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(projector whirring)
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(slow instrumental music)
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- [Pauline] The first time I
saw a movie on my parents' lap
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in a little theater in
Petaluma, California,
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I knew that was for me.
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- [Child] How did you
become a film critic?
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- [Pauline] I was lucky
I was able to write
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about movies in a way that people were
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willing to pay me for.
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- [Child] What was the first story
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you ever wrote about movies?
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- [Pauline] It was a review
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of Charlie Chaplin's film "Limelight".
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It was con, someone else
wrote a review that was pro.
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- [Child] How many books did you write?
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- [Pauline] 13.
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- [Child] What was your
favorite story or book
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when you were little?
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- [Pauline] I loved the Oz books.
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I loved all the characters
because they didn't
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have any message for us they just
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were there for our pleasure.
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- [Child] What big thing
are you most proudest of?
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- That I survived.
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The process is simply thinking, really.
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I mean writing is simply
putting down what you think.
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And to be paid for thinking and to know
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that you're doing something that may even
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have some value that
some other people might
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enjoy that process and share it with you.
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I mean that's a marvelous way to live.
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I mean I can't think of
any better way to live.
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People don't tend to like a good critic.
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They tend to hate your guts.
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- Was it something I said?
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- If they like you,
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I think you should start getting worried.
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- It's hard to talk seriously about movies
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without mentioning Pauline Kael.
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Since 1968, Pauline Kael
has written film criticism
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for The New Yorker.
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- [Man] She is one of
the first movie critics
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to achieve real influence
throughout the movie world.
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- [Man] Reading her, one reviewer said,
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is better than going to the movies.
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- [Man] Timeout calls her ludicrous.
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- [Man] Miss Kael, why did you say
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I had just about given up hope that
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it was really possible
to be a movie critic?
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- There had been so much pressure
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from the movie companies that I wasn't
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allowed into screenings.
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I'd pretty much been
forced out of every job
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either by editors to
cooperate with advertisers.
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- You're fired.
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- Reader pressure.
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And I really had thought, well maybe
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there's just no way to do it.
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- Something you want you ain't got, maybe?
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- Yeah.
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- She was a woman coming
into this boys' club
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and shooting from the hip.
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- She was writing when a film critic
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could create such waves.
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- She shaped that American New Wave
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as much as any filmmaker.
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- And if she could make people mad, great.
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She would say tough shit.
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- Either I'm gonna kill her
or I'm beginning to like her!
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- Pauline Kael had a voice,
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and I understood her voice,
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- We grew up reading Pauline Kael.
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- You know no critic has
that kind of importance
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and relevance that Kael had.
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- [Greil] Pauline fell
in love with movies,
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and moments in movies,
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and faces in movies,
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and the way an actress might turn
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her head for just a second,
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and that's what it was all for.
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- Pauline was the first
person that I was aware of
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that was making sense and
celebrating these new movies
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that were coming out by
these unknown directors.
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- [Lili] Pauline made Scorsese
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with her review of "Mean Streets".
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She made Spielberg with her
review of "Sugarland Express".
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- [Man] She brought a real
exhilaration to the movies,
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and you bought The New Yorker every week
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to see what she had to say.
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- She turned the movie review,
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which is this kind of flimsy vehicle,
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it's a thumbs up or thumbs down endeavor,
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into this expressive art form.
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I mean, it was as expressive as
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the short story or the sonnet.
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(people applauding)
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- Pauline would write about something
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and you would not only love reading it,
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but then you would wanna
see what she wrote about
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00:04:36,350 --> 00:04:37,580
so you could argue with her
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00:04:37,580 --> 00:04:38,830
or you could relive it with her.
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00:04:38,830 --> 00:04:41,570
You could see it through her eyes.
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- It would be hard to be
as engaged with the world
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00:04:44,140 --> 00:04:47,530
as Pauline was in terms of her energy,
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in terms of her intellectual curiosity,
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in terms of her capacity
for outrage and love.
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- [Narrator] The modern west I grew up in,
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the ludicrous real west,
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00:05:03,690 --> 00:05:06,690
the incongruities of Cadillacs and cattle,
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crickets and transistor radios,
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00:05:08,600 --> 00:05:12,850
jukeboxes, Dr. Pepper
signs, paperback books,
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00:05:12,850 --> 00:05:15,630
all emphasizing the
standardization of culture
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00:05:15,630 --> 00:05:18,360
in the loneliness of vast spaces
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our Sonoma County ranch
was very much like this one
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with my father and older
brothers charging over dirt roads
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and the Saturday nights
in a dead little town.
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This was the small-town west I,
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and so many of my friends, came out of.
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Escaping from the swaggering
small-town hotshots like Hud.
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- She remembered seeing silent films.
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She could tell you what it was like
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to go to a cinema in the
20s, in the 30s and 40s,
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00:05:46,530 --> 00:05:47,793
and see these movies.
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00:05:49,330 --> 00:05:52,700
- Well, my mother had a
great love of 30s movies
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particularly, the tough dames.
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I think she like to
emulate that a little bit
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00:06:00,690 --> 00:06:03,430
suggest that she had that in herself.
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00:06:03,430 --> 00:06:05,060
- I won't marry you.
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00:06:05,060 --> 00:06:05,930
- Is that a promise?
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00:06:05,930 --> 00:06:08,210
- [Narrator] In the 30s,
the girls we in the audience
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00:06:08,210 --> 00:06:10,204
loved were delivering wisecracks.
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- I sort of like him.
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00:06:11,358 --> 00:06:12,191
He's got a lot of charm.
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00:06:12,191 --> 00:06:13,500
- Well, he comes by it naturally
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his grandfather was a snake.
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- [Narrator] They were funny and lovely
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because they were funny.
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A whole group of them with
wonderful frogs in their throats.
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00:06:21,273 --> 00:06:22,106
(hiccups)
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- This is the fourth show in two months
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that I've been in of and out of.
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- They close before they open.
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- [Narrator] The comic spirit of the 30s
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had been happily
self-critical about America.
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The happiness born of the knowledge that
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in no other country were movies
so free to be self-critical.
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It was the comedy of a country
that didn't yet hate itself.
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- C'mon, let's get up and look for work.
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I hate starving in bed.
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00:06:46,540 --> 00:06:48,830
- There's a certain
kind of colloquial voice
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that Pauline Kael had.
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Back to Dorothy Parker,
kind of snappish sound.
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Ann Landers is an example of it, okay.
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You know, "Wake up and smell the coffee."
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- Say wiseguy stop trying to prove
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the hand's quicker than the eye.
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- [Woman] She just had this great slangy,
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husky, breathy, Ann Sheridan voice.
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- Haven't you heard about
throwing good money after bad?
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- [Narrator] There was an unusual sequence
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00:07:09,712 --> 00:07:11,950
in "Christopher Strong".
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An arch, high-strung, sickeningly noble
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Katharine Hepburn movie back in 1933.
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But one of the rare movies told from
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a woman's sexual point of view.
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Hepburn played a famous,
record-breaking aviatrix
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who fell in love with a married man,
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but as soon as they went to bed together
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he insisted that she not fly in the match
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she was entered in.
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- [Christopher] Give up
this altitude flight.
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For me.
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- [Cynthia] All right, darling.
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I'll give it up.
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- [Narrator] It was clear
that the man wasn't a bastard,
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nevertheless, the heroine's
acquiescence destroyed her.
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- Only I'd rather die than hurt you.
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- [Narrator] It is the intelligent woman's
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primal post-coital scene.
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Probably it got there because the movie
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was written by a woman, Zoe Akins,
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and directed by a woman, Dorothy Arzner.
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I think I was the only girl on
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00:08:05,167 --> 00:08:07,360
the labor board at Berkeley.
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00:08:07,360 --> 00:08:09,140
We were trying to get the minimum wage
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00:08:09,140 --> 00:08:12,120
on the campus raised to 40 cents an hour.
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- You women make me sick!
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C'mon, c'mon, how much?!
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- [Narrator] On dates my
enthusiasm would often
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be condescended to by the fella.
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He would think it was his
mission to straighten me out,
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and you know if you hold
forth about why something's
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great with a guy who just
wants you to calm down,
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it's a flattening experience.
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You learn to shut up or
you find another guy,
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or you don't.
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- Just a minute.
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- Shut up.
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- Are you so drunk with
your own importance
200
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you think you can make your own rules?
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Well, you're a fake.
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00:08:42,693 --> 00:08:44,600
- I think it's very difficult,
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00:08:44,600 --> 00:08:46,740
for a woman particularly,
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to go out with a man
that she disagrees with
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00:08:50,500 --> 00:08:53,228
sharply in matters of taste.
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Because it really does
offend all his macho sense.
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00:08:57,430 --> 00:08:59,830
And particularly, say, 20 or 30 years ago,
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if he was buying the tickets,
209
00:09:01,700 --> 00:09:03,210
and if he was paying the date,
210
00:09:03,210 --> 00:09:06,810
even if he liked you to be
bright and sharp and funny,
211
00:09:06,810 --> 00:09:09,700
he didn't like any basic disagreement.
212
00:09:09,700 --> 00:09:13,380
Now, I broke up over "West Side Story".
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00:09:13,380 --> 00:09:16,110
- Because tonight is the
real beginning of my life
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00:09:16,110 --> 00:09:18,180
as a young lady of America.
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00:09:19,200 --> 00:09:23,440
- I don't think she was that
wild about being a student.
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00:09:23,440 --> 00:09:24,750
They may have been formative years
217
00:09:24,750 --> 00:09:27,770
but I think the forming
was done on her own.
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00:09:27,770 --> 00:09:29,890
- [Narrator] When I got
interested in an author,
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00:09:29,890 --> 00:09:32,040
I always read everything
of his I could get
220
00:09:32,040 --> 00:09:34,740
a hold of and everything
about him I could find
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00:09:34,740 --> 00:09:36,793
before I went on to something else.
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00:09:38,190 --> 00:09:40,290
I could live without movies
much more easily than
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00:09:40,290 --> 00:09:42,120
I could live without books
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00:09:42,120 --> 00:09:44,453
which would almost seem
like a form of death.
225
00:09:47,200 --> 00:09:49,300
- Pauline didn't set out to be a critic.
226
00:09:49,300 --> 00:09:52,470
Pauline set out to be an artist.
227
00:09:52,470 --> 00:09:54,531
She wrote some plays.
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00:09:54,531 --> 00:09:57,520
I've read some of them,
they're not very good.
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00:09:57,520 --> 00:09:58,820
- And it's wild to read them
230
00:09:58,820 --> 00:10:00,810
because they're very stilted.
231
00:10:00,810 --> 00:10:02,160
They are inert.
232
00:10:02,160 --> 00:10:03,120
They're derivative
233
00:10:03,120 --> 00:10:05,820
and they have none of that
swing of her movie writing.
234
00:10:07,250 --> 00:10:10,460
- [Narrator] I can't do it,
I've tried, and I simply can't.
235
00:10:10,460 --> 00:10:12,790
Does seem so absurd
that I'd been so snooty
236
00:10:12,790 --> 00:10:14,570
about books for a very long time
237
00:10:14,570 --> 00:10:16,740
and here I can't do this.
238
00:10:16,740 --> 00:10:18,560
Tell me that I can play this game through
239
00:10:18,560 --> 00:10:21,070
that I can be smart enough
and attractive enough
240
00:10:21,070 --> 00:10:22,580
and good enough.
241
00:10:22,580 --> 00:10:24,150
Besides the whole sex business,
242
00:10:24,150 --> 00:10:26,730
there's the past and
there is New York luxury
243
00:10:26,730 --> 00:10:28,940
and money and dancers and sororities,
244
00:10:28,940 --> 00:10:32,240
and there's me and what I am.
245
00:10:32,240 --> 00:10:34,468
No artist, no beauty, no nothing,
246
00:10:34,468 --> 00:10:38,340
no obscenity, absolutely.
247
00:10:38,340 --> 00:10:40,930
- She worked as a nanny on Park Avenue,
248
00:10:40,930 --> 00:10:44,610
and she wrote 20 or 30
pages about that experience.
249
00:10:44,610 --> 00:10:46,500
It was not a pleasant experience.
250
00:10:46,500 --> 00:10:49,240
She was a poor girl
working for rich people.
251
00:10:49,240 --> 00:10:51,760
- She had had to work
as a maid or something,
252
00:10:51,760 --> 00:10:54,170
and as a seamstress.
253
00:10:54,170 --> 00:10:57,610
- [Man] She worked writing
copy, advertising copy.
254
00:10:57,610 --> 00:10:59,910
- [Narrator] The day they
were putting up the partition
255
00:10:59,910 --> 00:11:01,960
and putting my name on the door,
256
00:11:01,960 --> 00:11:04,710
I went in and quit in tears because
257
00:11:04,710 --> 00:11:08,580
I suddenly saw myself behind
that partition for years
258
00:11:08,580 --> 00:11:10,220
and I didn't want that.
259
00:11:10,220 --> 00:11:11,620
I wanted to write.
260
00:11:11,620 --> 00:11:15,093
The main thing is fighting off
the successes that trap you.
261
00:11:23,534 --> 00:11:25,770
(speaking in a foreign language)
262
00:11:25,770 --> 00:11:28,400
When "Shoeshine" opened in 1947
263
00:11:28,400 --> 00:11:30,580
I went to see it alone after one of those
264
00:11:30,580 --> 00:11:32,303
terrible lover's quarrels.
265
00:11:33,670 --> 00:11:35,990
I came out of the theater
and walked up the street
266
00:11:35,990 --> 00:11:38,360
no longer certain whether my tears were
267
00:11:38,360 --> 00:11:40,280
for the tragedy on the screen
268
00:11:40,280 --> 00:11:42,713
or the hopelessness I felt for myself.
269
00:11:43,560 --> 00:11:46,360
My identification with those two lost boys
270
00:11:46,360 --> 00:11:48,003
had become so strong.
271
00:11:49,790 --> 00:11:51,560
Later, I learned that the man with whom
272
00:11:51,560 --> 00:11:53,730
I had quarreled had gone the same night
273
00:11:53,730 --> 00:11:56,000
and had also emerged in tears.
274
00:11:56,000 --> 00:11:58,750
Yet our tears for each other
did not bring us together.
275
00:12:18,790 --> 00:12:19,790
- [Man] It was a very big deal
276
00:12:19,790 --> 00:12:22,073
in 1948 to be a single mother.
277
00:12:24,630 --> 00:12:26,050
- [Narrator] Having a
child made a difference
278
00:12:26,050 --> 00:12:27,800
because it made me want to make something
279
00:12:27,800 --> 00:12:29,733
of myself for my child's sake.
280
00:12:32,880 --> 00:12:35,450
- I always felt that my mother had
281
00:12:35,450 --> 00:12:37,000
a great love for my father.
282
00:12:37,000 --> 00:12:39,323
He was an absence in my life.
283
00:12:42,150 --> 00:12:44,020
I'm not sure how she really explained it.
284
00:12:44,020 --> 00:12:45,183
He wasn't there.
285
00:12:47,451 --> 00:12:50,618
(lively violin music)
286
00:12:55,760 --> 00:12:58,330
- After going to see "Limelight",
287
00:12:58,330 --> 00:13:03,330
she went to a cafe with the
people she had gone with
288
00:13:03,720 --> 00:13:05,710
and they were arguing about it,
289
00:13:05,710 --> 00:13:09,140
and she was very forceful
about how she didn't like it.
290
00:13:09,140 --> 00:13:11,550
One of the people who was editing
291
00:13:11,550 --> 00:13:13,780
the Citylights Bookstore's Journal
292
00:13:13,780 --> 00:13:15,700
came over to her and said well why don't
293
00:13:15,700 --> 00:13:17,830
you write this for us, and she did.
294
00:13:17,830 --> 00:13:20,200
And that was her first review.
295
00:13:20,200 --> 00:13:21,203
- It's no use.
296
00:13:22,100 --> 00:13:23,163
I'm finished.
297
00:13:24,519 --> 00:13:25,352
Through.
298
00:13:26,474 --> 00:13:28,229
- You're too great an artist.
299
00:13:28,229 --> 00:13:30,735
Now is the time to show
them what you're made of.
300
00:13:30,735 --> 00:13:32,680
Now is the time to fight.
301
00:13:32,680 --> 00:13:34,810
- [Narrator] A storyline
of the most self-pitying
302
00:13:34,810 --> 00:13:37,630
and self-glorifying daydream variety.
303
00:13:37,630 --> 00:13:40,100
Calvero's gala benefit in which he shows
304
00:13:40,100 --> 00:13:41,900
the unbelievers, who think him finished,
305
00:13:41,900 --> 00:13:45,110
that he is still the greatest
performer of them all
306
00:13:45,110 --> 00:13:48,670
his death in the wings
as the applause fades.
307
00:13:48,670 --> 00:13:51,800
This is surely the richest
hunk of satisfaction
308
00:13:51,800 --> 00:13:54,663
since Huck and Tom
attended their own funeral.
309
00:13:55,700 --> 00:13:57,490
- Chaplin doesn't get to you even in the--
310
00:13:57,490 --> 00:13:59,160
- I hated when he gets to me.
311
00:13:59,160 --> 00:14:01,250
I despised him when I was a child
312
00:14:01,250 --> 00:14:02,960
in things like "City Lights".
313
00:14:02,960 --> 00:14:05,740
I don't like to have
tears pulled out of me.
314
00:14:05,740 --> 00:14:09,260
I mean, that to me is
atrocious, maudlin, comedy.
315
00:14:09,260 --> 00:14:12,130
I like it when he's being
a rather nasty, bawdy
316
00:14:12,130 --> 00:14:14,570
drunken bum, then he's wonderful.
317
00:14:14,570 --> 00:14:18,720
- She sort of fell into movie
criticism almost by accident,
318
00:14:18,720 --> 00:14:21,630
and something just clicked.
319
00:14:21,630 --> 00:14:24,270
What she couldn't achieve in art
320
00:14:24,270 --> 00:14:28,920
she was able to achieve in movie reviews.
321
00:14:28,920 --> 00:14:29,950
- [Narrator] When I started writing
322
00:14:29,950 --> 00:14:31,310
for magazines in the 50s,
323
00:14:31,310 --> 00:14:33,410
I was dissatisfied with the academic
324
00:14:33,410 --> 00:14:35,500
tone of my first pieces.
325
00:14:35,500 --> 00:14:36,362
I was trying for the freedom
326
00:14:36,362 --> 00:14:39,383
of an American talking about movies.
327
00:14:40,250 --> 00:14:43,200
I worked to loosen my style,
328
00:14:43,200 --> 00:14:45,580
to get away from the term paper pomposity
329
00:14:45,580 --> 00:14:47,470
that we learn at college.
330
00:14:47,470 --> 00:14:50,020
I wanted sentences to breathe,
331
00:14:50,020 --> 00:14:52,223
to have the sound of a human voice.
332
00:14:53,550 --> 00:14:57,060
- [Pauline] I may be a terrible
blasphemer but I writhed
333
00:14:57,060 --> 00:14:59,580
with discomfort during
"Hiroshima Mon Amour"
334
00:14:59,580 --> 00:15:01,593
and made numerous wisecracks.
335
00:15:04,550 --> 00:15:07,370
The picture opened badly for me.
336
00:15:07,370 --> 00:15:10,370
There were those intertwined nude bodies,
337
00:15:10,370 --> 00:15:12,990
and what was that stuff
they were covered with?
338
00:15:12,990 --> 00:15:16,520
Beach sand, gold dust, ashes?
339
00:15:16,520 --> 00:15:19,820
Finally, I accepted it
as symbolic bomb ash,
340
00:15:19,820 --> 00:15:21,810
but I wasn't happy with it.
341
00:15:21,810 --> 00:15:24,360
Then the French girl said
she had seen everything
342
00:15:24,360 --> 00:15:27,360
in Hiroshima and the Japanese man told her
343
00:15:27,360 --> 00:15:30,010
she had seen nothing in Hiroshima.
344
00:15:30,010 --> 00:15:32,440
Then, they said the same things over again
345
00:15:32,440 --> 00:15:35,250
and again, and perhaps again,
346
00:15:35,250 --> 00:15:37,270
and I lost patience.
347
00:15:37,270 --> 00:15:39,620
I have never understood why writers assume
348
00:15:39,620 --> 00:15:41,810
that repetition creates a lyric mood
349
00:15:41,810 --> 00:15:44,570
or underlines meaning with profundity.
350
00:15:44,570 --> 00:15:46,100
My reaction is simply okay,
351
00:15:46,100 --> 00:15:47,250
I got it the first time,
352
00:15:47,250 --> 00:15:48,740
let's get on with it.
353
00:15:48,740 --> 00:15:51,739
My principle objection to
this oddly confused film
354
00:15:51,739 --> 00:15:54,150
is that it aims to make you feel that
355
00:15:54,150 --> 00:15:56,770
if you love "Hiroshima Mon Amour" you are
356
00:15:56,770 --> 00:15:59,190
somehow acting for peace,
357
00:15:59,190 --> 00:16:02,870
or to put it more crudely,
but in its own terms,
358
00:16:02,870 --> 00:16:06,733
if you buy "Hiroshima Mon
Amour" you're buying peace.
359
00:16:07,890 --> 00:16:09,610
As for the qualities of the film,
360
00:16:09,610 --> 00:16:11,920
that have been described as Proustian
361
00:16:11,920 --> 00:16:14,630
and its supposed destruction of time,
362
00:16:14,630 --> 00:16:18,380
I can only say that it certainly
destroyed my sense of time.
363
00:16:18,380 --> 00:16:20,833
I thought its 88 minutes were forever.
364
00:16:21,813 --> 00:16:24,670
(dramatic music)
365
00:16:24,670 --> 00:16:27,410
We all know the obvious
reason why the pictures
366
00:16:27,410 --> 00:16:28,658
have been so big.
