5 thoughts on “Roger Ebert’s Movie Home Companion – 1985”
I have several copies of those books at home and I devour them. I loved reading them both because Roger’s positive reviews dominate the books far more often than his negative reviews, and also because he reveals himself as a first hand witness to huge changes in Hollywood. He started reviewing movies at the beginning of the New Hollywood era. He became a TV star during the rise of the summer blockbusters. And he spent his last years with Gene Siskel covering the independent film boom. I really enjoy reading them, though I probably wouldn’t get this edition because that only covered titles from 1980 to 1985 and at that point, he was already feeling frustrated with the 80s as a whole. But the second edition came out in 1986 and he updated the book with his 70s reviews, which I think improved the book greatly. Then year after year, he updated each edition with new reviews and essays. The Companion series ended in 1997 because he was running out of room for new reviews, so he started writing his Movie Yearbook series, covering two year of movies per edition until his death in 2013. But I prefer the Companion series because of the variety of 15-30 years of movies.
Though to be honest, about a year ago, I almost lost interest in S&E. I’m sure you’re familliar with a user named Flaccidus Minimus because of his posts of the missing Ebert and Roeper Best of episodes and he could have been an interesting person to talk to, but I don’t think he is. I just felt that his own commentary on cinema has a lot of problems. For one thing, Flaccidus just can’t seem to get over his bias with 80s pop culture, half of which I disagree with, so you can see how many problems arose from that. For another, sometimes he deliberately ignores other qualities and make disingenuous arguments on certain films so that it would seem like he was right. And worst of all, for a guy who’s all about open minded film criticism and S&E, he acts like his point of view is the only right one to follow. He writes his own opinions like we should always agree and follow what he’s saying, when he clearly knows that’s not the case. I almost lost interest in S&E because of him.
25 Editions he would make of that Companion, changing the title from Movie Home to Video in 1994 and then in 1999, changing it to Video Yearbook and only concentrating on all the reviews he wrote for the last 30 months, due to the original books bursting at their seams. When he died I was sad there would be no more Yearbooks from him but thought they might’ve done one more for his final reviews. They didn’t.
I have several copies of those books at home and I devour them. I loved reading them both because Roger’s positive reviews dominate the books far more often than his negative reviews, and also because he reveals himself as a first hand witness to huge changes in Hollywood. He started reviewing movies at the beginning of the New Hollywood era. He became a TV star during the rise of the summer blockbusters. And he spent his last years with Gene Siskel covering the independent film boom. I really enjoy reading them, though I probably wouldn’t get this edition because that only covered titles from 1980 to 1985 and at that point, he was already feeling frustrated with the 80s as a whole. But the second edition came out in 1986 and he updated the book with his 70s reviews, which I think improved the book greatly. Then year after year, he updated each edition with new reviews and essays. The Companion series ended in 1997 because he was running out of room for new reviews, so he started writing his Movie Yearbook series, covering two year of movies per edition until his death in 2013. But I prefer the Companion series because of the variety of 15-30 years of movies.
Interesting, Patrick. I have one of his books somewhere. Moving and unpacking is a pain!
You may not remember what edition, but I’m curious what it was.
Though to be honest, about a year ago, I almost lost interest in S&E. I’m sure you’re familliar with a user named Flaccidus Minimus because of his posts of the missing Ebert and Roeper Best of episodes and he could have been an interesting person to talk to, but I don’t think he is. I just felt that his own commentary on cinema has a lot of problems. For one thing, Flaccidus just can’t seem to get over his bias with 80s pop culture, half of which I disagree with, so you can see how many problems arose from that. For another, sometimes he deliberately ignores other qualities and make disingenuous arguments on certain films so that it would seem like he was right. And worst of all, for a guy who’s all about open minded film criticism and S&E, he acts like his point of view is the only right one to follow. He writes his own opinions like we should always agree and follow what he’s saying, when he clearly knows that’s not the case. I almost lost interest in S&E because of him.
25 Editions he would make of that Companion, changing the title from Movie Home to Video in 1994 and then in 1999, changing it to Video Yearbook and only concentrating on all the reviews he wrote for the last 30 months, due to the original books bursting at their seams. When he died I was sad there would be no more Yearbooks from him but thought they might’ve done one more for his final reviews. They didn’t.