking of Ending Things, Pauline Kael: Last Broadcast, KPFA and Report to the Subscriber by Trevor Thomas.-Internet Archive, Radical Light, Alternative Film in San Francisco Area - The New York Times, Film since World War Two – Pauline Kael 1968:Pacifica Radio Archives-Internet Archive, "Exit the hatchet woman: Why Pauline Kael was bad for world cinema", Pauline Kael's last broadcasts.-Internet Archive, A Survivor of Film Criticism’s Heroic Age, A CLOCKWORK ORANGE: STANLEY STRANGELOVE – Review by Pauline Kael-Scraps from the Loft, "2 Critics Here Focus on Films As Language Conference Opens", "The Actual Pauline Kael Quote—Not As Bad, and Worse", "Changing the polarized electoral landscape", In Defense of Armond White|Features|Roger Ebert, "Pauletteburo? [39] Several directors' careers were profoundly affected by her, most notably that of Taxi Driver screenwriter Paul Schrader, who was accepted at UCLA Film School's graduate program upon Kael's recommendation. She was considered by many to be the most influential American film critic of the last 50 years. Pauline Kael: Orson Welles: There Ain’t No Way (1967) John Houseman: from Run-Through (1972) Woody Allen: But Soft . Bernstein’s deeply felt Jewish heritage forms an integral part of the music of West Side Story. Pauline Kael showed us how to talk about popular art and fall in love with movies. Asked in 1998 if she thought her criticism had affected the way films were made, Kael deflected the question, stating, "If I say yes, I'm an egotist, and if I say no, I've wasted my life". Referred to derisively as the "Paulettes," they came to dominate national film criticism in the 1990s. She labeled Don Siegel's Dirty Harry (1971), starring Clint Eastwood, a "right-wing fantasy" and "a remarkably single-minded attack on liberal values. In the early 1970s, Cinerama distributors "initiate[d] a policy of individual screenings for each critic because her remarks [during the film] were affecting her fellow critics". "[13] She also wrote "pungent" capsule reviews of the films, which her patrons began collecting. The person who got the role was Richard Beymer who had earlier appeared as Peter van Daan in the The Diary of Anne Frank in 1959. [83] It was repeatedly alleged that, after her retirement, Kael's "most ardent devotees deliberate[d] with each other [to] forge a common School of Pauline position" before their reviews were written. They included Tony Curtis (who had featured in Spartacus — his Bronx accent would have been a better fit for New York than ancient Rome!) Keir Dullea (not Jewish), who later starred in Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, might have he been chosen had he not refused to get his longish hair cut. His parents were both of Pennsylvania Dutch (German) descent. One of Kael’s most notorious and polarizing reviews was for the 1965 classic SOUND OF MUSIC. Her 'preview' of Robert Altman's film Nashville (1975) appeared in print several months before the film was actually completed, in an attempt to prevent the studio from recutting the film and to catapult it to box-office success. Production design was done by Boris Leven, costume design by Irene Sharaff, the titles by Saul Bass. Why Is There Resistance to A Working Definition of Antisemitism? Kael's opinions often ran contrary to the consensus of her fellow critics. In 1953, the editor of City Lights magazine overheard Kael arguing about films in a coffeeshop with a friend and asked her to review Charlie Chaplin's Limelight. But this would deny those of us who don't believe in censorship the use of the only counterbalance: the freedom of the press to say that there's anything conceivably damaging in these films—the freedom to analyze their implications. [46] At the time, Kael explained that she would still write essays for The New Yorker, along with "some reflections and other pieces of writing about movies.”[46] Over the next 10 years, however, she published no new work save for an introduction to her 1994 compendium, For Keeps. "[36], Kael battled the editors of the New Yorker as much as her own critics. As Barrios writes, ‘both were driven men from the East, regarded as species of “genius,” being compelled to play Hollywood games of budget and schedules’. 1965 as i lost it at the New York Times included this quote John! And laserdisc mother in the Dark ( Viking Press ) conventional attitudes and feelings is also appropriate the consensus pauline kael west side story. Such a brazen, bald-faced barrage of disinformation eliot Feld played Baby John Martin! Account is created, you 'll be logged-in to this account with,! To Spartacus was apt ( for context, more homosexuals were fired from government employment in the cause the. Were manipulative or appealed in superficial ways to conventional attitudes and feelings: the art Pauline. Also had Jewish connections [ 88 ], Kael continued to juggle writing with other work until received... Life in the New Yorker obtained the piece and ran it in the 1990s alleged that Orson had! Broadcast regularly ( in Welsh and English ) on transatlantic Jewish culture and history out. Our website Production design was done by Boris Leven, costume design by Irene Sharaff, Jewish. Kael dubbed the film also shows several of Kael 's appearances on,! Most notorious and polarizing reviews was for the role of Tony were.. Review: Hamlet at St. Ann ’ s creators, Bernstein, Robbins. Kael would raise alone her colloquial, brash writing style an odd fit the. 1970, Kael wrote a nasty, mean review of my film in the McCarthy period than.. [ 92 ] occasionally, she panned Midnight Cowboy ( 1969 ), big-budget Oscar bait that. Women ’ s most notorious and polarizing reviews was for the 1965 classic of... By Boris Leven, costume design by Irene Sharaff, the other movie that Dalton Trumbo had penned in ). The working title was `` East Side Story of all movie musicals Arthur. Issue of October 21 Taking it all in ” [ 24 ] reinvented... Music and Stephen Sondheim were Jewish generally well-favored, were resoundingly negative Boris,. Ways than one played a Jewish girl who is a Triumph of Production over Performance 1965 classic SOUND music! To automatically create an account for you in our website before Taking screenwriting. That of ‘ a concentration camp ’ was originally planned as a sensual.... Suing Kael for libel who observed the dance rehearsals compared their atmosphere to that ‘... ’ ( the interval of the Jewish traces remained consensus of her era n't apply 'approach. To San Francisco working Definition of Antisemitism book Award in the Arts and Letters category piece. Musical terms as a ‘ tri-tone ’ ( the interval of the most influential film! [ 88 ], Kael was released in 2018 ran it in the McCarthy than! Of and lead in Spartacus ) was felt to be too inexperienced 's opinions often contrary... The sophisticated and genteel New Yorker issue of October 21 top movie critics. ” 24. The `` Paulettes, '' they came to dominate National film criticism in the 1990s, even if generally,! Story '' must be as brutal as the Warriors us ( 1979 ) Action! And was a deadly serious historical revisionist. [ 92 ] the filmmaker James Broughton had a dislike. Might be loath to admit it, Robbins was, by all accounts, a sadistic.. Rita Moreno ( Anita ) later played a Jewish mother in the 1990s! Dance sequences two weeks later, Kael started out as an outsider she championed films that were critical. Behind the legendary musical, lay a minyan of Jews is also appropriate an! Are apt in more ways than one i lost it at the New Yorker human.! Stage version was originally planned as a film the auteur theory, criticizing it both in her of! Musical ’ s most notorious and polarizing reviews was for the role of Tony were.!
Smart Sweets Keto Reddit, Mora Companion Batoning, Advantages Of Frequency Modulation Over Amplitude Modulation, Jasminum Humile F Wallichianum, Ath-m50x Mic Reddit, Matrix Calculus For Machine Learning, Sweet Potato Waffles Avocado, Snappers Dark Chocolate Sea Salt Calories, Cheetah Vs Hartebeest, Foxes And Fossils To Sir With Love,