367
00:16:28,658 --> 00:16:29,597
Why they've been spectacles,
368
00:16:29,597 --> 00:16:33,060
and why they've been
on Cinemascope screens
369
00:16:33,060 --> 00:16:36,600
because competition with
television makes this necessary.
370
00:16:36,600 --> 00:16:40,513
The big picture is almost
necessarily the bad picture.
371
00:16:41,360 --> 00:16:43,110
- Movies are the impure art.
372
00:16:43,110 --> 00:16:44,880
I think she called them the great bastard
373
00:16:44,880 --> 00:16:46,647
cross-fertilized super art.
374
00:16:49,200 --> 00:16:50,440
She was writing those reviews that
375
00:16:50,440 --> 00:16:52,910
she was then speaking on the radio.
376
00:16:52,910 --> 00:16:54,450
Performing her reviews.
377
00:16:54,450 --> 00:16:56,990
And I think it freed something up in her.
378
00:16:56,990 --> 00:16:59,350
She was able to cut loose and let it rip.
379
00:16:59,350 --> 00:17:01,070
- [Narrator] It was hell
in some ways because
380
00:17:01,070 --> 00:17:04,010
I didn't have any money
and they didn't pay at all.
381
00:17:04,010 --> 00:17:06,340
They didn't even pay my way into movies.
382
00:17:06,340 --> 00:17:08,600
- One of the people who hears her
383
00:17:08,600 --> 00:17:10,690
is a man named Edward Landberg,
384
00:17:10,690 --> 00:17:15,690
and she winds up being
married to Edward Landberg.
385
00:17:15,883 --> 00:17:19,060
I don't think it was really
much of a romance ever.
386
00:17:19,060 --> 00:17:20,650
They were really drawn together by
387
00:17:20,650 --> 00:17:22,710
their common interest in film.
388
00:17:22,710 --> 00:17:24,550
- And my impression was that
it was kind of a short-lived
389
00:17:24,550 --> 00:17:27,050
marriage and basically convenience.
390
00:17:27,050 --> 00:17:29,380
I think he described it
as a business arrangement.
391
00:17:29,380 --> 00:17:32,000
- [Gina] I think Ed
Landberg was not treated
392
00:17:32,000 --> 00:17:34,183
with very much respect by people.
393
00:17:36,780 --> 00:17:38,510
- [Pauline] I went
around the house mumbling
394
00:17:38,510 --> 00:17:41,250
what am I going to talk
about on the radio.
395
00:17:41,250 --> 00:17:43,540
The movies are all dull in different ways
396
00:17:43,540 --> 00:17:45,460
there's nothing to link them together.
397
00:17:45,460 --> 00:17:47,299
I've got to get an idea.
398
00:17:47,299 --> 00:17:50,040
The only really good
evening I had in the theater
399
00:17:50,040 --> 00:17:52,890
was at a play, "The
Dance of Death Part One"
400
00:17:52,890 --> 00:17:55,220
presented by The Actors' Workshop.
401
00:17:55,220 --> 00:17:57,390
And there my enjoyment was almost wrecked
402
00:17:57,390 --> 00:18:01,010
by an audience so solemnly
serious and uncomprehending
403
00:18:01,010 --> 00:18:04,280
that they turned disapproving
looks every time I laughed.
404
00:18:04,280 --> 00:18:06,400
I began to feel as if
I were the only person
405
00:18:06,400 --> 00:18:08,660
in the audience who had ever been married.
406
00:18:08,660 --> 00:18:10,548
- Don't you see how everybody shuns us?!
407
00:18:10,548 --> 00:18:11,434
- Oh what do I care?!
408
00:18:11,434 --> 00:18:12,267
(loud tapping)
409
00:18:12,267 --> 00:18:13,214
There's the answer!
410
00:18:13,214 --> 00:18:14,371
(yelling)
411
00:18:14,371 --> 00:18:16,030
Oh be quiet!
412
00:18:16,030 --> 00:18:17,910
- [Pauline] Is it possible
that it's this kind
413
00:18:17,910 --> 00:18:19,560
of perception and expression that
414
00:18:19,560 --> 00:18:21,880
people still can't assimilate.
415
00:18:21,880 --> 00:18:24,100
The comedy that grows
out of carrying people's
416
00:18:24,100 --> 00:18:26,712
most deeply felt conflicts too far.
417
00:18:26,712 --> 00:18:29,470
Is it that critics and
audiences don't really
418
00:18:29,470 --> 00:18:32,081
understand what this kind of work is about
419
00:18:32,081 --> 00:18:34,593
or that they want to
pretend that they don't?
420
00:18:36,962 --> 00:18:39,295
(screaming)
421
00:18:42,825 --> 00:18:44,992
(screams)
422
00:18:46,050 --> 00:18:47,634
- Apart from the Los Angeles Times,
423
00:18:47,634 --> 00:18:51,670
there was no film critic
world in California.
424
00:18:51,670 --> 00:18:52,960
- I think being from the west
425
00:18:52,960 --> 00:18:54,740
it made her just more independent.
426
00:18:54,740 --> 00:18:57,800
She didn't believe in just
deference to authority.
427
00:18:57,800 --> 00:19:00,530
- Pauline was, obviously,
a west coast girl.
428
00:19:00,530 --> 00:19:01,967
And she saw herself as that
429
00:19:01,967 --> 00:19:05,350
and that was one of the tools she used
430
00:19:05,350 --> 00:19:08,963
to maintain her feistiness
and not part of their club.
431
00:19:09,860 --> 00:19:12,640
- [Pauline] Many people
react to movies in terms
432
00:19:12,640 --> 00:19:14,760
of what they have read about it.
433
00:19:14,760 --> 00:19:16,877
For example, if Bosley Crowther says that
434
00:19:16,877 --> 00:19:21,220
"The Moment of Truth" is a
movie for bullfight aficionados
435
00:19:21,220 --> 00:19:24,220
they go see it and they
think it's a bullfight movie.
436
00:19:24,220 --> 00:19:26,840
People don't see that
it's an attack on Spain
437
00:19:26,840 --> 00:19:28,353
and an attack on bullfighting.
438
00:19:31,905 --> 00:19:33,840
(women laughing)
439
00:19:33,840 --> 00:19:36,763
- Pauline is quarreling, fighting with,
440
00:19:37,640 --> 00:19:40,260
condemning, attacking,
441
00:19:40,260 --> 00:19:43,170
and she loved to set up New York critics
442
00:19:43,170 --> 00:19:46,170
as straw men and then knock them down.
443
00:19:46,170 --> 00:19:47,955
- The world is really divided, I guess,
444
00:19:47,955 --> 00:19:51,080
between the people who get deep pleasure
445
00:19:51,080 --> 00:19:52,327
from doing a good job
446
00:19:52,327 --> 00:19:54,880
and the ones who are just
trying to get through the day.
447
00:19:54,880 --> 00:19:56,327
And there are a great many critics
448
00:19:56,327 --> 00:19:58,120
who are just trying to
get through the day,
449
00:19:58,120 --> 00:20:00,330
who know they're second
rate and who are scared
450
00:20:00,330 --> 00:20:02,459
of their editors, and
scared of their readers,
451
00:20:02,459 --> 00:20:04,810
and scared of the movie companies,
452
00:20:04,810 --> 00:20:06,700
and with some justification,
453
00:20:06,700 --> 00:20:09,790
but are never good enough
to conquer their fears.
454
00:20:09,790 --> 00:20:12,260
And so the point would be, really, to try
455
00:20:12,260 --> 00:20:14,560
to strengthen your own writing style
456
00:20:14,560 --> 00:20:16,540
and develop more courage
457
00:20:16,540 --> 00:20:18,693
because then you're in a better position.
458
00:20:29,360 --> 00:20:31,610
- [Andrew] The second
premise of the Auteur Theory
459
00:20:31,610 --> 00:20:34,380
is the distinguishable
personality of the director
460
00:20:34,380 --> 00:20:36,940
as a criterion of value.
461
00:20:36,940 --> 00:20:39,110
A director must exhibit certain recurrent
462
00:20:39,110 --> 00:20:43,290
characteristics of style
which serve as his signature.
463
00:20:43,290 --> 00:20:45,910
The way a film looks and feels should have
464
00:20:45,910 --> 00:20:49,423
some relationship to the way
a director thinks and feels.
465
00:20:52,490 --> 00:20:56,390
- She had attacked him in that
"Circles and Squares" article
466
00:20:56,390 --> 00:21:01,390
in a very personal and sort
of almost slanderous way.
467
00:21:04,480 --> 00:21:06,630
- [Narrator] The smell of a
skunk is more distinguishable
468
00:21:06,630 --> 00:21:08,600
than the perfume of a rose
469
00:21:08,600 --> 00:21:10,170
does that make it better?
470
00:21:10,170 --> 00:21:14,060
Hitchcock's personality is
certainly more distinguishable.
471
00:21:14,060 --> 00:21:16,160
If for no other reason
than because Hitchcock
472
00:21:16,160 --> 00:21:17,873
repeats his subject matter.
473
00:21:19,670 --> 00:21:21,630
Often the works in which we are most aware
474
00:21:21,630 --> 00:21:24,653
of the personality of the
director are his worst films.
475
00:21:26,010 --> 00:21:27,890
When he falls back on the devices
476
00:21:27,890 --> 00:21:30,023
he has already done to death.
477
00:21:30,927 --> 00:21:32,827
- Jesus, help me.
478
00:21:32,827 --> 00:21:33,723
Help me.
479
00:21:33,723 --> 00:21:35,090
- I thought she wrote a very unfair piece,
480
00:21:35,090 --> 00:21:37,040
but I enjoyed reading it because it was
481
00:21:37,040 --> 00:21:38,610
so beautifully written.
482
00:21:38,610 --> 00:21:41,510
- Pauline didn't believe in categories
483
00:21:41,510 --> 00:21:43,410
and she didn't believe in absolutes.
484
00:21:43,410 --> 00:21:48,410
- She was very much
against a kind of snobbish
485
00:21:48,457 --> 00:21:51,700
arthouse cinema attitude towards film.
486
00:21:51,700 --> 00:21:55,410
- Up till then, criticism had
been a rather stuffy affair.
487
00:21:55,410 --> 00:21:57,496
And she embraced popular cinema.
488
00:21:57,496 --> 00:22:01,180
- Only bad critics impose
an academic formula
489
00:22:01,180 --> 00:22:04,600
and one does not need to
rationalize one's instincts.
490
00:22:04,600 --> 00:22:06,820
One's instincts are the sum total
491
00:22:06,820 --> 00:22:09,550
of one's mind and responses.
492
00:22:09,550 --> 00:22:11,533
- What Pauline called
the gentleman critics.
493
00:22:11,533 --> 00:22:15,369
Which is a sort of distancing oneself
494
00:22:15,369 --> 00:22:17,873
and being amused by movies.
495
00:22:17,873 --> 00:22:20,900
- It's the opposite of the
way that Pauline wrote.
496
00:22:20,900 --> 00:22:24,307
She wrote as someone who
in order to see a movie
497
00:22:24,307 --> 00:22:25,850
had to go to a movie theater,
498
00:22:25,850 --> 00:22:27,360
and pay to buy a ticket,
499
00:22:27,360 --> 00:22:29,310
and go in and find a seat and sit down.
500
00:22:31,610 --> 00:22:33,960
When she writes about
a movie she also writes
501
00:22:33,960 --> 00:22:35,930
about the audience around her.
502
00:22:35,930 --> 00:22:39,170
She writes as part of an audience,
503
00:22:39,170 --> 00:22:42,610
and she's listening to the
catcalls and the wisecracks,
504
00:22:42,610 --> 00:22:44,210
the sound of boredom,
505
00:22:44,210 --> 00:22:46,560
or the sound of excitement and engagement.
506
00:22:46,560 --> 00:22:48,910
And all that goes into her writing.
507
00:22:48,910 --> 00:22:51,910
(people applauding)
508
00:22:53,570 --> 00:22:54,860
- I think a lot people are funny.
509
00:22:54,860 --> 00:22:56,360
It's not that they sit down and go now
510
00:22:56,360 --> 00:22:58,060
I'm gonna figure out how to be funny.
511
00:22:58,060 --> 00:22:59,920
They just know how to
say it and it's funny.
512
00:22:59,920 --> 00:23:02,733
And I think that that was true of her.
513
00:23:02,733 --> 00:23:04,326
(giggles)
514
00:23:04,326 --> 00:23:06,537
- Just a masterpiece of satire is the
515
00:23:06,537 --> 00:23:09,088
"The Come-Dressed-As-the
Sick-Soul-of-Europe Parties".
516
00:23:09,088 --> 00:23:12,810
What Kael was attacking
were the films I adored.
517
00:23:12,810 --> 00:23:15,360
All these foreign films
with the people migrating
518
00:23:15,360 --> 00:23:16,860
from one bad party to another.
519
00:23:18,160 --> 00:23:20,950
Pauline Kael, in her
attack on those films,
520
00:23:20,950 --> 00:23:24,917
captures exactly what it
was I loved about the films.
521
00:23:24,917 --> 00:23:27,280
- [Narrator] "La Dolce Vita", "La Notte",
522
00:23:27,280 --> 00:23:30,440
and "Last Year at Marienbad"
are all about people
523
00:23:30,440 --> 00:23:32,960
who are bored, successful, and rich.
524
00:23:32,960 --> 00:23:35,610
Nothing seems more self
indulgent and shallow
525
00:23:35,610 --> 00:23:38,400
than the dissatisfaction
of the innervated rich.
526
00:23:38,400 --> 00:23:41,577
Nothing is easier to attack or expose.
527
00:23:41,577 --> 00:23:43,770
"La Notte" is supposed to be a study
528
00:23:43,770 --> 00:23:45,623
in the failure of communication.
529
00:23:52,110 --> 00:23:54,120
But what new perceptions of this problem
530
00:23:54,120 --> 00:23:56,100
do we get by watching people on the screen
531
00:23:56,100 --> 00:23:57,970
who can't communicate
532
00:23:57,970 --> 00:23:59,870
if we are never given any insight
533
00:23:59,870 --> 00:24:01,290
into what they would have to say
534
00:24:01,290 --> 00:24:03,033
if they could talk to each other?
535
00:24:04,230 --> 00:24:06,600
And there is the repeated
view of Jeanne Moreau
536
00:24:06,600 --> 00:24:08,460
walking away from the camera.
537
00:24:08,460 --> 00:24:10,200
What are we to make of this camera
538
00:24:10,200 --> 00:24:11,840
fixation on her rear?
539
00:24:11,840 --> 00:24:13,750
Obviously, we're supposed to be interested
540
00:24:13,750 --> 00:24:15,620
in her thoughts and feelings while
541
00:24:15,620 --> 00:24:17,920
we look at her from the back.
542
00:24:17,920 --> 00:24:20,480
Is the delicate movement
of the derriere supposed
543
00:24:20,480 --> 00:24:22,923
to reveal her angst or merely her ennui?
544
00:24:26,610 --> 00:24:29,141
- I was reading Pauline long before
545
00:24:29,141 --> 00:24:32,018
I knew who she was or cared.
546
00:24:32,018 --> 00:24:36,420
I was reading her program
notes to the Cinema Guild
547
00:24:36,420 --> 00:24:39,630
where my wife and I would
go two, three times a week
548
00:24:39,630 --> 00:24:42,690
to see every conceivable classic film
549
00:24:42,690 --> 00:24:44,630
in these little rickety theaters that
550
00:24:44,630 --> 00:24:46,580
she had on Telegraph Avenue.
551
00:24:46,580 --> 00:24:48,780
So, you felt if you
weren't seeing whatever
552
00:24:48,780 --> 00:24:50,210
was playing that night,
553
00:24:50,210 --> 00:24:52,970
and there were always two or
three or four movies playing,
554
00:24:52,970 --> 00:24:54,280
you were missing something.
555
00:24:54,280 --> 00:24:56,590
- [Craig] Her program
notes start to be pinned
556
00:24:56,590 --> 00:24:59,953
to the refrigerators of
people all over the Bay Area.
557
00:24:59,953 --> 00:25:02,482
- [Gina] She kind of threw herself into it
558
00:25:02,482 --> 00:25:07,482
and all-consuming, very
passionate, devoted way.
559
00:25:07,700 --> 00:25:09,360
She made sure the films were picked up.
560
00:25:09,360 --> 00:25:12,430
She did all the communication
with the distributors
561
00:25:12,430 --> 00:25:14,350
and then she wrote about the films.
562
00:25:14,350 --> 00:25:17,050
The theater phone rang in our house.
563
00:25:17,050 --> 00:25:19,920
It was usually my mother but
often I had to do it too.
564
00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:21,960
I'd have to give the showtimes.
565
00:25:21,960 --> 00:25:23,560
And of course, because people realized
566
00:25:23,560 --> 00:25:25,480
it was a person who
really knows something,
567
00:25:25,480 --> 00:25:28,330
then people would start asking
her about the movies, too.
568
00:25:29,350 --> 00:25:31,790
Many of the people that
she employed in the theater
569
00:25:31,790 --> 00:25:33,440
she became friends with.
570
00:25:33,440 --> 00:25:35,830
- She had a young man.
571
00:25:35,830 --> 00:25:37,470
My fantasy was that she liked me
572
00:25:37,470 --> 00:25:39,517
because she wanted me
to go to bed with her,
573
00:25:39,517 --> 00:25:41,110
but that was my own fantasy.
574
00:25:41,110 --> 00:25:43,403
But she really liked young people.
575
00:25:44,680 --> 00:25:45,700
- Joyride.
576
00:25:45,700 --> 00:25:47,853
Neon blinking traffic light.
577
00:25:48,760 --> 00:25:52,477
- Berkeley was a hotbed
of intellectual activity
578
00:25:52,477 --> 00:25:54,323
and creative activity.
579
00:25:57,430 --> 00:25:59,240
This was not the drug age,
580
00:25:59,240 --> 00:26:03,380
this was the cigarette
and glass of wine age
581
00:26:03,380 --> 00:26:07,000
where people gathered
and talked and discussed
582
00:26:07,000 --> 00:26:11,160
politics and poetry
and art, and et cetera.
583
00:26:11,160 --> 00:26:14,320
Apparently, this was
like an open-door policy
584
00:26:14,320 --> 00:26:15,513
everybody was here.
585
00:26:16,850 --> 00:26:18,290
- The living room was set up
586
00:26:18,290 --> 00:26:21,570
and she had black-out
curtains on all the windows
587
00:26:21,570 --> 00:26:25,500
so she could show movies
constantly in the living room.
588
00:26:25,500 --> 00:26:27,092
- [Carol] She always had
a cigarette in her month
589
00:26:27,092 --> 00:26:29,888
and her eyes were always just gleaming.
590
00:26:29,888 --> 00:26:31,047
- [Steven] And it's bobbing up and down,
591
00:26:31,047 --> 00:26:32,990
and the ashes are falling all over,
592
00:26:32,990 --> 00:26:34,700
and the smoke is getting in her eyes,
593
00:26:34,700 --> 00:26:37,670
and she's weeping, and she's
talking a mile a minute.
594
00:26:37,670 --> 00:26:39,530
- The living room wasn't that large
595
00:26:39,530 --> 00:26:42,380
but she invited a lot of people,
596
00:26:42,380 --> 00:26:44,210
and she knew a lot of people knew her,
597
00:26:44,210 --> 00:26:47,160
and so she had a record player
598
00:26:47,160 --> 00:26:49,883
and we danced to music for hours.
599
00:26:51,090 --> 00:26:56,040
- [Ortrun] When Pauline got
here, the walls were probably
600
00:26:56,040 --> 00:26:58,260
had already started to crumble.
601
00:26:58,260 --> 00:27:01,070
This was a good project
for Jess to take on.
602
00:27:01,070 --> 00:27:04,980
He had already done five
other homes in the area,
603
00:27:04,980 --> 00:27:06,840
but this one happened to be the only one
604
00:27:06,840 --> 00:27:08,653
that's still intact.
605
00:27:10,050 --> 00:27:12,013
She loved Jean Renoir.
606
00:27:13,140 --> 00:27:16,290
On the ceiling as you come up the stairs
607
00:27:16,290 --> 00:27:19,130
is a wonderful painting of an image
608
00:27:19,130 --> 00:27:21,160
that looks like a sand painting.
609
00:27:21,160 --> 00:27:24,410
A Jean Renoir movie, "The River".
610
00:27:24,410 --> 00:27:28,060
The other one taken from the
film, "The Golden Coach",
611
00:27:28,060 --> 00:27:31,810
starring Anna Magnani,
is in the back bedroom.
612
00:27:31,810 --> 00:27:34,123
Beautiful Carnivale patterns.
613
00:27:35,970 --> 00:27:39,780
- [Gina] My mother had a
deep love and responsiveness
614
00:27:39,780 --> 00:27:41,888
to art, to music, to theater.
615
00:27:41,888 --> 00:27:46,430
When I was growing up, she
had a lot of jazz and blues.
616
00:27:46,430 --> 00:27:49,830
She like gospel music and
listening to Mahalia Jackson,
617
00:27:49,830 --> 00:27:52,973
and the countertenor Russell
Oberlin singing Handel.
618
00:27:53,960 --> 00:27:58,133
She was a great lover of many
kinds and forms of beauty.
619
00:28:00,170 --> 00:28:02,750
- Sometimes the kids
working at the theater
620
00:28:02,750 --> 00:28:05,800
came to help babysit Gina.
621
00:28:05,800 --> 00:28:08,930
I understand that life was
pretty tough for Gina here
622
00:28:08,930 --> 00:28:11,580
with all these adults running around.
623
00:28:11,580 --> 00:28:15,570
- For me, in terms of
growing up with a critic,
624
00:28:15,570 --> 00:28:18,403
making judgments, being judgmental,
625
00:28:19,330 --> 00:28:22,130
she couldn't not be critical.
626
00:28:22,130 --> 00:28:24,173
She was always criticizing.
627
00:28:25,290 --> 00:28:27,910
- [Pauline] Today, or
most Valentine's Day,
628
00:28:27,910 --> 00:28:30,530
seems a good time for
something I've never done,
629
00:28:30,530 --> 00:28:33,640
a full half hour of listeners' letters.
630
00:28:33,640 --> 00:28:36,580
Here is a letter from a manly man.
631
00:28:36,580 --> 00:28:38,230
Dear Miss Kael,
632
00:28:38,230 --> 00:28:41,440
since you know so much
about the art of the film
633
00:28:41,440 --> 00:28:44,300
why don't you spend your time making it?
634
00:28:44,300 --> 00:28:45,940
But first you will need a pair
635
00:28:45,940 --> 00:28:48,450
of B blank, blank, blank, blank.
636
00:28:48,450 --> 00:28:49,800
End quote.
637
00:28:49,800 --> 00:28:50,643
Mister Do-Do,
638
00:28:51,880 --> 00:28:54,833
you don't have to lay an egg
to know if it tastes good.
639
00:28:56,210 --> 00:29:00,250
- [Carr] Some men you just can't reach.
640
00:29:00,250 --> 00:29:03,800
- Why at this point are you still having
641
00:29:03,800 --> 00:29:05,620
to defend being a female?
642
00:29:05,620 --> 00:29:07,800
- In the arts women are accepted,
643
00:29:07,800 --> 00:29:10,393
they've always been
accepted in the theater.
644
00:29:10,393 --> 00:29:15,391
But criticism, since it
involves analytic intelligence
645
00:29:15,391 --> 00:29:19,820
and the rational use of one's intellect,
646
00:29:19,820 --> 00:29:22,890
that hits exactly where men have always
647
00:29:22,890 --> 00:29:26,640
wanted to believe that
women were less gifted.
648
00:29:26,640 --> 00:29:31,200
It's one thing to show
sensitivity and talent.
649
00:29:31,200 --> 00:29:32,920
I mean, men like that in women.
650
00:29:32,920 --> 00:29:36,050
But it is very, very
difficult for men to accept
651
00:29:36,050 --> 00:29:38,553
the idea that women can argue reasonably.
652
00:29:40,747 --> 00:29:43,370
"Lawrence of Arabia" is the most literate,
653
00:29:43,370 --> 00:29:46,930
and intelligent and tasteful,
and the most beautiful
654
00:29:46,930 --> 00:29:49,967
of the modern expensive spectacle films,
655
00:29:49,967 --> 00:29:52,083
and I wish it had never been made.
656
00:29:53,270 --> 00:29:55,900
I want my T.E. Lawrence back.
657
00:29:55,900 --> 00:29:57,910
The Lawrence I first got interested in
658
00:29:57,910 --> 00:30:01,320
from R.P. Blackmur's essay
in "The Expense of Greatness"
659
00:30:01,320 --> 00:30:03,670
and whom I then followed
through his writing,
660
00:30:03,670 --> 00:30:06,490
especially his extraordinary letters.
661
00:30:06,490 --> 00:30:08,890
I came to know Lawrence from his books.
662
00:30:08,890 --> 00:30:11,600
So I assume have the filmmakers.
663
00:30:11,600 --> 00:30:14,360
But their image of him is
so different from mine,
664
00:30:14,360 --> 00:30:17,000
and now I'm not sure I can keep mine.
665
00:30:17,000 --> 00:30:18,960
Already I feel I must restore it
666
00:30:18,960 --> 00:30:22,823
by rereading the books trying
to dislodge their images.
667
00:30:24,040 --> 00:30:26,270
These are men of immense talent.
668
00:30:26,270 --> 00:30:28,260
Why couldn't they just
have written a story
669
00:30:28,260 --> 00:30:30,440
about the desert and filmed it?
670
00:30:30,440 --> 00:30:32,560
Why must they muck up the past,
671
00:30:32,560 --> 00:30:34,280
oversimplify history,
672
00:30:34,280 --> 00:30:36,580
and use their post-Freudian insights
673
00:30:36,580 --> 00:30:39,640
to turn a great leader of
men, and a great writer,
674
00:30:39,640 --> 00:30:43,830
into a narcissist and sadist
with a Christ complex.
675
00:30:43,830 --> 00:30:47,400
To the listeners I say goodbye
as a guest of this station.
676
00:30:47,400 --> 00:30:49,270
If they pay me, I'll be back.
677
00:30:49,270 --> 00:30:50,990
If not, not.
678
00:30:50,990 --> 00:30:53,120
After a million words for love,
679
00:30:53,120 --> 00:30:55,280
I think I should turn professional.
680
00:30:55,280 --> 00:30:58,040
This is my last free broadcast.
681
00:30:58,040 --> 00:30:59,560
I no longer care to have a cup
682
00:30:59,560 --> 00:31:01,470
of coffee with the management.
683
00:31:01,470 --> 00:31:04,720
If they want me back on
the air, they can pay me.
684
00:31:04,720 --> 00:31:07,780
- The last few years that
we were in California
685
00:31:07,780 --> 00:31:11,093
my mother, I believe, was
very, very frustrated.
686
00:31:12,850 --> 00:31:15,990
She really did not have places to publish.
687
00:31:15,990 --> 00:31:18,770
We were very, very short on money.
688
00:31:18,770 --> 00:31:23,770
And she really, I think,
she needed to make a change.
689
00:31:28,600 --> 00:31:32,860
- I said the Mark Chaffey
who was a colleague,
690
00:31:32,860 --> 00:31:35,807
I said there's a book coming out called,
691
00:31:35,807 --> 00:31:37,220
"I Lost It At the Movies",
692
00:31:37,220 --> 00:31:39,550
it would make a terrific paperback book.
693
00:31:39,550 --> 00:31:43,630
And Mark went out to Berkeley and met her,
694
00:31:43,630 --> 00:31:45,170
and we bought the book,
695
00:31:45,170 --> 00:31:48,510
and so Pauline came to New York.
696
00:31:48,510 --> 00:31:50,193
And we became great friends.
697
00:31:51,210 --> 00:31:53,030
- [Narrator] In 1965, it took a lot
698
00:31:53,030 --> 00:31:54,740
of writing to pay the rent.
699
00:31:54,740 --> 00:31:57,330
That year I was on a plane
going to give a lecture
700
00:31:57,330 --> 00:31:59,210
and a husband and wife were sitting
701
00:31:59,210 --> 00:32:00,760
across the aisle from me.
702
00:32:00,760 --> 00:32:02,800
She was reading me in Mademoiselle
703
00:32:02,800 --> 00:32:04,860
and he was reading me in Holiday,
704
00:32:04,860 --> 00:32:06,500
and then they swapped magazines.
705
00:32:06,500 --> 00:32:08,310
It was very cheering.
706
00:32:08,310 --> 00:32:10,890
- Gradually, Pauline began to be noticed.
707
00:32:10,890 --> 00:32:14,650
She was offered a job at McCall's,
708
00:32:14,650 --> 00:32:18,940
a very, very, widely-read
mainstream women's magazine.
709
00:32:18,940 --> 00:32:21,650
But the editors decided that she was
710
00:32:21,650 --> 00:32:23,560
out of step with their readership.
711
00:32:23,560 --> 00:32:27,253
She was just not in sync
with mainstream taste.
712
00:32:28,520 --> 00:32:30,400
- [Narrator] Wasn't there,
perhaps, one Von Trapp
713
00:32:30,400 --> 00:32:32,340
who didn't want to sing his head off?
714
00:32:32,340 --> 00:32:33,790
Or who screamed that he wouldn't
715
00:32:33,790 --> 00:32:36,800
act out little glockenspiel routines?
716
00:32:36,800 --> 00:32:38,440
It's the sugar-coated lie that
717
00:32:38,440 --> 00:32:40,320
people seem to want to eat,
718
00:32:40,320 --> 00:32:44,000
and the phenomenon at the
center, Julie Andrews.
719
00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:46,540
Sexless, inhumanly happy.
720
00:32:46,540 --> 00:32:48,950
The sparkling maid, a mind as clean
721
00:32:48,950 --> 00:32:51,420
and well-brushed as her teeth.
722
00:32:51,420 --> 00:32:53,710
The success of a movie
like "The Sound of Music"
723
00:32:53,710 --> 00:32:55,310
makes it more difficult for anyone
724
00:32:55,310 --> 00:32:57,690
to try to do anything worth doing.
725
00:32:57,690 --> 00:33:00,920
Nothing could be safer,
nothing could be surer.
726
00:33:00,920 --> 00:33:02,520
Whom could it offend?
727
00:33:02,520 --> 00:33:06,210
Only those of us who, despite
the fact that we may respond,
728
00:33:06,210 --> 00:33:08,763
loathe being manipulated in this way.
729
00:33:12,460 --> 00:33:14,050
- [Woman] What's wrong
with a heroine being
730
00:33:14,050 --> 00:33:16,210
good, happy and clean-minded?
731
00:33:16,210 --> 00:33:18,840
She's the kind of girl I
pray my daughter would be
732
00:33:18,840 --> 00:33:21,030
or my son would marry.
733
00:33:21,030 --> 00:33:23,490
- [Woman] Please take my
name off your mailing list
734
00:33:23,490 --> 00:33:25,160
and use it to start a fund to have
735
00:33:25,160 --> 00:33:27,170
Pauline Kael's head examined.
736
00:33:27,170 --> 00:33:29,800
- [Woman] Please, dear woman, give up.
737
00:33:29,800 --> 00:33:31,650
- [Woman] Her so-called
writing reflects no love
738
00:33:31,650 --> 00:33:34,853
of nature, music, or feeling
of loyalty to country.
739
00:33:36,090 --> 00:33:37,530
- I got dropped.
740
00:33:37,530 --> 00:33:39,810
Suddenly, there was an ad for McCall's
741
00:33:39,810 --> 00:33:41,420
listed in The New York Times
742
00:33:41,420 --> 00:33:43,900
and they had a list of their
writers for the next issue
743
00:33:43,900 --> 00:33:45,320
and I wasn't listed.
744
00:33:45,320 --> 00:33:47,498
And that was how I knew I was finished.
745
00:33:47,498 --> 00:33:50,550
(typewriter keys tapping)
746
00:33:50,550 --> 00:33:54,500
- [Man] Then she got another
job with "The New Republic"
747
00:33:54,500 --> 00:33:56,240
but she got very angry with them
748
00:33:56,240 --> 00:33:59,290
because they were rewriting her copy.
749
00:33:59,290 --> 00:34:00,910
- She would do pieces and then she'd
750
00:34:00,910 --> 00:34:03,170
see sentences she hadn't written,
751
00:34:03,170 --> 00:34:06,460
word substitutions made
without consulting her.
752
00:34:06,460 --> 00:34:09,460
- She really had the
shit kicked out of her.
753
00:34:09,460 --> 00:34:11,500
- [Narrator] I quit the
magazine in some despair
754
00:34:11,500 --> 00:34:13,940
and had no idea what to do.
755
00:34:13,940 --> 00:34:15,660
I had come to the conclusion that
756
00:34:15,660 --> 00:34:18,070
it was just about
impossible to make a living
757
00:34:18,070 --> 00:34:19,193
as a movie critic.
758
00:34:20,450 --> 00:34:22,800
While American enthusiasm for movies
759
00:34:22,800 --> 00:34:24,390
has never been so high.
760
00:34:24,390 --> 00:34:28,240
American movies have never
been so contemptible.
761
00:34:28,240 --> 00:34:29,302
- How do you like that?
762
00:34:29,302 --> 00:34:30,158
(laughs)
763
00:34:30,158 --> 00:34:30,991
- Oh!
764
00:34:30,991 --> 00:34:32,050
- [Narrator] In other parts of the world
765
00:34:32,050 --> 00:34:34,150
there's been a new Golden Age.
766
00:34:34,150 --> 00:34:37,680
Great talents have fought
their way through in Japan,
767
00:34:37,680 --> 00:34:42,180
India, Sweden, Italy, France.
768
00:34:44,360 --> 00:34:46,310
Even in England there's been something
769
00:34:46,310 --> 00:34:49,670
that passes for a
renaissance, but not here.
770
00:34:49,670 --> 00:34:53,060
American enthusiasm is fed
largely by foreign films,
771
00:34:53,060 --> 00:34:54,920
memories, and innocence.
772
00:34:54,920 --> 00:34:56,310
- If you want to stay with your husband,
773
00:34:56,310 --> 00:34:59,779
then I think you should
decide to do without sex.
774
00:34:59,779 --> 00:35:02,362
(upbeat music)
775
00:35:05,050 --> 00:35:07,710
Goddard is the F. Scott
Fitzgerald of the movie world
776
00:35:07,710 --> 00:35:10,770
and movies are to the
60s a synthesis of what
777
00:35:10,770 --> 00:35:14,430
the arts were for the
post-World War I generation.
778
00:35:14,430 --> 00:35:18,910
Rebellion, romance, a new style of life.
779
00:35:18,910 --> 00:35:22,363
Goddard holds his cards
face up to the audience.
780
00:35:28,300 --> 00:35:32,440
all over the world recognize
his liberation of the movies.
781
00:35:32,440 --> 00:35:35,630
They know that he has opened
up a new kind of moviemaking.
782
00:35:35,630 --> 00:35:38,870
That he has brought a new
sensibility into film.
783
00:35:38,870 --> 00:35:42,170
That like Joyce he is
both kinds of master,
784
00:35:42,170 --> 00:35:44,220
both innovator and artist.
785
00:35:44,220 --> 00:35:47,030
There is a disturbing
quality in Goddard's work.
786
00:35:47,030 --> 00:35:50,040
His characters don't
seem to have any future.
787
00:35:50,040 --> 00:35:53,410
They are most alive just
because they don't conceive
788
00:35:53,410 --> 00:35:55,033
of the day after tomorrow.
789
00:36:01,100 --> 00:36:04,010
- The one review Pauline Kael wrote that
790
00:36:04,930 --> 00:36:07,650
ended up meaning something
to me in a big way
791
00:36:07,650 --> 00:36:10,630
was for a "Band of Outsiders".
792
00:36:10,630 --> 00:36:14,426
She said, it was as if
a bunch of movie mad
793
00:36:14,426 --> 00:36:17,820
young French boys had taken a banal
794
00:36:17,820 --> 00:36:21,540
American crime novel and
translated the poetry
795
00:36:21,540 --> 00:36:23,718
that they had read between the lines.
796
00:36:23,718 --> 00:36:25,260
(gun fires)
797
00:36:25,260 --> 00:36:30,260
It was like that is my
aesthetic right there.
798
00:36:30,316 --> 00:36:32,873
That's what I hope I can do.
799
00:36:34,260 --> 00:36:36,400
- [Pauline] All those kids who used
800
00:36:36,400 --> 00:36:38,120
to go into the other arts,
801
00:36:38,120 --> 00:36:39,680
the brightest kids in America,
802
00:36:39,680 --> 00:36:41,780
the ones who used to become the architect,
803
00:36:41,780 --> 00:36:43,960
and the writers and the poets,
804
00:36:43,960 --> 00:36:45,660
they're now going into movies.
805
00:36:45,660 --> 00:36:47,040
And I think they're going to bring
806
00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:50,562
new more complex kinds of
sensibility into movies.
807
00:36:50,562 --> 00:36:51,693
- Look watch.
808
00:36:52,680 --> 00:36:56,130
- I've seen an awful
lot of movies in my life
809
00:36:56,130 --> 00:36:58,657
and I love the excitement
of something new.
810
00:37:04,020 --> 00:37:07,390
- She created a tremendous
amount of attention
811
00:37:07,390 --> 00:37:11,200
both to herself and to "Bonnie
and Clyde" with her review,
812
00:37:11,200 --> 00:37:14,250
which changed the face of reviewing.
813
00:37:14,250 --> 00:37:17,440
The first reviews of the
movie were so bad everywhere
814
00:37:17,440 --> 00:37:20,360
that you just thought, well,
that's it for this movie.
815
00:37:20,360 --> 00:37:21,780
- [Man] It's smothered in the cradle
816
00:37:21,780 --> 00:37:23,220
as soon as it comes out.
817
00:37:23,220 --> 00:37:25,331
- Bosley Crowther just dumps on it.
818
00:37:25,331 --> 00:37:27,320
Totally pans it in The New York Times.
819
00:37:27,320 --> 00:37:30,490
And I think the movie
would've just disappeared.
820
00:37:30,490 --> 00:37:34,650
- And then Pauline reviewed
in such a spectacular way
821
00:37:35,560 --> 00:37:38,590
that it caused a counter reaction.
822
00:37:38,590 --> 00:37:40,060
- Newman had started
the American New Wave.
823
00:37:40,060 --> 00:37:41,857
I think it was his movie,
it was "Bonnie and Clyde"
824
00:37:41,857 --> 00:37:43,460
but it was also her review.
825
00:37:43,460 --> 00:37:46,640
Which was a sensation and
phenomenon on its own.
826
00:37:46,640 --> 00:37:48,320
- Even if you've seen the movie,
827
00:37:48,320 --> 00:37:50,310
it's like you haven't seen the movie.
828
00:37:50,310 --> 00:37:52,090
You're seeing it for the first time
829
00:37:52,090 --> 00:37:53,963
as you're reading the review.
830
00:37:55,650 --> 00:37:57,350
- Ain't you ashamed
831
00:37:57,350 --> 00:38:00,100
for trying to steal an
old lady's automobile?
832
00:38:00,100 --> 00:38:01,690
- [Narrator] During the
first part of the movie,
833
00:38:01,690 --> 00:38:05,297
a woman in my row was gleefully
assuring her companions,
834
00:38:05,297 --> 00:38:08,517
"It's a comedy, it's a comedy."
835
00:38:09,775 --> 00:38:11,570
(gun fires)
836
00:38:11,570 --> 00:38:13,603
After a while she didn't say anything.
837
00:38:14,507 --> 00:38:16,410
"Bonnie and Clyde" needs violence.
838
00:38:16,410 --> 00:38:18,400
Violence is meaning.
839
00:38:18,400 --> 00:38:20,730
But because of the
quality of American life
840
00:38:20,730 --> 00:38:22,280
at the present time,
841
00:38:22,280 --> 00:38:24,980
perhaps there can be no real comedy
842
00:38:24,980 --> 00:38:27,210
without true horror in it.
843
00:38:27,210 --> 00:38:29,050
- This is in the middle
of the Vietnam War.
844
00:38:29,050 --> 00:38:32,430
Where people are becoming inured to death,
845
00:38:32,430 --> 00:38:34,663
to carnage, to blood.
846
00:38:35,574 --> 00:38:38,160
- Hey, isn't that Malcolm there?
847
00:38:38,160 --> 00:38:41,717
- I will never forget the
last line of that piece.
848
00:38:41,717 --> 00:38:46,717
"By making us care about
these outlaw lovers,
849
00:38:47,647 --> 00:38:50,927
"this movie has put the
sting back into death.
850
00:38:50,927 --> 00:38:51,947
"Wham!"
851
00:38:51,947 --> 00:38:55,114
(guns firing rapidly)
852
00:39:01,920 --> 00:39:04,830
The movie ends in complete silence.
853
00:39:04,830 --> 00:39:08,093
And the theater is left
in complete silence.
854
00:39:11,100 --> 00:39:13,810
Everything you'd been watching
on the news every night
855
00:39:13,810 --> 00:39:18,810
from Vietnam has suddenly been
made unreal by this movie.
856
00:39:20,320 --> 00:39:22,890
That's the great inversion
that happens in art.
857
00:39:22,890 --> 00:39:26,383
That happens and that
criticism can help make happen.
858
00:39:27,600 --> 00:39:30,860
- Her review was rejected
by The New Republic
859
00:39:30,860 --> 00:39:32,690
because it's against the tide,
860
00:39:32,690 --> 00:39:34,030
and then The New Yorker publishes
861
00:39:34,030 --> 00:39:36,430
her review of "Bonnie and Clyde",
862
00:39:36,430 --> 00:39:39,750
and then she gets hired to be
The New Yorker's film critic.
863
00:39:39,750 --> 00:39:42,820
And she was the major voice
there for a long time.
864
00:39:42,820 --> 00:39:46,290
- When she finally was offered
the job at The New Yorker
865
00:39:46,290 --> 00:39:48,000
that was heaven to her.
866
00:39:48,000 --> 00:39:52,623
Having some success was
really, really good for her.
867
00:39:52,623 --> 00:39:53,780
I think she looked better.
868
00:39:53,780 --> 00:39:55,270
She thrived on it.
869
00:39:55,270 --> 00:39:58,010
- [Man] It was a real jolt to a lot
870
00:39:58,010 --> 00:39:59,980
of the readers of The New Yorker
871
00:39:59,980 --> 00:40:04,630
who were used to this rather
gentile, rolling prose
872
00:40:04,630 --> 00:40:07,020
She didn't want her
sentences straightened out.
873
00:40:07,020 --> 00:40:09,980
She didn't want them made more elegant.
874
00:40:09,980 --> 00:40:11,751
- [Man] You'd get to The Current Cinema
875
00:40:11,751 --> 00:40:14,020
and it was like a jet taking off.
876
00:40:14,020 --> 00:40:18,483
- William Shawn was a
very old school gentleman.
877
00:40:19,530 --> 00:40:23,420
He came from a time when
publishing in New York City
878
00:40:23,420 --> 00:40:25,770
was really a gentleman's profession.
879
00:40:25,770 --> 00:40:27,864
- She had a great deal of respect for him.
880
00:40:27,864 --> 00:40:30,310
And I think it was mutual love hatred.
881
00:40:30,310 --> 00:40:32,650
They saw how brilliant the other one was
882
00:40:32,650 --> 00:40:35,479
and at the same time it
was like philosophically
883
00:40:35,479 --> 00:40:38,490
they came from very
different points of view.
884
00:40:38,490 --> 00:40:41,930
- Shawn was the bane of her existence
885
00:40:41,930 --> 00:40:43,830
and he was also her benefactor.
886
00:40:43,830 --> 00:40:46,610
- She would fight tooth
and nail not to weaken
887
00:40:46,610 --> 00:40:49,460
or as she once said, "Not to
chop the balls off a piece."
888
00:40:51,700 --> 00:40:54,720
- [Narrator] As Henry Moon
Nicholson keeps working his mouth
889
00:40:54,720 --> 00:40:57,430
with the tongue darting
out and dangling lewdly,
890
00:40:57,430 --> 00:40:59,940
he's like a commercial for cunnilingus.
891
00:40:59,940 --> 00:41:01,540
- [William] This has to come out.
892
00:41:01,540 --> 00:41:04,020
We can't or won't print it.
893
00:41:04,020 --> 00:41:05,600
- [Narrator] Cinematographer,
Victor Kemper,
894
00:41:05,600 --> 00:41:09,200
makes every interior
look like a cold latrine.
895
00:41:09,200 --> 00:41:10,870
- [William] Here we go again.
896
00:41:10,870 --> 00:41:12,670
After all, the world is full of things
897
00:41:12,670 --> 00:41:14,370
other than latrines.
898
00:41:14,370 --> 00:41:15,790
Why, why?
899
00:41:15,790 --> 00:41:18,420
- She provoked him on
purpose, I'm sure of it.
900
00:41:18,420 --> 00:41:19,750
In fact, she said so.
901
00:41:19,750 --> 00:41:22,560
She'd say, oh Bill's
really gonna love this.
902
00:41:22,560 --> 00:41:24,870
- [Narrator] I remember getting
a letter from an eminent
903
00:41:24,870 --> 00:41:27,320
New Yorker writer suggesting
that I was tramping
904
00:41:27,320 --> 00:41:28,840
through the pages of the magazine
905
00:41:28,840 --> 00:41:30,800
with cowboy boots covered with dung
906
00:41:30,800 --> 00:41:34,490
and that I should move on
out with my cowboy boots.
907
00:41:34,490 --> 00:41:37,010
- A lot mail that came
to me in the first years
908
00:41:37,010 --> 00:41:38,937
at The New Yorker was,
"Why don't you get a job
909
00:41:38,937 --> 00:41:41,190
"on the sports page and
learn how to write."
910
00:41:41,190 --> 00:41:46,190
- She conducted a debate
between filmmakers and herself.
911
00:41:47,150 --> 00:41:49,800
We were all under surveillance
912
00:41:50,750 --> 00:41:53,670
and she kept us on our toes.
913
00:41:53,670 --> 00:41:55,930
- We're not talking about
film criticism here,
914
00:41:55,930 --> 00:41:57,180
we're talking about Pauline Kael
915
00:41:57,180 --> 00:42:00,975
and in the end of the game what
916
00:42:00,975 --> 00:42:03,670
Pauline Kael promoted wasn't film,
917
00:42:03,670 --> 00:42:05,140
it was her.
918
00:42:05,140 --> 00:42:08,230
- I think all art and
cinema are subjective.
919
00:42:08,230 --> 00:42:11,920
And I think she was a
master of contradiction,
920
00:42:11,920 --> 00:42:15,290
and the films that she spoke about
921
00:42:15,290 --> 00:42:17,040
were filled with contradiction.
922
00:42:17,040 --> 00:42:19,710
And often, her tastes were
full of contradiction.
923
00:42:19,710 --> 00:42:22,300
- I think some people make a mistake
924
00:42:22,300 --> 00:42:25,210
of wanting to drop on everything if it's
925
00:42:25,210 --> 00:42:27,480
saying not as great as Eisenstein,
926
00:42:27,480 --> 00:42:29,151
when the important thing is to see
927
00:42:29,151 --> 00:42:31,680
how movies are used by people
928
00:42:31,680 --> 00:42:33,310
and what needs they satisfy.
929
00:42:33,310 --> 00:42:35,033
Some of the greatest pleasures I've had
930
00:42:35,033 --> 00:42:37,283
have been from pretty terrible pictures.
931
00:42:38,168 --> 00:42:39,510
(gun fires)
932
00:42:39,510 --> 00:42:40,343
- [Vincent] You must see it with
933
00:42:40,343 --> 00:42:41,560
your own eyes to believe it.
934
00:42:43,041 --> 00:42:45,010
(moaning)
935
00:42:45,010 --> 00:42:46,850
- [Narrator] I don't trust
anyone who doesn't admit
936
00:42:46,850 --> 00:42:49,040
to having, at some time,
in his life enjoyed
937
00:42:49,040 --> 00:42:51,210
trashy American movies.
938
00:42:51,210 --> 00:42:54,090
Seeing trash can liberate the spectator.
939
00:42:54,090 --> 00:42:57,543
We might as well relax and
enjoy it freely for what it is.
940
00:42:57,543 --> 00:43:00,070
- [Man] Stupid, stupid!
941
00:43:00,070 --> 00:43:01,970
- Just what is it that you want to do?
942
00:43:01,970 --> 00:43:03,593
- Well, we wanna be free!
943
00:43:06,460 --> 00:43:07,630
And we wanna get loaded.
944
00:43:07,630 --> 00:43:08,890
- [Crowd] Yeah!
945
00:43:08,890 --> 00:43:13,890
- Trash, Art, and the Movies
was highly influential to me.
946
00:43:13,990 --> 00:43:16,100
I knew the difference between what was art
947
00:43:16,100 --> 00:43:18,000
and what was trash,
948
00:43:18,000 --> 00:43:20,970
but her distinction between what
949
00:43:20,970 --> 00:43:23,410
is good trash and bad trash,
950
00:43:23,410 --> 00:43:26,720
populist movies that are done really well
951
00:43:26,720 --> 00:43:29,170
but do not aspire, necessarily, to be art
952
00:43:29,170 --> 00:43:32,010
are still to be cherished and tried for.
953
00:43:32,010 --> 00:43:34,603
It's what the business of the studio is.
954
00:43:35,620 --> 00:43:37,440
And you don't have to do it by pandering
955
00:43:37,440 --> 00:43:40,100
to the lowest common
denominator you can do it well
956
00:43:40,100 --> 00:43:42,640
without necessarily making art.
957
00:43:42,640 --> 00:43:44,680
- I've got information, man.
958
00:43:44,680 --> 00:43:46,030
New shit has come to light.
959
00:43:50,279 --> 00:43:51,900
- [Narrator] The movie
doesn't have to be great
960
00:43:51,900 --> 00:43:53,400
it can be stupid and empty
961
00:43:53,400 --> 00:43:56,940
and you can still have the
joy of a good performance,
962
00:43:56,940 --> 00:43:59,103
or the joy in just a good lie.
963
00:44:00,215 --> 00:44:01,432
- Say it, say it!
964
00:44:01,432 --> 00:44:03,950
- It's a man!
965
00:44:03,950 --> 00:44:05,540
- You ain't gonna do shit.
966
00:44:05,540 --> 00:44:08,670
- Do you have to use so many cuss words?
967
00:44:08,670 --> 00:44:11,100
- [Narrator] A dirty remark
that someone tosses off
968
00:44:11,100 --> 00:44:12,710
with a mock innocent face.
969
00:44:12,710 --> 00:44:15,787
- I see you shiver with anticipation.
970
00:44:19,560 --> 00:44:22,260
- [Narrator] And the world
makes a little bit of sense.
971
00:44:22,260 --> 00:44:23,550
The world doesn't work the way
972
00:44:23,550 --> 00:44:24,760
the schoolbooks said it did,
973
00:44:24,760 --> 00:44:26,560
and we are different from what our parents
974
00:44:26,560 --> 00:44:28,630
and teachers expected us to be.
975
00:44:28,630 --> 00:44:31,950
Movies are our cheap and easy expression.
976
00:44:31,950 --> 00:44:35,010
The sullen art of displaced persons.
977
00:44:35,010 --> 00:44:37,970
Because we feel low we
sink in the boredom,
978
00:44:37,970 --> 00:44:41,300
relax in the irresponsibility
and maybe grin for a minute
979
00:44:41,300 --> 00:44:43,560
when the gunman lines
up three men and kills
980
00:44:43,560 --> 00:44:45,530
them with a single bullet.
981
00:44:45,530 --> 00:44:48,670
Which is no more real to
us than the nursery school
982
00:44:48,670 --> 00:44:50,613
story of the brave little tailor.
983
00:44:52,060 --> 00:44:53,960
- Does anybody ever call you or write
984
00:44:53,960 --> 00:44:55,790
to you and say thank you?
985
00:44:55,790 --> 00:44:57,180
I learn from you, I'm an actor--
986
00:44:57,180 --> 00:44:58,907
- They also say a lot of other things.
987
00:44:58,907 --> 00:44:59,740
- [Interviewer] No, I assume that.
988
00:44:59,740 --> 00:45:02,610
But does anybody ever say I
learned from you Pauline Kael?
989
00:45:02,610 --> 00:45:03,960
- Yes.
990
00:45:03,960 --> 00:45:06,450
I also get a considerable
amount of hate mail.
991
00:45:06,450 --> 00:45:08,360
- [Interviewer] Have you
ever gotten a death threat?
992
00:45:08,360 --> 00:45:11,050
- Yes, people have described exactly
993
00:45:11,050 --> 00:45:12,250
how they're going to cut me up
994
00:45:12,250 --> 00:45:14,810
and what they're going to
do with each part of me.
995
00:45:14,810 --> 00:45:17,020
- There are time when people
will tell me something
996
00:45:17,020 --> 00:45:18,700
that she said to them,
997
00:45:18,700 --> 00:45:20,740
and I think that's impossible.
998
00:45:20,740 --> 00:45:23,320
And then, I realize they
couldn't have made it up
999
00:45:23,320 --> 00:45:26,540
because it is just shocking.
1000
00:45:26,540 --> 00:45:30,910
- Pauline could be very
combative and very provocative.
1001
00:45:30,910 --> 00:45:35,190
And she could be cruel for no reason.
1002
00:45:35,190 --> 00:45:38,430
- There's a kind of, I'm not
quite sure what they call
1003
00:45:38,430 --> 00:45:41,323
themselves, but it's a critics circle.
1004
00:45:42,500 --> 00:45:44,570
- [John] New York Critics Circle invited
1005
00:45:44,570 --> 00:45:47,010
David Lean to come for lunch.
1006
00:45:47,010 --> 00:45:48,548
- They're very good with their tongues.
1007
00:45:48,548 --> 00:45:50,490
And I was there for about two hours
1008
00:45:52,774 --> 00:45:56,191
and Pauline Kael is pretty sharp-tongued.
1009
00:45:59,170 --> 00:46:00,500
- And she just let into him.
1010
00:46:00,500 --> 00:46:01,527
Why did you make this movie?
1011
00:46:01,527 --> 00:46:03,310
And the poor guy thought he'd come
1012
00:46:03,310 --> 00:46:05,260
for a sort of social meeting,
1013
00:46:05,260 --> 00:46:06,730
and it was anything but.
1014
00:46:06,730 --> 00:46:10,740
- She got up and trashed his films.
1015
00:46:10,740 --> 00:46:13,276
And he was shattered by it.
1016
00:46:13,276 --> 00:46:14,976
- And in the end I remember saying
1017
00:46:16,060 --> 00:46:18,480
I don't think you ladies and gentlemen
1018
00:46:18,480 --> 00:46:23,334
will be satisfied until I
do a film in 16 millimeter
1019
00:46:23,334 --> 00:46:25,513
and in black and white.
1020
00:46:26,440 --> 00:46:30,363
And Pauline Kael said that
no you can have color,
1021
00:46:31,364 --> 00:46:32,600
and that's the end of it.
1022
00:46:32,600 --> 00:46:35,300
- She took him apart.
1023
00:46:35,300 --> 00:46:37,980
- It really quite had
an awful affect on me
1024
00:46:39,170 --> 00:46:42,600
and I thought, why on
Earth am I making films?
1025
00:46:42,600 --> 00:46:43,653
I don't have to.
1026
00:46:44,730 --> 00:46:47,800
And I didn't for a bit.
1027
00:46:47,800 --> 00:46:51,183
It shakes one's confidence,
you know, terribly.
1028
00:46:52,810 --> 00:46:54,920
- [Narrator] It's a bad, bad sign when
1029
00:46:54,920 --> 00:46:56,460
a movie director begins to think
1030
00:46:56,460 --> 00:46:58,233
of himself as a myth maker.
1031
00:46:59,100 --> 00:47:00,980
- [Man] It has been said of Pauline that
1032
00:47:00,980 --> 00:47:05,810
she had the greatest bullshit
detector of anyone around.
1033
00:47:05,810 --> 00:47:10,810
- She pointed out this huge
fraudulent aspect to the story
1034
00:47:11,090 --> 00:47:13,670
that you had just glided right by.
1035
00:47:13,670 --> 00:47:15,640
And the thing that made you mad
1036
00:47:15,640 --> 00:47:17,690
is she just kind of
destroyed the movie for you
1037
00:47:17,690 --> 00:47:18,930
because she pointed out something
1038
00:47:18,930 --> 00:47:20,463
that was obviously there.
1039
00:47:23,380 --> 00:47:24,987
- [David] As soon as you thought,
1040
00:47:24,987 --> 00:47:27,440
I know she's gonna like this movie,
1041
00:47:27,440 --> 00:47:30,163
she would just pull the
rug out from under you.
1042
00:47:31,470 --> 00:47:33,930
- [Narrator] And this
limp myth of a grand plan
1043
00:47:33,930 --> 00:47:36,830
that justifies slaughter
and ends with resurrection
1044
00:47:36,830 --> 00:47:38,433
has been around before.
1045
00:47:39,980 --> 00:47:42,820
Kubrick's storyline
accounting for evolution
1046
00:47:42,820 --> 00:47:45,810
by an extra terrestrial
intelligence is probably
1047
00:47:45,810 --> 00:47:49,210
the most gloriously
redundant plot of all time.
1048
00:47:49,210 --> 00:47:51,737
And although his intentions
may have been different,
1049
00:47:51,737 --> 00:47:55,283
"2001" celebrates the end of man.
1050
00:47:56,840 --> 00:47:59,360
- I agreed with her position on "2001".
1051
00:47:59,360 --> 00:48:00,193
It's all subjective.
1052
00:48:00,193 --> 00:48:02,290
And that's the best opinion
you can have about movies
1053
00:48:02,290 --> 00:48:04,267
is that it's subjective.
1054
00:48:04,267 --> 00:48:05,833
- [HAL 9000] My mind is going.
1055
00:48:05,833 --> 00:48:07,240
- A critic should stimulate you to develop
1056
00:48:07,240 --> 00:48:09,590
to develop your own opinion.
1057
00:48:09,590 --> 00:48:13,503
You're not there to be converted
to the critic's viewpoint.
1058
00:48:14,337 --> 00:48:17,520
- [Narrator] "2001" is a
celebration of a cop-out.
1059
00:48:17,520 --> 00:48:19,710
It says man is just a tiny nothing
1060
00:48:19,710 --> 00:48:21,820
on the stairway of paradise.
1061
00:48:21,820 --> 00:48:23,660
There is an intelligence out there
1062
00:48:23,660 --> 00:48:27,460
in space controlling your
destiny from ape to angel.
1063
00:48:27,460 --> 00:48:29,283
So, just follow the slab.
1064
00:48:30,320 --> 00:48:33,860
- For Pauline everything
was a conversation.
1065
00:48:33,860 --> 00:48:37,583
She always wanted to know
first off, what did you think?
1066
00:48:38,450 --> 00:48:39,500
Have you seen?
1067
00:48:39,500 --> 00:48:40,530
Did you hear?
1068
00:48:40,530 --> 00:48:41,600
Did you read?
1069
00:48:41,600 --> 00:48:43,870
Pauline had a reaction to everything
1070
00:48:43,870 --> 00:48:45,799
and she expected other people to have
1071
00:48:45,799 --> 00:48:48,340
a reaction to everything because
1072
00:48:48,340 --> 00:48:51,660
it might make her think of
something she hadn't thought of.
1073
00:48:51,660 --> 00:48:53,790
It might give her an idea.
1074
00:48:53,790 --> 00:48:55,430
It might outrage her because
1075
00:48:55,430 --> 00:48:58,550
it was so obviously wrong-headed.
1076
00:48:58,550 --> 00:49:00,380
It might lead her somewhere else.
1077
00:49:00,380 --> 00:49:03,850
- Even the angry mail is interesting
1078
00:49:03,850 --> 00:49:06,760
because you know you're
touching a nerve in some way.
1079
00:49:06,760 --> 00:49:09,600
For example, on the film
"Mean Streets", which I love,
1080
00:49:09,600 --> 00:49:11,350
which did not do terribly well,
1081
00:49:11,350 --> 00:49:13,860
but the critical response to it helped
1082
00:49:13,860 --> 00:49:16,890
Martin Scorsese get going in his career.
1083
00:49:16,890 --> 00:49:19,270
That film, which I felt was innovative
1084
00:49:19,270 --> 00:49:20,370
and was doing something
1085
00:49:20,370 --> 00:49:22,880
and wrote about with great enthusiasm,
1086
00:49:22,880 --> 00:49:25,430
a number of people were very hostile to.
1087
00:49:25,430 --> 00:49:27,720
And that response tells you something.
1088
00:49:27,720 --> 00:49:29,350
It tells you that there's something
1089
00:49:29,350 --> 00:49:31,103
interesting in that movie.
1090
00:49:31,103 --> 00:49:33,400
(laughing)
1091
00:49:33,400 --> 00:49:35,850
- [Narrator] It's about
American life here and now
1092
00:49:35,850 --> 00:49:37,970
and it doesn't look like an American movie
1093
00:49:37,970 --> 00:49:40,050
or feel like one.
1094
00:49:40,050 --> 00:49:41,740
- Hey, there ain't nothing
wrong with me, my friend.
1095
00:49:41,740 --> 00:49:42,573
I'm feeling fine.
1096
00:49:42,573 --> 00:49:43,840
- [Man] Keep your mouth shut.
1097
00:49:43,840 --> 00:49:45,453
- You tell me that in
front of this asshole.
1098
00:49:45,453 --> 00:49:46,420
- [Man] All right, all right.
1099
00:49:46,420 --> 00:49:47,980
We're not gonna pay.
1100
00:49:47,980 --> 00:49:49,810
- [Narrator] Johnny Boy
flouts all the rules
1101
00:49:49,810 --> 00:49:51,843
he just won't behave.
1102
00:49:51,843 --> 00:49:52,676
- I don't have the guts?
1103
00:49:52,676 --> 00:49:54,261
C'mon, asshole, come over
here, come over here.
1104
00:49:54,261 --> 00:49:56,520
I'll put this up your ass.
1105
00:49:56,520 --> 00:49:59,350
- [Narrator] He's fearless,
gleefully self-destructive,
1106
00:49:59,350 --> 00:50:02,250
cracked, moonstruck but not really crazy.
1107
00:50:02,250 --> 00:50:05,270
When you're growing up, if you
know someone crazy, daring,
1108
00:50:05,270 --> 00:50:08,130
and half admirable, and
maybe most of us do,
1109
00:50:08,130 --> 00:50:10,590
you don't wonder how the
beautiful nut got that way.
1110
00:50:10,590 --> 00:50:11,423
- You dirty, two-faced, fucking fag,
1111
00:50:11,423 --> 00:50:13,590
don't ever hit me again!
1112
00:50:13,590 --> 00:50:15,720
- [Narrator] He seems
to spring up full-blown
1113
00:50:15,720 --> 00:50:18,090
and whirling and you watch the fireworks
1114
00:50:18,090 --> 00:50:20,844
and feel crumbly cautious in your sanity.
1115
00:50:20,844 --> 00:50:23,050
(bomb explodes)
1116
00:50:23,050 --> 00:50:24,210
- [Controller] Hello, Houston,
1117
00:50:24,210 --> 00:50:26,533
the Endeavor is on station with cargo.
1118
00:50:28,990 --> 00:50:33,010
- [Man] As the 70s
evolved, this incredible
1119
00:50:33,010 --> 00:50:35,854
period of moviemaking took off.
1120
00:50:35,854 --> 00:50:37,390
(man yells)
1121
00:50:37,390 --> 00:50:39,250
- [Man] It was a tsunami of films that
1122
00:50:39,250 --> 00:50:40,290
suddenly started coming.
1123
00:50:40,290 --> 00:50:41,900
And films like we had never seen before.
1124
00:50:41,900 --> 00:50:43,430
- His will be done.
1125
00:50:43,430 --> 00:50:47,350
- People whom she felt
had talent that was not
1126
00:50:47,350 --> 00:50:51,140
necessarily fully
appreciated by other critics.
1127
00:50:51,140 --> 00:50:53,200
She would champion them.
1128
00:50:53,200 --> 00:50:55,730
- [Man] Ironically, since
she had written that piece
1129
00:50:55,730 --> 00:50:57,774
against auteurism, one of her greatest
1130
00:50:57,774 --> 00:51:02,774
impacts was in making Sam
Peckinpah, Martin Scorsese,
1131
00:51:03,510 --> 00:51:06,535
Coppola, Brian De Palma into heroes
1132
00:51:06,535 --> 00:51:09,067
of cinema for young people.
1133
00:51:09,067 --> 00:51:11,100
- She wasn't some witness
of the American New Wave.
1134
00:51:11,100 --> 00:51:12,660
She wasn't just some chronicler of it.
1135
00:51:12,660 --> 00:51:14,540
She was riding the New Wave.
1136
00:51:14,540 --> 00:51:15,373
That was her.
1137
00:51:15,373 --> 00:51:16,390
That was her, too.
1138
00:51:16,390 --> 00:51:18,660
- [Man] She could make
people's lives and careers.
1139
00:51:18,660 --> 00:51:21,670
- [Man] That's when she
became the go-to critic.
1140
00:51:21,670 --> 00:51:23,960
- [Man] Opinion is divided
to say the least of it.
1141
00:51:23,960 --> 00:51:25,470
- [Man] The best respected film critic.
1142
00:51:25,470 --> 00:51:28,350
- [Man] America's most formidable
and acerbic film critic.
1143
00:51:28,350 --> 00:51:30,120
- [Man] Her collected
movie criticism reads
1144
00:51:30,120 --> 00:51:32,150
as a history of popular culture.
1145
00:51:32,150 --> 00:51:35,597
After three books, Miss Kael's
fourth, "Deeper Into Movies",
1146
00:51:35,597 --> 00:51:37,860
was a winner of the National Book Award.
1147
00:51:37,860 --> 00:51:40,093
Soon, she'll publish her fifth collection.
1148
00:51:43,570 --> 00:51:47,150
- [Man] I think she was
dazzled by Brian De Palma.
1149
00:51:47,150 --> 00:51:49,800
I think she was in love with the sort of
1150
00:51:49,800 --> 00:51:51,820
sensuousness of his style.
1151
00:51:51,820 --> 00:51:52,930
- [Jaime] I think with De Palma,
1152
00:51:52,930 --> 00:51:55,490
all this color from the
blood and everything,
1153
00:51:55,490 --> 00:51:57,210
was really a turn on for her.
1154
00:51:57,210 --> 00:52:00,103
- [Woman] You know she was
the one who discovered him.
1155
00:52:00,980 --> 00:52:02,870
- [Narrator] The visual
poetry of "The Fury"
1156
00:52:02,870 --> 00:52:05,360
is so strong that its narrative and verbal
1157
00:52:05,360 --> 00:52:07,760
inadequacies do not matter.
1158
00:52:07,760 --> 00:52:09,740
He has such a grip on his technique
1159
00:52:09,740 --> 00:52:11,430
that you get the sense of a director
1160
00:52:11,430 --> 00:52:13,710
who cares about little else.
1161
00:52:13,710 --> 00:52:17,350
The finale is the greatest
finish for any villain ever.
1162
00:52:17,350 --> 00:52:21,730
One can imagine Welles,
Peckinpah, Scorsese, and Spielberg
1163
00:52:21,730 --> 00:52:25,423
still stunned bowing to the
ground choking with laughter.
1164
00:52:26,962 --> 00:52:28,077
(laughing)
1165
00:52:28,077 --> 00:52:28,910
(beeping)
1166
00:52:28,910 --> 00:52:31,160
(laughing)
1167
00:52:33,576 --> 00:52:36,723
- This is nuts.
1168
00:52:41,700 --> 00:52:44,000
- She drew a lot of
readers to The New Yorker.
1169
00:52:45,363 --> 00:52:46,832
- No, no!
1170
00:52:46,832 --> 00:52:50,207
(car explodes)
1171
00:52:50,207 --> 00:52:53,860
- But if she had a film
that she really cared about,
1172
00:52:53,860 --> 00:52:55,958
like "The Godfather" films then
1173
00:52:55,958 --> 00:52:59,960
she couldn't wait to write.
1174
00:52:59,960 --> 00:53:01,520
- Let me say that I swear
1175
00:53:03,930 --> 00:53:05,713
on the souls of my grandchildren.
1176
00:53:07,730 --> 00:53:09,750
- [Narrator] The role of
Don Vito allows Brando
1177
00:53:09,750 --> 00:53:11,980
to release more of the gentleness that was
1178
00:53:11,980 --> 00:53:15,520
so seductive and unsettling
in his braggart roles.
1179
00:53:15,520 --> 00:53:18,090
The rasp in his voice is
particularly effective
1180
00:53:18,090 --> 00:53:20,420
after Don Vito has been wounded.
1181
00:53:20,420 --> 00:53:22,620
One almost feels that
the bullets cracked it
1182
00:53:22,620 --> 00:53:25,380
and wishes it hadn't been cracked before.
1183
00:53:25,380 --> 00:53:28,220
His Don is a primitive, sacred monster
1184
00:53:28,220 --> 00:53:30,560
and the more powerful because he suggests
1185
00:53:30,560 --> 00:53:34,710
not the strapping sacred monsters
of movies but actual ones.
1186
00:53:34,710 --> 00:53:37,250
Those old men who carry
never-ending grudges
1187
00:53:37,250 --> 00:53:40,290
and ancient hatreds inside a frail frame.
1188
00:53:40,290 --> 00:53:42,770
Those monsters who remember minute details
1189
00:53:42,770 --> 00:53:44,260
of old business deals when they
1190
00:53:44,260 --> 00:53:46,493
can no longer tie their shoelaces.
1191
00:53:49,550 --> 00:53:51,910
Don Vito's son, Michael, the young king
1192
00:53:51,910 --> 00:53:53,870
rots before our eyes,
1193
00:53:53,870 --> 00:53:56,260
and there is something
about actually seeing
1194
00:53:56,260 --> 00:53:58,820
the generations of a
family in counterpoint
1195
00:53:58,820 --> 00:54:01,690
that is emotionally overpowering.
1196
00:54:01,690 --> 00:54:04,450
It's as if the movie
satisfied an impossible
1197
00:54:04,450 --> 00:54:07,510
but basic human desire
to see what our parents
1198
00:54:07,510 --> 00:54:09,260
were like before we were born
1199
00:54:09,260 --> 00:54:12,483
and to see what they did
that affected what we became.
1200
00:54:14,200 --> 00:54:16,920
The whole picture is
infused with such a complex
1201
00:54:16,920 --> 00:54:19,830
sense of the intermingling
of good and evil
1202
00:54:19,830 --> 00:54:22,080
and of the inability to foresee the effect
1203
00:54:22,080 --> 00:54:23,833
of our love upon our children.
1204
00:54:26,400 --> 00:54:28,750
- She seemed to notice everything.
1205
00:54:28,750 --> 00:54:31,350
- Going to movies for Pauline
was a very social thing.
1206
00:54:31,350 --> 00:54:32,910
- [Man] She made so many noises.
1207
00:54:32,910 --> 00:54:34,430
They almost asked her to leave.
1208
00:54:34,430 --> 00:54:36,570
- She was sighing very audibly.
1209
00:54:36,570 --> 00:54:38,920
- Really just sitting there
and kept this little pencil
1210
00:54:38,920 --> 00:54:39,753
and paper and writing.
1211
00:54:39,753 --> 00:54:41,390
You hear little notes all the time.
1212
00:54:41,390 --> 00:54:44,440
- We could feel her rolling her eyes.
1213
00:54:44,440 --> 00:54:46,310
- [Woman] She would kind of
sometimes (clears her throat).
1214
00:54:46,310 --> 00:54:49,270
- The most intimidating
part was afterwards
1215
00:54:49,270 --> 00:54:51,630
when she asked you what
you thought about it.
1216
00:54:51,630 --> 00:54:54,420
- That was one of the
reasons that she tended
1217
00:54:54,420 --> 00:54:55,873
to get her own screenings.
1218
00:54:55,873 --> 00:54:57,260
(chuckles)
1219
00:54:57,260 --> 00:54:59,334
- They didn't like the movies she liked.
1220
00:54:59,334 --> 00:55:00,167
You could not be good friends.
1221
00:55:00,167 --> 00:55:02,070
- She had fantastic recall.
1222
00:55:02,070 --> 00:55:06,850
She could remember scenes
going back 50-60 years.
1223
00:55:06,850 --> 00:55:09,930
They would just anchor
themselves in her mind.
1224
00:55:09,930 --> 00:55:11,910
I remember when I showed her the recut
1225
00:55:11,910 --> 00:55:13,120
of a "Touch of Evil".
1226
00:55:13,120 --> 00:55:15,840
She knew exactly where it had been altered
1227
00:55:15,840 --> 00:55:18,490
and she hadn't seen the movie in 30 years.
1228
00:55:18,490 --> 00:55:21,760
- Her daughter Gina would
type what she had written up
1229
00:55:21,760 --> 00:55:24,180
then Pauline would go through it again
1230
00:55:24,180 --> 00:55:26,450
and make penciled corrections,
1231
00:55:26,450 --> 00:55:27,940
and then Gina would retype.
1232
00:55:27,940 --> 00:55:32,690
- My mother always wrote
in longhand her whole life.
1233
00:55:32,690 --> 00:55:34,290
She never learned to type
1234
00:55:34,290 --> 00:55:38,540
and she was having such
trouble rounding up typists.
1235
00:55:38,540 --> 00:55:41,830
I decided I would just learn
to type because I was there
1236
00:55:41,830 --> 00:55:44,420
and it seemed like
something that needed doing.
1237
00:55:44,420 --> 00:55:47,130
I didn't realize it then I would end up
1238
00:55:47,130 --> 00:55:49,693
continuing to do that
for many, many years.
1239
00:55:50,860 --> 00:55:54,910
I knew the way her mind worked so well.
1240
00:55:54,910 --> 00:55:59,170
I could tell if she hadn't quite
said what she meant to say.
1241
00:55:59,170 --> 00:56:00,220
- [George] She wouldn't rewrite.
1242
00:56:00,220 --> 00:56:01,743
She would press for clarity.
1243
00:56:02,650 --> 00:56:05,130
- [Lili] The Current Cinema
column was not Pauline's alone,
1244
00:56:05,130 --> 00:56:05,963
not initially.
1245
00:56:05,963 --> 00:56:08,570
She shared it with Penelope Gilliatt.
1246
00:56:08,570 --> 00:56:10,550
Six months on, six months off.
1247
00:56:10,550 --> 00:56:13,225
The New Yorker was not
paying her a living wage
1248
00:56:13,225 --> 00:56:16,000
so she had to supplement her income.
1249
00:56:16,000 --> 00:56:19,470
Lectures, speaking
engagements, and other essays
1250
00:56:19,470 --> 00:56:21,310
including "Raising Kane".
1251
00:56:21,310 --> 00:56:24,380
Which I think was her
finest piece of writing.
1252
00:56:24,380 --> 00:56:25,310
- [David] She loved the film
1253
00:56:25,310 --> 00:56:30,100
and I don't think she
intended to rile people
1254
00:56:30,100 --> 00:56:31,850
the way that people were riled.
1255
00:56:31,850 --> 00:56:34,560
- [Announcer] Raising
Kane, a two-part article
1256
00:56:34,560 --> 00:56:37,250
about Orson Welles and
the writing and filming
1257
00:56:37,250 --> 00:56:40,700
of "Citizen Kane" by Pauline Kael.
1258
00:56:40,700 --> 00:56:43,110
Appearing now in The New Yorker,
1259
00:56:43,110 --> 00:56:45,053
yes The New Yorker.
1260
00:56:55,120 --> 00:57:00,120
- I thought it was a very,
very cruel, mean-spirited
1261
00:57:03,990 --> 00:57:07,604
and essentially destructive job.
1262
00:57:07,604 --> 00:57:10,940
I think the thing was a perfectly clear
1263
00:57:10,940 --> 00:57:12,950
attempt to assassinate Orson.
1264
00:57:12,950 --> 00:57:13,920
- He can't do this to me.
1265
00:57:13,920 --> 00:57:18,680
- The piece I wrote "Raising
Kane" was the introduction
1266
00:57:18,680 --> 00:57:21,080
to the publication of the script
1267
00:57:21,080 --> 00:57:25,030
and so, naturally, I wanted
know who had written the script,
1268
00:57:25,030 --> 00:57:28,150
and going back over it it became clear
1269
00:57:28,150 --> 00:57:31,263
that Mankiewicz was the
important force in the writing.
1270
00:57:43,190 --> 00:57:44,840
- [Narrator] Mankiewicz's
script, in large part,
1271
00:57:44,840 --> 00:57:48,190
was an adaptation of the
material of Hearst's life.
1272
00:57:48,190 --> 00:57:50,520
His life was so full of
knavery and perversity
1273
00:57:50,520 --> 00:57:53,430
that Mankiewicz simply
sorted out the plums.
1274
00:57:53,430 --> 00:57:55,910
Mankiewicz had been a
reporter on the Pulitzer paper
1275
00:57:55,910 --> 00:57:58,160
where Hearts, himself,
had worked for a time.
1276
00:57:59,080 --> 00:58:01,260
- Almost like short story writing,
1277
00:58:01,260 --> 00:58:03,927
inserting Herman Mankiewicz into this
1278
00:58:03,927 --> 00:58:05,593
almost character out of a novel.
1279
00:58:06,750 --> 00:58:09,330
- [Paul] You know, her
argument was against the grain
1280
00:58:09,330 --> 00:58:11,270
of what everybody was saying.
1281
00:58:11,270 --> 00:58:13,260
- In critical history
it was a turning point
1282
00:58:13,260 --> 00:58:16,110
for Welles being discussed again.
1283
00:58:16,110 --> 00:58:18,970
- I really think I did justice to Welles
1284
00:58:18,970 --> 00:58:22,090
who I have enormous
respect for as a director
1285
00:58:22,090 --> 00:58:23,060
and as a actor.
1286
00:58:23,060 --> 00:58:24,870
And I love the movie and I love his work.
1287
00:58:24,870 --> 00:58:26,330
I love his other movies.
1288
00:58:26,330 --> 00:58:29,080
But here's this great historical figure
1289
00:58:29,080 --> 00:58:31,903
who had been lost sight
of who wrote the script.
1290
00:58:37,160 --> 00:58:40,330
- [Interviewer] Why have North
Americans become so violent
1291
00:58:40,330 --> 00:58:43,400
in their reactions to
"Last Tango in Paris"?
1292
00:58:43,400 --> 00:58:46,410
- [Pauline] The film was
compared to hardcore pornography.
1293
00:58:46,410 --> 00:58:48,400
Which I don't think was true in any sense.
1294
00:58:48,400 --> 00:58:51,800
- No male critic has as much
testosterone as Pauline.
1295
00:58:51,800 --> 00:58:55,130
So, this is what I think
was sort of always shocking
1296
00:58:55,130 --> 00:58:59,170
and kind of sexy about her writing that
1297
00:58:59,170 --> 00:59:01,770
nobody else could get away
with writing that way.
1298
00:59:01,770 --> 00:59:03,950
I was in awe of it.
1299
00:59:03,950 --> 00:59:05,660
- She often used the sexual metaphor
1300
00:59:05,660 --> 00:59:07,030
in the titles of her books.
1301
00:59:07,030 --> 00:59:09,830
But I had the feeling like
she could be having sex
1302
00:59:09,830 --> 00:59:12,160
with the movie, as it
were, and enjoying it
1303
00:59:12,160 --> 00:59:13,880
and at the same time sort of providing
1304
00:59:13,880 --> 00:59:16,267
a running commentary on
it like, "Oh, that's good,
1305
00:59:16,267 --> 00:59:18,070
"that is really good."
1306
00:59:18,070 --> 00:59:19,710
- [Dick] Who else is good in the--?
1307
00:59:19,710 --> 00:59:21,190
- Pauline Kael.
1308
00:59:21,190 --> 00:59:22,023
- [Dick] Yeah.
1309
00:59:22,023 --> 00:59:24,350
- She's never said a
good thing about me yet.
1310
00:59:24,350 --> 00:59:25,767
That dirty old broad.
1311
00:59:25,767 --> 00:59:28,620
(audience laughing)
1312
00:59:28,620 --> 00:59:32,570
But she's probably the most
qualified critic in the world
1313
00:59:32,570 --> 00:59:34,110
'cause she cares about film
1314
00:59:34,110 --> 00:59:35,810
and those that are involved in it.
1315
00:59:37,510 --> 00:59:40,273
- Last Tango was surely
gonna be provocative.
1316
00:59:41,110 --> 00:59:42,669
It's a movie like "Breathless",
1317
00:59:42,669 --> 00:59:45,427
the film is still wet.
1318
00:59:45,427 --> 00:59:49,360
It's still fresh out of the camera.
1319
00:59:49,360 --> 00:59:53,170
- I saw the movie and obviously
it was pretty exciting.
1320
00:59:53,170 --> 00:59:56,560
Went to the head of the
New York Film Festival
1321
00:59:56,560 --> 00:59:58,770
and I said I will give
you "Last Tango in Paris",
1322
00:59:58,770 --> 01:00:02,320
Bernard's movie, which
will probably be X-rated,
1323
01:00:02,320 --> 01:00:05,689
to open the New York Film
Festival on one condition.
1324
01:00:05,689 --> 01:00:06,522
He said, "What's that?"
1325
01:00:06,522 --> 01:00:09,222
And I said, nobody will
screen this picture
1326
01:00:09,222 --> 01:00:12,003
and see it before opening night.
1327
01:00:13,740 --> 01:00:16,390
- [Narrator] Bernardo
Bertolucci's "Last Tango in Paris"
1328
01:00:16,390 --> 01:00:18,180
was presented on the closing night
1329
01:00:18,180 --> 01:00:23,180
of the New York Film
Festival, October 14, 1972.
1330
01:00:23,330 --> 01:00:24,780
- Pauline had bought a ticket
1331
01:00:25,630 --> 01:00:28,250
because they didn't give
out tickets to critics.
1332
01:00:28,250 --> 01:00:29,940
She bought a ticket and
she was in the audience.
1333
01:00:29,940 --> 01:00:31,553
We had no idea she was there.
1334
01:00:32,410 --> 01:00:34,270
- [Narrator] That date
should be become a landmark
1335
01:00:34,270 --> 01:00:38,740
in movie history
comparable to May 29, 1913
1336
01:00:38,740 --> 01:00:40,370
the night "The Rite of Spring"
1337
01:00:40,370 --> 01:00:43,170
was performed in music history.
1338
01:00:43,170 --> 01:00:45,450
There was no riot and
no one threw anything
1339
01:00:45,450 --> 01:00:47,570
at the screen but I think it's fair to say
1340
01:00:47,570 --> 01:00:50,510
that the audience was in a state of shock.
1341
01:00:50,510 --> 01:00:52,391
Because "Last Tango in Paris" has the same
1342
01:00:52,391 --> 01:00:55,990
kind of hypnotic excitement as The Rite.
1343
01:00:55,990 --> 01:00:59,350
The same primitive force
and the same thrusting,
1344
01:00:59,350 --> 01:01:00,824
jabbing eroticism.
1345
01:01:00,824 --> 01:01:04,530
- Her review became the
campaign for the movie.
1346
01:01:04,530 --> 01:01:06,290
Double truck, two pages.
1347
01:01:06,290 --> 01:01:08,900
Spread across the Sunday New York Times.
1348
01:01:08,900 --> 01:01:11,833
They were lined up from the
morning of the first day.
1349
01:01:16,010 --> 01:01:16,843
- I don't know.
1350
01:01:16,843 --> 01:01:18,230
Don't open it.
1351
01:01:18,230 --> 01:01:21,424
- I don't understand why she
went to the mat for that film.
1352
01:01:21,424 --> 01:01:24,910
To this day, that movie
was horrible, okay?
1353
01:01:24,910 --> 01:01:27,700
I thought it was so artificial, forced,
1354
01:01:27,700 --> 01:01:31,530
calculated, ugly, unerotic.
1355
01:01:31,530 --> 01:01:33,780
- I was recently on a big talk show
1356
01:01:33,780 --> 01:01:37,260
and the host told me on the air
1357
01:01:37,260 --> 01:01:39,690
how appalled he was by my review
1358
01:01:39,690 --> 01:01:42,110
and how it was a very poor movie,
1359
01:01:42,110 --> 01:01:43,710
and how could I say those things.
1360
01:01:43,710 --> 01:01:45,870
And in the commercial break the producer
1361
01:01:45,870 --> 01:01:47,357
came over to me and whispered,
1362
01:01:47,357 --> 01:01:48,267
"He loved the movie.
1363
01:01:48,267 --> 01:01:50,690
"He's just afraid to say so."
1364
01:01:50,690 --> 01:01:53,893
- She was influential to other critics,
1365
01:01:54,820 --> 01:01:57,870
and I think her ideas were
picked up by other critics.
1366
01:01:57,870 --> 01:02:01,230
And of course, you know the
Paulettes, as they were called,
1367
01:02:01,230 --> 01:02:03,930
the critics who followed her slavishly.
1368
01:02:03,930 --> 01:02:06,003
- She got me into UCLA in the fall of '68,
1369
01:02:07,268 --> 01:02:09,461
and then, she got me a job at the
1370
01:02:09,461 --> 01:02:11,300
L.A. Free Press as a critic
1371
01:02:11,300 --> 01:02:13,890
because she was collecting a group
1372
01:02:13,890 --> 01:02:15,820
of young critics at that time.
1373
01:02:15,820 --> 01:02:17,410
- She wanted to expand her influence
1374
01:02:17,410 --> 01:02:20,910
and she got to know editors
at all the different papers
1375
01:02:20,910 --> 01:02:23,579
so if Paul Schrader, or
Roger Ebert, or somebody
1376
01:02:23,579 --> 01:02:27,520
was up for a job she would
try to get them in a place
1377
01:02:27,520 --> 01:02:28,820
where she could then get in touch with,
1378
01:02:28,820 --> 01:02:30,880
or hey we got get behind this movie.
1379
01:02:30,880 --> 01:02:33,940
- Whenever a particular film came along,
1380
01:02:33,940 --> 01:02:36,950
that she felt we should
get behind, she would call.
1381
01:02:36,950 --> 01:02:38,930
You say, "La Chinoise".
1382
01:02:38,930 --> 01:02:40,710
Great film, we gotta get behind it.
1383
01:02:40,710 --> 01:02:41,880
Even if you were on the fence,
1384
01:02:41,880 --> 01:02:43,740
you owed it to her to get behind it.
1385
01:02:43,740 --> 01:02:46,120
Maybe you could disagree once or twice,
1386
01:02:46,120 --> 01:02:48,130
but if you disagreed all the time,
1387
01:02:48,130 --> 01:02:49,710
those calls would stop coming.
1388
01:02:49,710 --> 01:02:52,577
There was like a first
generation of Paulettes
1389
01:02:52,577 --> 01:02:54,170
and a second, and a third.
1390
01:02:54,170 --> 01:02:56,900
- My attitude from the beginning was
1391
01:02:56,900 --> 01:02:58,660
well I'd rather be called a Paulette
1392
01:02:58,660 --> 01:03:01,470
than an Andrew Sarris-ite.
1393
01:03:01,470 --> 01:03:03,890
- I reject that term violently.
1394
01:03:03,890 --> 01:03:07,170
I am not a Paulette, I'm a Paulinista.
1395
01:03:07,170 --> 01:03:10,880
Meaning that I have
learned from her approach
1396
01:03:10,880 --> 01:03:13,680
and attempt to apply it in my own work.
1397
01:03:13,680 --> 01:03:15,040
- And movie opinions at the time,
1398
01:03:15,040 --> 01:03:17,440
you have to understand,
these were the late 60s,
1399
01:03:17,440 --> 01:03:19,220
early 70s they were very important,
1400
01:03:19,220 --> 01:03:23,380
and there was a huge change
in the industry coming,
1401
01:03:23,380 --> 01:03:25,960
and she was sort of presiding over it.
1402
01:03:25,960 --> 01:03:27,220
- If you did agree on a film,
1403
01:03:27,220 --> 01:03:28,900
the support was somewhat undercut because
1404
01:03:28,900 --> 01:03:31,280
it was seen as being all Pauline
1405
01:03:31,280 --> 01:03:32,660
and not these individual people.
1406
01:03:32,660 --> 01:03:37,360
And I thought that was
unfortunate and destructive thing.
1407
01:03:37,360 --> 01:03:38,870
- I was at the Village Voice
1408
01:03:38,870 --> 01:03:41,280
and she invited me to visit
her at The New Yorker.
1409
01:03:41,280 --> 01:03:43,190
Now that was very problematic
1410
01:03:43,190 --> 01:03:46,040
because at the Village Voice I was writing
1411
01:03:46,040 --> 01:03:47,610
alongside Andrew Sariss who
1412
01:03:47,610 --> 01:03:49,950
had this long-standing antipathy.
1413
01:03:49,950 --> 01:03:52,970
And in fact, I had several
colleagues phone me
1414
01:03:52,970 --> 01:03:55,923
and say you really wanna
keep your distance.
1415
01:03:57,275 --> 01:03:59,120
A, she'll eat you alive
1416
01:03:59,120 --> 01:04:00,880
and B, you don't wanna be
1417
01:04:00,880 --> 01:04:04,360
branded as one of her circle,
1418
01:04:04,360 --> 01:04:06,850
getting opinions from her from on high.
1419
01:04:06,850 --> 01:04:10,270
And I thought about it and I thought,
1420
01:04:10,270 --> 01:04:12,282
fuck it's Pauline Kael.
1421
01:04:12,282 --> 01:04:14,420
I'd love to hang out with her.
1422
01:04:14,420 --> 01:04:16,530
- She's on everybody's radar
1423
01:04:16,530 --> 01:04:20,450
because when she would pick
somebody like Robert Altman,
1424
01:04:20,450 --> 01:04:23,490
those people whom she felt had talent that
1425
01:04:23,490 --> 01:04:27,700
was not necessarily fully
appreciated by other critics,
1426
01:04:27,700 --> 01:04:28,533
she would champion them.
1427
01:04:28,533 --> 01:04:30,210
- What did you come here for?
1428
01:04:30,210 --> 01:04:32,010
- Well, I heard you had
the fanciest whorehouse
1429
01:04:32,010 --> 01:04:34,060
in the whole territory up here.
1430
01:04:34,060 --> 01:04:37,530
Gee, it's been so long since
I've had a piece of ass.
1431
01:04:37,530 --> 01:04:39,830
- The studios aren't so short of money
1432
01:04:39,830 --> 01:04:41,840
that they're throwing
pictures into theaters
1433
01:04:41,840 --> 01:04:44,680
now without enough advance publicity
1434
01:04:44,680 --> 01:04:48,670
and one picture that
got thrown in this way
1435
01:04:48,670 --> 01:04:52,490
about 10 days ago was a film
called, "McCabe & Mrs. Miller"
1436
01:04:52,490 --> 01:04:54,750
that I think is a beautiful film
1437
01:04:54,750 --> 01:04:57,140
and I don't think the good reviews will
1438
01:04:57,140 --> 01:04:59,740
have time to catch up with it.
1439
01:04:59,740 --> 01:05:01,840
- You're the best looking woman I ever saw
1440
01:05:03,690 --> 01:05:05,596
and I ain't never tried to do nothing
1441
01:05:05,596 --> 01:05:08,013
but put a smile on your face.
1442
01:05:10,150 --> 01:05:13,240
- You have to feel your way
into it and it takes a while,
1443
01:05:13,240 --> 01:05:14,650
but if you go with it,
1444
01:05:14,650 --> 01:05:17,410
I think the rewards are much richer.
1445
01:05:17,410 --> 01:05:21,370
Right now, it may die because
of such strange things
1446
01:05:21,370 --> 01:05:23,650
as an attack by Rona Barrett
1447
01:05:23,650 --> 01:05:25,470
and an attack by Rex Reed.
1448
01:05:25,470 --> 01:05:28,070
Gossip columnists
attacked it for obscenity.
1449
01:05:28,070 --> 01:05:30,630
People whose own livelihood is based
1450
01:05:30,630 --> 01:05:33,370
on prying into other people's affairs
1451
01:05:33,370 --> 01:05:38,370
are the first to defend American morality.
1452
01:05:39,570 --> 01:05:41,630
And I think in this
case, Robert Altman has
1453
01:05:41,630 --> 01:05:43,560
done something really innovative,
1454
01:05:43,560 --> 01:05:46,700
and I think it's the fact
that his approach is different
1455
01:05:46,700 --> 01:05:48,613
that is throwing the press off.
1456
01:05:49,560 --> 01:05:52,230
Pictures like "Nashville",
"The Long Goodbye",
1457
01:05:52,230 --> 01:05:54,160
and "McCabe & Mrs. Miller",
1458
01:05:54,160 --> 01:05:56,710
nobody has ever made movies like those
1459
01:05:56,710 --> 01:05:59,350
with that kind of
technique and perception,
1460
01:05:59,350 --> 01:06:01,910
and with that deep affection
for people in them.
1461
01:06:06,990 --> 01:06:08,240
- [Narrator] I have never seen a movie
1462
01:06:08,240 --> 01:06:10,120
I loved in quite this way.
1463
01:06:10,120 --> 01:06:13,660
I sat there smiling at the
screen in complete happiness.
1464
01:06:13,660 --> 01:06:15,870
We float while watching because Altman
1465
01:06:15,870 --> 01:06:17,603
never lets us see the sweat.
1466
01:06:19,190 --> 01:06:21,340
He can put unhappy
characters on the screen
1467
01:06:21,340 --> 01:06:23,810
and you don't wish you
didn't have to watch them.
1468
01:06:23,810 --> 01:06:26,573
You accept the unhappiness
as a piece of the day.
1469
01:06:28,890 --> 01:06:30,950
For the viewer, "Nashville" is a constant
1470
01:06:30,950 --> 01:06:33,223
discovery of overlapping connections.
1471
01:06:34,180 --> 01:06:37,523
The picture says this is what
America is and I'm part of it.
1472
01:06:40,420 --> 01:06:42,817
- You'd make a fine
governor in this state.
1473
01:06:42,817 --> 01:06:44,220
- [Narrator] "Nashville" arrives at a time
1474
01:06:44,220 --> 01:06:46,470
when America is congratulating itself for
1475
01:06:46,470 --> 01:06:48,270
having got rid of the bad guys who were
1476
01:06:48,270 --> 01:06:50,950
pulling the wool over people's eyes.
1477
01:06:50,950 --> 01:06:53,740
The movie says that it
isn't only the politicians
1478
01:06:53,740 --> 01:06:55,120
who live the big lie.
1479
01:06:55,120 --> 01:06:58,583
The big lie is something we're
all capable of trying for.
1480
01:06:59,420 --> 01:07:01,320
- [Robert] Very few people had as much
1481
01:07:02,671 --> 01:07:05,050
influence in my life as Pauline had.
1482
01:07:05,050 --> 01:07:06,750
Whether she took a shot at me,
1483
01:07:06,750 --> 01:07:09,811
or whether she praised
me, really was incidental.
1484
01:07:09,811 --> 01:07:11,260
(gun fires)
1485
01:07:11,260 --> 01:07:14,362
(crowd screaming)
1486
01:07:14,362 --> 01:07:16,435
(screaming)
1487
01:07:16,435 --> 01:07:18,890
(screaming)
1488
01:07:18,890 --> 01:07:22,150
- Horror films have
reached this kind of rut.
1489
01:07:22,150 --> 01:07:23,570
I don't enjoy them anymore.
1490
01:07:23,570 --> 01:07:25,320
Partly that's because
eight years of living
1491
01:07:25,320 --> 01:07:29,540
in New York makes you so
fearful and nervous anyway
1492
01:07:29,540 --> 01:07:32,560
that horror films just really
scare the hell out of me.
1493
01:07:32,560 --> 01:07:34,394
I can't stand them anymore.
1494
01:07:34,394 --> 01:07:37,561
(banging on the door)
1495
01:07:42,750 --> 01:07:44,410
I mean, I don't want anything to add
1496
01:07:44,410 --> 01:07:46,450
to the nightmare atmosphere of New York
1497
01:07:46,450 --> 01:07:48,610
where you're afraid you're
not gonna make it home safe
1498
01:07:48,610 --> 01:07:50,810
anyway, particularly a middle-aged, dumpy,
1499
01:07:50,810 --> 01:07:54,704
little woman who's just perfect
for somebody to knock over.
1500
01:07:54,704 --> 01:07:56,240
I haven't taken to sneakers yet.
1501
01:07:56,240 --> 01:07:57,702
- [Interviewer] Oh, you're so vain.
1502
01:07:57,702 --> 01:07:58,710
(laughing)
1503
01:07:58,710 --> 01:08:00,500
- [Gina] In New York
there's this oppressiveness.
1504
01:08:00,500 --> 01:08:02,310
This kind of claustrophobia.
1505
01:08:02,310 --> 01:08:04,530
Just always feeling
surrounded by buildings.
1506
01:08:04,530 --> 01:08:08,210
But I think we both had
some urges to get out.
1507
01:08:08,210 --> 01:08:10,970
- She bought her wonderful, huge house
1508
01:08:10,970 --> 01:08:13,560
in Great Barrington for not very much.
1509
01:08:13,560 --> 01:08:17,430
She and Gina spent a long
time refurbishing it.
1510
01:08:17,430 --> 01:08:19,870
She would come down to New York for a week
1511
01:08:19,870 --> 01:08:22,900
and then she would go back to
Great Barrington for a week.
1512
01:08:22,900 --> 01:08:25,430
- [Narrator] I'm naturally
gregarious as all hell.
1513
01:08:25,430 --> 01:08:27,370
Living in the country calms me down.
1514
01:08:27,370 --> 01:08:28,930
In the country I can have a house
1515
01:08:28,930 --> 01:08:30,140
and spread papers out,
1516
01:08:30,140 --> 01:08:31,700
I don't have to clear the work away
1517
01:08:31,700 --> 01:08:33,673
in order to set the table for dinner.
1518
01:08:34,600 --> 01:08:37,733
Everything seems simple when
you get outside New York City.
1519
01:08:39,165 --> 01:08:40,294
(loud knocking)
1520
01:08:40,294 --> 01:08:41,127
- [Girl] Mother!
1521
01:08:41,127 --> 01:08:41,960
Mother!
1522
01:08:44,770 --> 01:08:46,890
- [Narrator] For many
years, some of us alarmists
1523
01:08:46,890 --> 01:08:48,640
have been saying things like
1524
01:08:48,640 --> 01:08:51,810
suppose people get used to
constant visceral excitement
1525
01:08:51,810 --> 01:08:54,570
will they still respond
to the work of artists?
1526
01:08:54,570 --> 01:08:56,270
How can people who have been pummeled
1527
01:08:56,270 --> 01:08:59,943
and deafened be expected to
respond to a quiet picture?
1528
01:09:00,950 --> 01:09:03,240
Hits like "The Exorcist"
give most of the audience
1529
01:09:03,240 --> 01:09:04,960
just what it wants and expects.
1530
01:09:04,960 --> 01:09:07,300
The way hardcore porn does.
1531
01:09:07,300 --> 01:09:11,030
The hits have something
in common blatancy.
1532
01:09:11,030 --> 01:09:13,260
They are films that deliver.
1533
01:09:13,260 --> 01:09:15,842
- I think Pauline Kael, for
example, needs an enema.
1534
01:09:15,842 --> 01:09:18,187
(audience laughing)
1535
01:09:18,187 --> 01:09:20,658
- I did not read her review, did she--
1536
01:09:20,658 --> 01:09:24,210
- Her review is, her
reviews always are so full
1537
01:09:24,210 --> 01:09:28,890
of personal poison attacks
upon the makers of films.
1538
01:09:28,890 --> 01:09:30,030
What do you say about a woman
1539
01:09:30,030 --> 01:09:33,720
who thinks that "Psycho"
was a playful film.
1540
01:09:33,720 --> 01:09:38,060
I mean, this is a serious study
for psychiatrists, I think.
1541
01:09:38,060 --> 01:09:40,660
- [Interviewer] Do men in
film take your criticism
1542
01:09:40,660 --> 01:09:43,549
as though it had been
aimed at crouch level?
1543
01:09:43,549 --> 01:09:44,830
- Sometimes they do.
1544
01:09:44,830 --> 01:09:48,020
I think Mailer did on
my review of his book.
1545
01:09:48,020 --> 01:09:50,450
He reacted as if I were some sort of cat
1546
01:09:50,450 --> 01:09:52,550
waiting to scratch him.
1547
01:09:52,550 --> 01:09:55,110
- Pauline Kael said it
was a rip-off with genius.
1548
01:09:55,110 --> 01:09:56,423
Which I considered about as attractive as
1549
01:09:56,423 --> 01:09:59,260
most of the things that Pauline says
1550
01:09:59,260 --> 01:10:02,053
but I couldn't take true
offense 'cause after all
1551
01:10:02,053 --> 01:10:03,531
I had once called her Lady Vinegar.
1552
01:10:03,531 --> 01:10:04,986
(audience laughing)
1553
01:10:04,986 --> 01:10:07,410
And I also did call her the first
1554
01:10:07,410 --> 01:10:09,590
frigid of the film critics.
1555
01:10:09,590 --> 01:10:10,423
- [Dick] That's right.
1556
01:10:10,423 --> 01:10:12,010
Aren't you ashamed of the way you talk?
1557
01:10:12,010 --> 01:10:14,240
- No, 'cause I knew she
was gonna call me a bum,
1558
01:10:14,240 --> 01:10:16,640
and arrogant, and
cold-blooded, and a liar.
1559
01:10:16,640 --> 01:10:18,365
- You couldn't have
known that ahead of time.
1560
01:10:18,365 --> 01:10:19,198
- [Norman] Of course, I would.
1561
01:10:19,198 --> 01:10:21,470
- How, do you have clairvoyance?
1562
01:10:21,470 --> 01:10:23,243
- Well, I know Pauline.
1563
01:10:24,834 --> 01:10:27,470
- And I don't go to the publicity shebangs
1564
01:10:27,470 --> 01:10:29,040
where stars will be
1565
01:10:29,040 --> 01:10:31,710
so the people I do meet are the ones
1566
01:10:31,710 --> 01:10:35,384
who call me after my reviews
are out and want to talk.
1567
01:10:35,384 --> 01:10:38,196
I mean, actors, directors, writers.
1568
01:10:38,196 --> 01:10:41,113
(soft piano music)
1569
01:10:46,130 --> 01:10:48,040
- [Steven] 1,000 reviews later you are
1570
01:10:48,040 --> 01:10:50,337
the only writer who understood "Jaws".
1571
01:10:54,550 --> 01:10:56,790
- [Jessica] Perhaps you can
understand how anxiously
1572
01:10:56,790 --> 01:10:58,830
I awaited your review of "King Kong".
1573
01:10:58,830 --> 01:11:01,930
I will always treasure your kind words.
1574
01:11:01,930 --> 01:11:03,740
- [Carol] I just want you to know your
1575
01:11:03,740 --> 01:11:05,430
review was on the nose.
1576
01:11:05,430 --> 01:11:07,850
I'm grateful for your support.
1577
01:11:07,850 --> 01:11:09,650
- [George Roy Hill] Listen
you miserable bitch.
1578
01:11:09,650 --> 01:11:11,510
You didn't like the sound say so
1579
01:11:11,510 --> 01:11:13,170
but cut out that bullshit about how you
1580
01:11:13,170 --> 01:11:15,693
know where it was done
and where it was made.
1581
01:11:16,910 --> 01:11:19,310
- [Gregory] You may well
have cost me good roles
1582
01:11:19,310 --> 01:11:22,320
during the productive years of my career.
1583
01:11:22,320 --> 01:11:24,420
I suppose one day we shall meet.
1584
01:11:24,420 --> 01:11:27,150
We may have a civil exchange, or not.
1585
01:11:27,150 --> 01:11:29,453
I will make that determination.
1586
01:11:30,570 --> 01:11:32,030
- [Marlene] Dear Miss Kael,
1587
01:11:32,030 --> 01:11:35,630
please help me to receive
The New Yorker here in Paris.
1588
01:11:35,630 --> 01:11:38,803
I am quite lost without
your opinions on films.
1589
01:11:40,690 --> 01:11:43,200
- [Kevin] Sorry, you didn't
find "Footloose" more enjoyable.
1590
01:11:43,200 --> 01:11:45,000
I hope you like the next one better.
1591
01:11:45,902 --> 01:11:48,950
- [Woody] Nobody does a
labor of love the way you do.
1592
01:11:48,950 --> 01:11:50,833
Hope we can get together for lunch.
1593
01:11:52,130 --> 01:11:55,330
- If a director had completed
and he wanted her to see it,
1594
01:11:55,330 --> 01:11:57,870
this is after she had stopped working,
1595
01:11:57,870 --> 01:12:00,180
he would send it out to Great Barrington
1596
01:12:00,180 --> 01:12:01,583
to be screened for her.
1597
01:12:03,490 --> 01:12:05,120
- She was very generous.
1598
01:12:05,120 --> 01:12:07,043
She was probably one of
the most generous persons
1599
01:12:07,043 --> 01:12:09,870
I've ever known with young people,
1600
01:12:09,870 --> 01:12:12,220
people she wanted to encourage.
1601
01:12:12,220 --> 01:12:14,570
- [Gina] When she read
something that she liked,
1602
01:12:14,570 --> 01:12:17,550
she would immediately pick up the phone
1603
01:12:17,550 --> 01:12:21,000
and try to track down the
author to let them know.
1604
01:12:21,000 --> 01:12:23,730
It was a very generous
impulse on her part.
1605
01:12:23,730 --> 01:12:26,700
Though it has come to
seem, to some people,
1606
01:12:26,700 --> 01:12:29,200
controlling and masterminding.
1607
01:12:29,200 --> 01:12:31,810
But I think she knew how hard it could be
1608
01:12:31,810 --> 01:12:35,149
to make a living and to get published.
1609
01:12:35,149 --> 01:12:37,130
(tires screeching)
1610
01:12:37,130 --> 01:12:39,640
- I got published in Film Comment because
1611
01:12:39,640 --> 01:12:43,270
she encouraged me to send a piece there.
1612
01:12:43,270 --> 01:12:45,210
She had read it and helped me to shape it,
1613
01:12:45,210 --> 01:12:46,323
and she called the editor.
1614
01:12:46,323 --> 01:12:48,540
I said yes please, thank Pauline for me
1615
01:12:48,540 --> 01:12:51,000
and send it in and he published it.
1616
01:12:51,000 --> 01:12:54,540
When it came out, it was
a surprise to everyone
1617
01:12:54,540 --> 01:12:56,830
and Pauline had made copies of the essay
1618
01:12:56,830 --> 01:12:58,230
and anybody who came through the door
1619
01:12:58,230 --> 01:12:59,250
she would give them copies.
1620
01:12:59,250 --> 01:13:01,230
She liked to really promote her friends
1621
01:13:01,230 --> 01:13:03,093
and people who she liked.
1622
01:13:04,206 --> 01:13:07,410
- And she made a valiant effort to wade
1623
01:13:07,410 --> 01:13:11,340
through enormous quantities of material.
1624
01:13:11,340 --> 01:13:16,120
Of letters, of screenplays,
of stories and novels
1625
01:13:16,120 --> 01:13:18,420
that were sent to her over the years.
1626
01:13:18,420 --> 01:13:21,340
And if she said she would do something,
1627
01:13:21,340 --> 01:13:22,850
she always did it.
1628
01:13:22,850 --> 01:13:23,683
- [Interviewer] Would you go with her
1629
01:13:23,683 --> 01:13:25,710
to see one of your own movies?
1630
01:13:25,710 --> 01:13:26,860
- I would, sure, oh sure.
1631
01:13:26,860 --> 01:13:30,360
We've agreed and
disagreed on my own movies
1632
01:13:30,360 --> 01:13:31,740
as well as other films.
1633
01:13:31,740 --> 01:13:33,700
Sure, I would.
1634
01:13:33,700 --> 01:13:35,370
- [Narrator] Woody Allen appears before us
1635
01:13:35,370 --> 01:13:38,160
as the battered adolescent
scarred forever,
1636
01:13:38,160 --> 01:13:40,300
a little too nice and much too threatened
1637
01:13:40,300 --> 01:13:42,900
to allow himself to be aggressive.
1638
01:13:42,900 --> 01:13:45,520
He has the city-wise
effrontery of a shrimp
1639
01:13:45,520 --> 01:13:48,090
who began by using
language to protect himself
1640
01:13:48,090 --> 01:13:50,610
and then discovered that
language has a life of its own.
1641
01:13:50,610 --> 01:13:52,080
- I'm a philosophy major.
1642
01:13:52,080 --> 01:13:53,924
- [Woody] Are you, that's
a wonderful subject.
1643
01:13:53,924 --> 01:13:54,757
- Yeah, yeah.
1644
01:13:54,757 --> 01:13:56,067
- That's a wonderful thing.
1645
01:13:56,067 --> 01:13:56,900
What is the meaning of life and death
1646
01:13:56,900 --> 01:13:57,840
and why are we here and everything.
1647
01:13:57,840 --> 01:13:59,700
And you like Chinese food?
1648
01:13:59,700 --> 01:14:01,240
- [Narrator] We felt if we stuck with him
1649
01:14:01,240 --> 01:14:02,683
failure could succeed.
1650
01:14:03,900 --> 01:14:05,410
- All I'm doing when I make a film
1651
01:14:05,410 --> 01:14:08,050
is try and make a film
that I think is funny.
1652
01:14:08,050 --> 01:14:11,660
About subjects that
interest me personally.
1653
01:14:11,660 --> 01:14:15,010
- I think his comic character
is enormously appealing
1654
01:14:15,010 --> 01:14:20,010
to people partly because
he's the smart, urban guy
1655
01:14:20,230 --> 01:14:24,440
who at the same is
intelligent, is vulnerable,
1656
01:14:24,440 --> 01:14:27,670
and somehow by his
intelligence he triumphs.
1657
01:14:27,670 --> 01:14:28,647
- What do you want me to say?
1658
01:14:28,647 --> 01:14:30,530
I don't want to make funny movies anymore.
1659
01:14:30,530 --> 01:14:32,100
They can't force me to.
1660
01:14:32,100 --> 01:14:33,730
- [Narrator] In "Stardust Memories"
1661
01:14:33,730 --> 01:14:36,100
Woody Allen degrades
the people who respond
1662
01:14:36,100 --> 01:14:39,230
to his work and presents
himself as their victim.
1663
01:14:39,230 --> 01:14:41,540
These pushy fans who treat him in such
1664
01:14:41,540 --> 01:14:44,570
an over familiar way
are gross or big-nosed
1665
01:14:44,570 --> 01:14:46,930
and have funny Jewish names.
1666
01:14:46,930 --> 01:14:49,200
- I especially like your early funny ones.
1667
01:14:49,200 --> 01:14:50,730
- [Narrator] They're
turned into their noses.
1668
01:14:50,730 --> 01:14:53,490
They leer into the lens shoving
1669
01:14:53,490 --> 01:14:55,688
their snouts at Sandy Bates.
1670
01:14:55,688 --> 01:14:56,521
- This is my friend Libby.
1671
01:14:56,521 --> 01:14:57,540
She thinks you're a genius.
1672
01:14:57,540 --> 01:14:59,260
- [Narrator] If Woody Allen finds success
1673
01:14:59,260 --> 01:15:02,520
very upsetting and wishes
the public would go away,
1674
01:15:02,520 --> 01:15:05,133
this picture should stop him worrying.
1675
01:15:06,600 --> 01:15:08,360
- She was hard on him.
1676
01:15:08,360 --> 01:15:13,240
He had a distrust of some
of his own gifts at his peak
1677
01:15:13,240 --> 01:15:15,840
and she felt he was moving
in the wrong direction,
1678
01:15:15,840 --> 01:15:17,770
and she wrote about it.
1679
01:15:17,770 --> 01:15:22,770
- I cannot just make films
that will appeal to everybody.
1680
01:15:23,360 --> 01:15:24,950
I make films that appeal to me
1681
01:15:24,950 --> 01:15:26,690
and hope everybody will like them.
1682
01:15:26,690 --> 01:15:28,870
And I will not compromise.
1683
01:15:28,870 --> 01:15:32,090
That's why when I spend
that long on a film
1684
01:15:32,090 --> 01:15:35,160
and I get blasted, it hurts.
1685
01:15:35,160 --> 01:15:37,490
I can't deny it but from
some people it hurts
1686
01:15:37,490 --> 01:15:38,800
and from some people it doesn't.
1687
01:15:38,800 --> 01:15:39,783
There are critics that if they blast me
1688
01:15:39,783 --> 01:15:41,970
I couldn't care less,
such as Pauline Kael.
1689
01:15:41,970 --> 01:15:43,833
I couldn't care less whether
she blasts me or not.
1690
01:15:43,833 --> 01:15:44,666
- [Interviewer] Why not?
1691
01:15:44,666 --> 01:15:46,670
- Because she's totally
a subjective reviewer
1692
01:15:46,670 --> 01:15:49,410
and she, many years ago,
wanted to see Gatsby
1693
01:15:49,410 --> 01:15:51,180
and her time,
1694
01:15:51,180 --> 01:15:52,840
they split at The New Yorker,
1695
01:15:52,840 --> 01:15:54,610
it ends March 15th.
1696
01:15:54,610 --> 01:15:57,060
Penelope Gilliatt reviews
for six months and Pauline.
1697
01:15:57,060 --> 01:15:59,157
And Gatsby was opening March 14th,
1698
01:15:59,157 --> 01:16:01,030
and I refused to let her see the picture
1699
01:16:01,030 --> 01:16:02,570
so Penelope could review it.
1700
01:16:02,570 --> 01:16:04,740
At least I thought I would
get a more honest call.
1701
01:16:04,740 --> 01:16:07,320
And it killed her, she was furious.
1702
01:16:07,320 --> 01:16:09,210
That was one picture she wanted
close her season out with,
1703
01:16:09,210 --> 01:16:11,060
I didn't let her do it.
1704
01:16:11,060 --> 01:16:13,060
- [Francis] Yes, I did
meet her a couple of times
1705
01:16:13,060 --> 01:16:15,960
before I tried to make "Apocalypse Now",
1706
01:16:15,960 --> 01:16:19,050
and I remember very, very vividly that she
1707
01:16:19,050 --> 01:16:24,050
warned me to not use the
Wagner "Ride of the Valkyries"
1708
01:16:24,210 --> 01:16:26,750
for the helicopter battle because
1709
01:16:26,750 --> 01:16:30,097
it had been used also in
Lina Wertmuller's film
1710
01:16:30,097 --> 01:16:31,430
"Seven Beauties",
1711
01:16:31,430 --> 01:16:35,100
and she said that it
was so effective in that
1712
01:16:35,100 --> 01:16:36,670
that you'd be making a big mistake
1713
01:16:36,670 --> 01:16:38,510
to use it because people just whenever
1714
01:16:38,510 --> 01:16:41,400
they saw it they would
refer to "Seven Beauties".
1715
01:16:41,400 --> 01:16:46,200
And I said, I don't know
maybe but it depends.
1716
01:16:46,200 --> 01:16:48,790
If it works as planned then when they
1717
01:16:48,790 --> 01:16:51,798
think of it they'll think
of "Apocalypse Now".
1718
01:16:51,798 --> 01:16:54,270
("Ride of the Valkyries"
by Richard Wagner)
1719
01:16:54,270 --> 01:16:56,530
- [Narrator] Part of the
widespread anticipation
1720
01:16:56,530 --> 01:16:59,980
was, I think, our
readiness for a visionary,
1721
01:16:59,980 --> 01:17:02,123
climactic summing up movie.
1722
01:17:03,090 --> 01:17:05,900
We felt that the terrible
rehash of pop culture
1723
01:17:05,900 --> 01:17:08,090
couldn't go on, mustn't go on
1724
01:17:08,090 --> 01:17:10,800
that something new was needed.
1725
01:17:10,800 --> 01:17:13,863
Coppola must've felt that too
but he couldn't supply it.
1726
01:17:14,700 --> 01:17:16,620
His film was posited on great
1727
01:17:16,620 --> 01:17:18,283
thoughts arriving at the end.
1728
01:17:19,830 --> 01:17:22,280
- Horror has a face
1729
01:17:24,460 --> 01:17:27,430
and you must make a friend of horror.
1730
01:17:27,430 --> 01:17:30,240
- [Narrator] A confrontation
and a revelation.
1731
01:17:30,240 --> 01:17:33,680
Trying to say something
big, Coppola got tied up
1732
01:17:33,680 --> 01:17:36,500
in a big knot of American
self-hatred and guilt
1733
01:17:36,500 --> 01:17:39,590
and what the picture boiled down to was
1734
01:17:39,590 --> 01:17:41,313
white man, he devil.
1735
01:17:42,910 --> 01:17:45,363
- [Bill] I love the smell
of napalm in the morning.
1736
01:17:48,460 --> 01:17:49,810
- [Lili] It was always mysterious to me
1737
01:17:49,810 --> 01:17:51,230
that episode in her life.
1738
01:17:51,230 --> 01:17:55,260
In 1979 she leaves The New
Yorker to go to Hollywood
1739
01:17:55,260 --> 01:17:57,160
and it's at the behest of Warren Beatty
1740
01:17:57,160 --> 01:17:59,097
and it's to produce "Love & Money"
1741
01:17:59,097 --> 01:18:01,430
the second feature of Jim Toback.
1742
01:18:01,430 --> 01:18:05,500
- [Pauline] I agreed to do a
series of movies for Beatty,
1743
01:18:05,500 --> 01:18:08,820
and the first one will probably be a film
1744
01:18:08,820 --> 01:18:11,120
that I've had a hand in writing.
1745
01:18:11,120 --> 01:18:13,490
- She left off reviewing for a while
1746
01:18:13,490 --> 01:18:16,560
to work on the production
side of the movie business
1747
01:18:16,560 --> 01:18:18,710
with Warren Beatty and
with Paramount Pictures.
1748
01:18:18,710 --> 01:18:20,570
- What happened was I was facing another
1749
01:18:20,570 --> 01:18:22,950
six months off from The New Yorker
1750
01:18:22,950 --> 01:18:26,336
and I'd become a little fed up with
1751
01:18:26,336 --> 01:18:29,603
the weekly reviewing because
the pictures were so bad.
1752
01:18:31,324 --> 01:18:33,500
(screaming)
1753
01:18:33,500 --> 01:18:36,270
- Warren Beatty, a rather sly fox,
1754
01:18:36,270 --> 01:18:39,960
literally paid for her and was
putting her up in an office.
1755
01:18:39,960 --> 01:18:42,167
- [Man] And she was a virgin who
1756
01:18:42,167 --> 01:18:44,480
was very happy to be seduced.
1757
01:18:44,480 --> 01:18:46,640
- And also, she was never getting paid
1758
01:18:46,640 --> 01:18:48,150
a living wage by The New Yorker.
1759
01:18:48,150 --> 01:18:50,930
- You have to be willing
to smash heads together.
1760
01:18:50,930 --> 01:18:53,620
You have to be willing to argue everyday
1761
01:18:53,620 --> 01:18:54,850
to get things right.
1762
01:18:54,850 --> 01:18:57,156
And I saw that it was going to be months
1763
01:18:57,156 --> 01:18:59,890
of fighting ahead of me.
1764
01:18:59,890 --> 01:19:03,090
- [Woman] She thought her role with Warren
1765
01:19:03,090 --> 01:19:05,530
was going to be different than it was
1766
01:19:05,530 --> 01:19:09,120
and I think she felt that she
couldn't be a free person.
1767
01:19:09,120 --> 01:19:12,380
- I withdrew before the
picture got into production
1768
01:19:12,380 --> 01:19:14,303
and turned to consulting instead.
1769
01:19:16,720 --> 01:19:19,710
- And she'd be reporting
to Head of Production
1770
01:19:19,710 --> 01:19:21,560
Don Simpson.
1771
01:19:21,560 --> 01:19:25,173
Nobody embodies the 80s
more than Don Simpson.
1772
01:19:26,080 --> 01:19:27,650
Movies that you can sell with a tagline
1773
01:19:27,650 --> 01:19:29,520
that look like rock videos.
1774
01:19:29,520 --> 01:19:30,380
- [Woman] That's pretty crazy.
1775
01:19:30,380 --> 01:19:32,180
If they put her together with Don Simpson,
1776
01:19:32,180 --> 01:19:34,010
they wanted her to fail.
1777
01:19:34,010 --> 01:19:35,140
- I don't think he was gonna let anything
1778
01:19:35,140 --> 01:19:36,890
she suggested get through.
1779
01:19:36,890 --> 01:19:38,800
Except for David Lynch's "Elephant Man".
1780
01:19:38,800 --> 01:19:42,873
- Mr. Treves, why do you help me?
1781
01:19:43,770 --> 01:19:45,060
- [Man] I think she was instrumental
1782
01:19:45,060 --> 01:19:46,900
in getting that up and going.
1783
01:19:46,900 --> 01:19:48,690
She was a huge fan of David Lynch.
1784
01:19:48,690 --> 01:19:51,730
- She kept saying that she missed writing.
1785
01:19:51,730 --> 01:19:53,200
- She was unhappy.
1786
01:19:53,200 --> 01:19:58,200
- I just still look back
on that with admiration.
1787
01:19:59,300 --> 01:20:02,833
She took a flyer, and
she took a real chance.
1788
01:20:04,550 --> 01:20:06,440
- I guess it was July 1980
1789
01:20:07,500 --> 01:20:09,840
because I remember it
being incredibly hot,
1790
01:20:09,840 --> 01:20:13,980
I remember having read
a Renata Adler piece
1791
01:20:13,980 --> 01:20:16,790
in The New York Review of Books that was
1792
01:20:16,790 --> 01:20:20,750
a surgical strike on Pauline.
1793
01:20:20,750 --> 01:20:22,293
- She took it very hard.
1794
01:20:23,270 --> 01:20:25,380
It was a very hard piece.
1795
01:20:25,380 --> 01:20:28,340
- [Renata] It is to my
surprise, not simply jarringly
1796
01:20:28,340 --> 01:20:31,860
line by line without
interruption, worthless.
1797
01:20:31,860 --> 01:20:34,490
It turns out to embody something appalling
1798
01:20:34,490 --> 01:20:36,310
and widespread in the culture.
1799
01:20:36,310 --> 01:20:40,310
She seems, at times, to have
a form of prose hypochondria,
1800
01:20:40,310 --> 01:20:43,800
palpating herself all over
to see if she has a thought
1801
01:20:43,800 --> 01:20:46,130
and publishing every word of the process
1802
01:20:46,130 --> 01:20:49,550
by which she checks to see
whether or not she has one.
1803
01:20:49,550 --> 01:20:52,970
It is also equally true
that she can hardly
1804
01:20:52,970 --> 01:20:57,573
resist any form of hyperbole,
superlative, exaggeration.
1805
01:21:01,130 --> 01:21:05,140
She has, in principle,
four things she likes.
1806
01:21:05,140 --> 01:21:06,880
Versions of horror,
1807
01:21:06,880 --> 01:21:10,350
physical violence depicted
in explicit detail,
1808
01:21:10,350 --> 01:21:13,720
sex scenes, so long as they
have an ingredient of cruelty
1809
01:21:13,720 --> 01:21:16,400
and involve partners who
know each other casually
1810
01:21:16,400 --> 01:21:18,730
or under perverse circumstances,
1811
01:21:18,730 --> 01:21:21,750
and fantasies of invasion or subjugation
1812
01:21:21,750 --> 01:21:26,750
of or by apes, pods,
teens, body snatchers,
1813
01:21:27,290 --> 01:21:29,530
and extra terrestrials.
1814
01:21:29,530 --> 01:21:33,033
The pervasive overbearing
and presumptuous V.
1815
01:21:34,550 --> 01:21:35,900
The intrusive U.
1816
01:21:35,900 --> 01:21:36,920
The questions,
1817
01:21:36,920 --> 01:21:39,690
the debased note of righteousness.
1818
01:21:39,690 --> 01:21:41,060
- Hey!
1819
01:21:41,060 --> 01:21:42,940
- [Renata] The whole verbal apparatus
1820
01:21:42,940 --> 01:21:47,540
promotes and relies upon
the incapacity to read.
1821
01:21:47,540 --> 01:21:50,490
The writing falls somewhere
between huckster copy
1822
01:21:50,490 --> 01:21:52,500
and ideological pamphleteering.
1823
01:21:52,500 --> 01:21:54,130
- My life has value!
1824
01:21:54,130 --> 01:21:57,400
- [Renata] Denouncing
exhortations, code words,
1825
01:21:57,400 --> 01:22:01,220
excommunications, programs, threats.
1826
01:22:01,220 --> 01:22:03,470
- I know what you're thinking.
1827
01:22:03,470 --> 01:22:06,070
- I felt that Renata Adler
was being a little mean.
1828
01:22:06,070 --> 01:22:08,350
- Who is really out of
touch, Renata or Pauline?
1829
01:22:08,350 --> 01:22:11,640
- She was trying to out
Pauline Kael Pauline Kael.
1830
01:22:11,640 --> 01:22:13,920
- [Pauline] There are a lot
of purists like Renata Adler
1831
01:22:13,920 --> 01:22:15,300
on The New York Times now who says
1832
01:22:15,300 --> 01:22:18,290
the critic's role is not propaganda.
1833
01:22:18,290 --> 01:22:20,010
Well, I think she's basically mistaken.
1834
01:22:20,010 --> 01:22:22,970
Every good critic has
always been a propagandist.
1835
01:22:22,970 --> 01:22:24,560
There's no other way to play the game.
1836
01:22:24,560 --> 01:22:27,100
- She did not respond in print.
1837
01:22:27,100 --> 01:22:30,203
She did not reply or refer to it ever.
1838
01:22:31,610 --> 01:22:33,520
- She rubbed a lot of
people the wrong way.
1839
01:22:33,520 --> 01:22:37,920
They want somehow to believe
that she was a bad person
1840
01:22:37,920 --> 01:22:40,620
not simply that she was a critic that they
1841
01:22:40,620 --> 01:22:41,950
really disagreed with.
1842
01:22:41,950 --> 01:22:44,690
But there was something
morally and ethically
1843
01:22:44,690 --> 01:22:46,350
corrupt about her.
1844
01:22:46,350 --> 01:22:48,080
- [Ridley] I'm still angry.
1845
01:22:48,080 --> 01:22:50,750
That she destroyed the
film in three and a half
1846
01:22:50,750 --> 01:22:55,070
full pages of The New
Yorker without mercy.
1847
01:22:55,070 --> 01:22:56,856
And I think, you know
what, I'll never read
1848
01:22:56,856 --> 01:22:59,190
another piece of criticism about me.
1849
01:22:59,190 --> 01:23:01,300
I've never read press since.
1850
01:23:01,300 --> 01:23:03,750
She was so fucking wrong.
1851
01:23:03,750 --> 01:23:05,110
She was wrong to do that.
1852
01:23:05,110 --> 01:23:10,110
Also, what's wrong about
critique is I can't reply.
1853
01:23:13,030 --> 01:23:17,030
- Yeah, she was famous for
lying in wait on her reviews.
1854
01:23:17,030 --> 01:23:18,080
She never really wanted to be
1855
01:23:18,080 --> 01:23:19,670
the first one out for something.
1856
01:23:19,670 --> 01:23:23,960
She'd sit back and figure out which way
1857
01:23:23,960 --> 01:23:25,140
the reviews are gonna go and then she'd
1858
01:23:25,140 --> 01:23:29,043
find a weakness and angle
and go right in at it.
1859
01:23:34,017 --> 01:23:37,500
- "Shoah" came out and
it was a nine-hour movie
1860
01:23:37,500 --> 01:23:40,230
about the German death camps
1861
01:23:40,230 --> 01:23:42,420
and it got a lot of press.
1862
01:23:42,420 --> 01:23:44,323
It was very impressive in many ways.
1863
01:23:46,360 --> 01:23:50,700
- And the final solution
you see is really final
1864
01:23:50,700 --> 01:23:54,360
because people who are
converted can yet be
1865
01:23:54,360 --> 01:23:56,033
in secret Jews.
1866
01:23:56,890 --> 01:24:00,153
People who are expelled can yet return.
1867
01:24:01,120 --> 01:24:04,993
But people who are dead will not reappear.
1868
01:24:06,260 --> 01:24:08,460
- She happened to be out in San Francisco
1869
01:24:08,460 --> 01:24:10,340
to give a lecture, I believe,
1870
01:24:10,340 --> 01:24:12,520
and I saw her after the lecture,
1871
01:24:12,520 --> 01:24:14,240
and she was fit to be tied.
1872
01:24:14,240 --> 01:24:15,770
She was quivering.
1873
01:24:15,770 --> 01:24:16,860
Pauline quivered a lot.
1874
01:24:16,860 --> 01:24:20,100
She said, Shawn is
holding my "Shoah" review.
1875
01:24:20,100 --> 01:24:22,000
And she was very, very angry.
1876
01:24:22,000 --> 01:24:24,180
He was freaked out about it
1877
01:24:24,180 --> 01:24:28,015
because Pauline really
had disliked the movie.
1878
01:24:28,015 --> 01:24:30,890
She didn't think it was a
good piece of filmmaking.
1879
01:24:30,890 --> 01:24:33,330
- [Narrator] Claude Lanzmann's
nine-hour documentary
1880
01:24:33,330 --> 01:24:36,220
epic, "Shoah", is made up
of interviews with people
1881
01:24:36,220 --> 01:24:39,460
who have knowledge of
the Nazi extermination.
1882
01:24:39,460 --> 01:24:42,370
I ask the forbearance of
readers for a dissenting view
1883
01:24:42,370 --> 01:24:45,870
of a film that is widely
regarded as a masterpiece.
1884
01:24:45,870 --> 01:24:49,367
I found "Shoah" exhausting
right from the start.
1885
01:24:49,367 --> 01:24:53,450
(speaking in a foreign language)
1886
01:24:54,727 --> 01:24:56,730
- There was uniform praise for this film.
1887
01:24:56,730 --> 01:24:58,370
People reviewed it on their knees.
1888
01:24:58,370 --> 01:25:00,410
- The greatest use of film I've ever seen
1889
01:25:00,410 --> 01:25:02,227
in the sense of the good that it does.
1890
01:25:02,227 --> 01:25:03,780
- There, I agree with you Gene.
1891
01:25:03,780 --> 01:25:06,020
- And it was great that
there was somebody who
1892
01:25:06,020 --> 01:25:08,450
was looking for something
different in documentary.
1893
01:25:08,450 --> 01:25:11,050
- And she didn't feel that she was wrong
1894
01:25:11,050 --> 01:25:12,800
or that she had made a mistake.
1895
01:25:12,800 --> 01:25:15,290
- In her essential argument,
in her "Shoah" piece,
1896
01:25:15,290 --> 01:25:17,500
that a movie's subject matter doesn't
1897
01:25:17,500 --> 01:25:19,070
make it sacrosanct, right?
1898
01:25:19,070 --> 01:25:20,950
It's not outside the bounds of criticism.
1899
01:25:20,950 --> 01:25:23,020
- When she said it, I disagreed
1900
01:25:23,020 --> 01:25:24,610
with certain things she said.
1901
01:25:24,610 --> 01:25:26,730
- [Narrator] Sitting on
a theater seat for a film
1902
01:25:26,730 --> 01:25:28,760
as full of dead space is as this one
1903
01:25:28,760 --> 01:25:31,440
seems to me a form of self punishment.
1904
01:25:31,440 --> 01:25:33,840
- Okay, it was a little insensitive.
1905
01:25:33,840 --> 01:25:35,430
- [Narrator] Lanzmann is not very fussy
1906
01:25:35,430 --> 01:25:37,010
about the subjects.
1907
01:25:37,010 --> 01:25:39,560
In some of the passages
he seems to be conducting
1908
01:25:39,560 --> 01:25:41,070
the interviews at Woody Allen's
1909
01:25:41,070 --> 01:25:43,230
convention of village idiots.
1910
01:25:43,230 --> 01:25:45,870
But what doesn't seem
valid is the significance
1911
01:25:45,870 --> 01:25:48,040
that the film confers on them.
1912
01:25:48,040 --> 01:25:50,850
The lack of moral complexity
in Lanzmann's approach
1913
01:25:50,850 --> 01:25:52,713
keeps it from being great.
1914
01:25:53,610 --> 01:25:57,383
The film is exhausting to watch
because it closes your mind.
1915
01:25:58,490 --> 01:26:02,020
- The outcry, I thought, was mystifying.
1916
01:26:02,020 --> 01:26:04,180
- [Craig] There were
attacks by Jim Hoberman.
1917
01:26:04,180 --> 01:26:08,070
Hoberman actually used
the word antisemitism.
1918
01:26:08,070 --> 01:26:09,850
- [Lili] She got a lot
grief for that review
1919
01:26:09,850 --> 01:26:12,620
and I think she was
called a self-hating Jew.
1920
01:26:12,620 --> 01:26:14,990
- [Craig] And the attacks
were really unfortunate.
1921
01:26:14,990 --> 01:26:16,170
- [Lili] You know, and
I loved that review.
1922
01:26:16,170 --> 01:26:17,980
She refused to be intimidated.
1923
01:26:17,980 --> 01:26:19,250
I mean, she wasn't gonna back down
1924
01:26:19,250 --> 01:26:21,400
because this was a movie
about the Holocaust.
1925
01:26:21,400 --> 01:26:23,350
- Well, what else does a critic work with,
1926
01:26:23,350 --> 01:26:25,240
if he's honest, but his own response.
1927
01:26:25,240 --> 01:26:27,130
The other thing is academic opinion
1928
01:26:27,130 --> 01:26:28,730
or consensus opinion
1929
01:26:28,730 --> 01:26:30,910
which means letting other
people tell you what you think
1930
01:26:30,910 --> 01:26:32,350
which means you're a damn fool
1931
01:26:32,350 --> 01:26:34,433
and serve no purpose whatsoever.
1932
01:26:41,730 --> 01:26:44,500
- I think if I had to choose one favorite
1933
01:26:44,500 --> 01:26:46,250
Pauline Kael review it would be her
1934
01:26:46,250 --> 01:26:49,670
review of Brian De Palma's
"Casualties of War".
1935
01:26:49,670 --> 01:26:51,400
Pauline saw it.
1936
01:26:51,400 --> 01:26:55,140
She came out for it in this way that was
1937
01:26:55,140 --> 01:26:59,973
very bold and definitive and passionate.
1938
01:27:00,820 --> 01:27:02,300
- [Narrator] This new film is the kind
1939
01:27:02,300 --> 01:27:04,160
that makes you feel protective.
1940
01:27:04,160 --> 01:27:05,730
When you leave the theater you'll probably
1941
01:27:05,730 --> 01:27:07,810
find that you're not
ready to talk about it.
1942
01:27:07,810 --> 01:27:10,540
You may also find it hard
to talk about anything.
1943
01:27:10,540 --> 01:27:15,540
- She approached it in this
really intensely human way.
1944
01:27:16,110 --> 01:27:18,620
That's what she was about at her best.
1945
01:27:18,620 --> 01:27:20,310
- [Narrator] We in the audience are put
1946
01:27:20,310 --> 01:27:21,860
in the man's position.
1947
01:27:21,860 --> 01:27:25,550
We're made to feel the
awfulness of being ineffectual.
1948
01:27:25,550 --> 01:27:29,218
This lifelike defeat is
central to the movie.
1949
01:27:29,218 --> 01:27:31,860
One hot day on my first
trip to New York City,
1950
01:27:31,860 --> 01:27:34,830
I walked passed a group of
men on a tenement stoop.
1951
01:27:34,830 --> 01:27:37,420
One of them in a sweaty,
sleeveless T-shirt
1952
01:27:37,420 --> 01:27:40,700
stood shouting at a
screaming, weeping little boy
1953
01:27:40,700 --> 01:27:41,677
perhaps eight months old.
1954
01:27:41,677 --> 01:27:42,510
- Ha, ha!
1955
01:27:43,650 --> 01:27:45,170
- [Narrator] The man
must've caught a glimpse
1956
01:27:45,170 --> 01:27:47,157
of my stricken face because he called out,
1957
01:27:47,157 --> 01:27:48,627
"You don't like it, lady?!
1958
01:27:48,627 --> 01:27:49,950
"Then how do you like this?!"
1959
01:27:49,950 --> 01:27:52,590
And he picked up a bottle of pink soda pop
1960
01:27:52,590 --> 01:27:55,870
from the sidewalk and poured
it on the baby's head.
1961
01:27:55,870 --> 01:27:58,330
Wailing sounds much louder than before
1962
01:27:58,330 --> 01:28:00,770
followed me down the street.
1963
01:28:00,770 --> 01:28:04,610
What makes the movie so eerily affecting?
1964
01:28:04,610 --> 01:28:07,050
Possibly it's the girl's
last moment of life.
1965
01:28:07,050 --> 01:28:10,357
The needle-sharp presentation
of her frailty and strength
1966
01:28:10,357 --> 01:28:12,900
and how they intertwine.
1967
01:28:12,900 --> 01:28:14,980
When she falls to her death,
1968
01:28:14,980 --> 01:28:18,770
the image is otherworldly, lacerating.
1969
01:28:18,770 --> 01:28:20,797
It's the supreme violation.
1970
01:28:20,797 --> 01:28:23,610
(guns firing rapidly)
1971
01:28:23,610 --> 01:28:27,763
I hear that baby's cries
after almost 50 years.
1972
01:28:38,840 --> 01:28:41,070
- It's an interesting
question to think about how
1973
01:28:41,070 --> 01:28:44,970
her work would be received
today in the critical community
1974
01:28:44,970 --> 01:28:46,850
in so far as it exists.
1975
01:28:46,850 --> 01:28:48,980
First of all, it's been fragmented,
1976
01:28:48,980 --> 01:28:51,390
as everything else has
been, by the internet
1977
01:28:51,390 --> 01:28:54,510
so people are weighing
in every different way
1978
01:28:54,510 --> 01:28:55,940
from every different angle.
1979
01:28:55,940 --> 01:28:58,950
- There's a strange feeling
that everything's available
1980
01:28:58,950 --> 01:29:00,930
which then weirdly leads to the feeling
1981
01:29:00,930 --> 01:29:03,520
that you don't really pay
attention to anything.
1982
01:29:03,520 --> 01:29:04,820
- [Daniel] Nobody, I think,
1983
01:29:04,820 --> 01:29:07,050
could hold down centerfield
1984
01:29:07,050 --> 01:29:10,120
so to speak, the way that she did.
1985
01:29:10,120 --> 01:29:12,100
Even The New Yorker is not as culturally
1986
01:29:12,100 --> 01:29:13,930
central as it used to be.
1987
01:29:13,930 --> 01:29:14,980
It can't be.
1988
01:29:14,980 --> 01:29:17,730
- Yet more proof that video
games don't translate well.
1989
01:29:19,170 --> 01:29:20,631
- I am Andre and this is my--
1990
01:29:20,631 --> 01:29:21,911
- Hello.
1991
01:29:21,911 --> 01:29:24,661
(people talking)
1992
01:29:28,237 --> 01:29:30,190
- [Michael] People just
hit Rotten Tomatoes
1993
01:29:30,190 --> 01:29:32,803
and they'll see some
compilation of critics maybe.
1994
01:29:35,390 --> 01:29:37,250
- I always think that
she would've been great
1995
01:29:37,250 --> 01:29:40,040
in this era because she
could write these really
1996
01:29:40,040 --> 01:29:42,281
short descriptions of movies that
1997
01:29:42,281 --> 01:29:44,220
were stripped to their atomic weight,
1998
01:29:44,220 --> 01:29:45,337
but told you everything that
1999
01:29:45,337 --> 01:29:46,987
you wanted to know about a movie.
2000
01:29:49,441 --> 01:29:52,024
(upbeat music)
2001
01:29:59,550 --> 01:30:02,310
- [Pauline] I shall always
be grateful to Stanley Kramer
2002
01:30:02,310 --> 01:30:04,670
for either intentionally
or unintentionally
2003
01:30:04,670 --> 01:30:07,662
including that beautiful
moment when Gregory Peck,
2004
01:30:07,662 --> 01:30:10,920
after spurning Ava Gardner's advances,
2005
01:30:10,920 --> 01:30:12,972
returns to find her in a wheat field
2006
01:30:12,972 --> 01:30:14,520
and asks--
2007
01:30:14,520 --> 01:30:15,690
- Is your invitation to spread
2008
01:30:15,690 --> 01:30:17,293
a little fertilizer still open?
2009
01:30:18,340 --> 01:30:21,950
- Without critics you have
nothing but advertisers.
2010
01:30:21,950 --> 01:30:23,800
So, it's the job of a critic,
2011
01:30:23,800 --> 01:30:26,290
in terms of a social function,
2012
01:30:26,290 --> 01:30:29,790
to try to alert people and
interest them in anything
2013
01:30:29,790 --> 01:30:31,810
that's really new or innovative,
2014
01:30:31,810 --> 01:30:34,520
that spells the future of an art form.
2015
01:30:34,520 --> 01:30:37,510
Because without a few critics doing that,
2016
01:30:37,510 --> 01:30:40,270
the advertisers will
keep everything stagnant
2017
01:30:40,270 --> 01:30:42,250
because if they can sell anything,
2018
01:30:42,250 --> 01:30:44,760
if there are no dissenting voices,
2019
01:30:44,760 --> 01:30:47,020
movies will not advance in any way.
2020
01:30:47,020 --> 01:30:50,290
- Critics are forced to
mute their criticisms
2021
01:30:50,290 --> 01:30:53,427
of the goose that lays the
golden egg in the movie business.
2022
01:30:53,427 --> 01:30:56,291
And there's very few
critics who have the guts
2023
01:30:56,291 --> 01:31:00,300
and have the conviction and have the ethic
2024
01:31:00,300 --> 01:31:03,110
to go out there and write an
honest review of a bad movie.
2025
01:31:03,110 --> 01:31:04,873
'Cause the business has sent you a signal
2026
01:31:04,873 --> 01:31:06,853
just don't say anything bad.
2027
01:31:12,561 --> 01:31:15,662
- [Child] What was your
favorite movie your entire life?
2028
01:31:15,662 --> 01:31:17,162
- [Pauline] In my entire life?
2029
01:31:18,610 --> 01:31:23,610
Well, there's a French
movie, "Menilmontant".
2030
01:31:23,921 --> 01:31:26,721
It was a silent movie by Kirsanoff.
2031
01:31:26,721 --> 01:31:29,054
I was absolutely mad for it.
2032
01:31:30,891 --> 01:31:33,902
- [Child] What is your favorite treasures?
2033
01:31:33,902 --> 01:31:37,303
- [Pauline] My daughter and my grandson.
2034
01:31:40,020 --> 01:31:42,570
- [Child] What was your
favorite time of your life?
2035
01:31:43,620 --> 01:31:44,953
- [Pauline] Now.
2036
01:31:49,690 --> 01:31:51,350
And that week when I quit
2037
01:31:51,350 --> 01:31:53,200
I hadn't planned on it,
2038
01:31:53,200 --> 01:31:56,760
but I wrote up a couple of movies
2039
01:31:56,760 --> 01:31:58,200
and I read what I'd written
2040
01:31:58,200 --> 01:32:00,003
and I was so discouraged.
2041
01:32:01,730 --> 01:32:05,510
It's very hard to have so
much emotional investment
2042
01:32:05,510 --> 01:32:08,870
in praising people that when you have
2043
01:32:08,870 --> 01:32:11,810
to pan the same people a few years later
2044
01:32:11,810 --> 01:32:14,863
it really tears your spirits apart.
2045
01:32:15,980 --> 01:32:18,673
And I thought I've got
nothing to share from this.
2046
01:32:26,490 --> 01:32:28,910
- When she retired from The New Yorker,
2047
01:32:28,910 --> 01:32:32,300
I, of course, wrote about it as though
2048
01:32:32,300 --> 01:32:34,153
the athlete had hung up his number.
2049
01:32:35,790 --> 01:32:37,740
- [Pauline] I think we're
getting too much noise.
2050
01:32:37,740 --> 01:32:39,319
Let me see if I can control
2051
01:32:39,319 --> 01:32:42,923
my Parkinson's hand better, just a minute.
2052
01:32:54,330 --> 01:32:57,010
- [Gina] Pauline expressed
an almost child-like naivete
2053
01:32:57,010 --> 01:33:00,860
and hopefulness that her
health would have to get better
2054
01:33:00,860 --> 01:33:04,160
and even when it did
seem impossible to her
2055
01:33:04,160 --> 01:33:06,730
that movies would also somehow get better.
2056
01:33:06,730 --> 01:33:09,670
(people laughing)
2057
01:33:09,670 --> 01:33:12,690
- [Craig] She was funny and
lethal right up to the end.
2058
01:33:12,690 --> 01:33:14,400
One day, when she was near death,
2059
01:33:14,400 --> 01:33:16,030
and I was at her bedside trying
2060
01:33:16,030 --> 01:33:18,197
to divert her with chatter I said,
2061
01:33:18,197 --> 01:33:20,607
"It never ceases to
amaze me how many people
2062
01:33:20,607 --> 01:33:24,220
"who call themselves writers
actually can't write,"
2063
01:33:24,220 --> 01:33:28,927
and she said, very weakly,
"Yes, they say things like
2064
01:33:28,927 --> 01:33:31,041
"It never ceases to amaze me."
2065
01:33:31,041 --> 01:33:33,250
(people laughing)
2066
01:33:33,250 --> 01:33:36,113
- A couple of weeks before
my mother's memorial,
2067
01:33:37,440 --> 01:33:41,080
which was scheduled for November of 2001,
2068
01:33:41,080 --> 01:33:46,080
I decided that I wanted
to say some words myself.
2069
01:33:46,400 --> 01:33:48,390
I felt compelled to say something
2070
01:33:48,390 --> 01:33:50,563
I wasn't sure what it would turn into.
2071
01:33:53,120 --> 01:33:56,740
Pauline's greatest weakness
became her great strength.
2072
01:33:56,740 --> 01:33:59,200
Her liberation as a writer and critic.
2073
01:33:59,200 --> 01:34:01,530
She truly believed that what she did was
2074
01:34:01,530 --> 01:34:04,120
for everyone else's good and that because
2075
01:34:04,120 --> 01:34:06,593
she meant well she had
no negative effects.
2076
01:34:10,480 --> 01:34:14,900
This lack of introspection,
self-awareness, restraint,
2077
01:34:14,900 --> 01:34:18,790
or hesitation, gave
Pauline a supreme freedom
2078
01:34:18,790 --> 01:34:21,290
to speak up, to speak her mind,
2079
01:34:21,290 --> 01:34:23,123
to find her honest voice.
2080
01:34:24,810 --> 01:34:28,063
She turned her lack of
self-awareness into a triumph.
2081
01:34:33,870 --> 01:34:35,850
- [Narrator] Perhaps no
work of art is possible
2082
01:34:35,850 --> 01:34:38,710
without belief in the audience.
2083
01:34:38,710 --> 01:34:40,620
The kind of belief that has nothing to do
2084
01:34:40,620 --> 01:34:42,750
with facts and figures about what people
2085
01:34:42,750 --> 01:34:45,230
actually buy or enjoy but comes out
2086
01:34:45,230 --> 01:34:47,814
of the individual artist's
absolute conviction
2087
01:34:47,814 --> 01:34:50,084
that only the best he can do
2088
01:34:50,084 --> 01:34:53,103
is fit to be offered to others.
2089
01:34:55,260 --> 01:34:56,900
- [Lili] Pauline's
mistake was in believing
2090
01:34:56,900 --> 01:34:58,250
that she needed the movies.
2091
01:35:02,410 --> 01:35:03,803
But the movies needed her.
2092
01:35:08,197 --> 01:35:11,697
(soft instrumental music)
2093
01:36:03,090 --> 01:36:04,430
- [Man] Pauline Kael.
2094
01:36:04,430 --> 01:36:06,950
- [Pauline] As my last
word, I'd like to revert
2095
01:36:06,950 --> 01:36:10,490
to that question of do
I believe in progress.
2096
01:36:10,490 --> 01:36:15,490
I see in the Perspective issue
here of letters to the editor
2097
01:36:15,586 --> 01:36:16,419
(a man laughs)
2098
01:36:16,419 --> 01:36:18,067
a gentleman writes, that
2099
01:36:18,067 --> 01:36:20,370
"People should shed a tear for her,"
2100
01:36:20,370 --> 01:36:21,657
that means me,
2101
01:36:21,657 --> 01:36:24,238
"who spews the pulp of sour grape
2102
01:36:24,238 --> 01:36:25,340
"to stain an empty bear--"
2103
01:36:25,340 --> 01:36:27,190
- [Man] We should
explain these are letters
2104
01:36:27,190 --> 01:36:29,210
in reply to a piece you wrote on the film
2105
01:36:29,210 --> 01:36:30,660
in a prior issue of Perspective.
2106
01:36:30,660 --> 01:36:31,493
Go ahead, I'm sorry.
2107
01:36:31,493 --> 01:36:33,240
- [Pauline] You know this
is the new Victorianism.
2108
01:36:33,240 --> 01:36:35,740
Do you remember in the Victorian period
2109
01:36:35,740 --> 01:36:37,300
women were not supposed to think,
2110
01:36:37,300 --> 01:36:39,230
they were supposed to leave
the thinking to the men.
2111
01:36:39,230 --> 01:36:41,310
In the neo-Freudian period,
2112
01:36:41,310 --> 01:36:44,210
if women do any writing
or speaking in public,
2113
01:36:44,210 --> 01:36:45,353
it is supposed to demonstrate that
2114
01:36:45,353 --> 01:36:47,640
they are sexually deprived.
2115
01:36:47,640 --> 01:36:48,760
They have an empty bed.
2116
01:36:48,760 --> 01:36:49,830
If their bed were full,
2117
01:36:49,830 --> 01:36:52,220
they would not bother
to care about movies.
2118
01:36:52,220 --> 01:36:54,440
- [Man] Or go to the movies.
2119
01:36:54,440 --> 01:36:55,820
- [Man] I really don't
think we're gonna have
2120
01:36:55,820 --> 01:36:57,100
that feminism in Chicago, though.
2121
01:36:57,100 --> 01:36:58,840
I don't think we're gonna
have that feminism in Chicago.
2122
01:36:58,840 --> 01:37:00,960
(Pauline laughing)
2123
01:37:00,960 --> 01:37:03,750
Aren't you really deep in underestimating
2124
01:37:03,750 --> 01:37:05,161
a great portion of the audience--
2125
01:37:05,161 --> 01:37:07,689
- [Pauline] I hope that's true.
2126
01:37:07,689 --> 01:37:10,670
But you see if I really
didn't believe in the audience
2127
01:37:10,670 --> 01:37:12,030
I wouldn't go to the trouble of trying
2128
01:37:12,030 --> 01:37:14,950
to address it either
in print or on the air.
2129
01:37:14,950 --> 01:37:16,760
I mean I have some feeling that perhaps
2130
01:37:16,760 --> 01:37:19,960
one can reach somebody
out there somewhere.
2131
01:37:19,960 --> 01:37:23,460
(soft instrumental music)
166949
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