Roger Ebert is my favorite film reviewer. Not just because I agree with his opinions more than any other critic, but because he is a true journalist. Today, most reviewers care far more about writing about who the star is dating in their personal life, what behind the scenes tragedy happened during the filming, or what sort of a funny tagline they can make so that their quote ends up on the movie poster. Not Roger Ebert. His reviews are thoughtful, detailed, and funny, but most of all, about the movie.
While most movie reviews are mere comparisons to other films ("This year's Pulp Fiction!" type of dirge), Ebert breaks down the movie. He discusses what works with it. What emotions the film brought out in him. What this movie made him think about, well after the lights came back on. I can't believe how many critics I see on TV who never seem to be willing to insult a film that they didn't like, because then they might not get to interview its star, or get free tickets to the studio's next film. Ebert's fame and influence help to make him invulnerable to this kind of bribery / blackmail.
Often reading Ebert's review of a film after I had seen it makes me appreciate the good ones more, and hate the bad ones more for wasting my time. Even when I don't agree with his overall opinion, he often will bring up new points that make me question what I originally thought about the film. I do disagree with him around 10% of the time, but he seldom brings up a point or an argument that I can’t see his reasoning behind.
Although the majority of the book is composed of his film reviews, each year's edition also contains various extras, including interviews, essays and answers to questions submitted to him by readers. You will usually see a detailed list of what he considers to be the greatest films of the year, and why. He has often discussed the careers of movie makers who have perished that year. Sometimes he just writes about current trends in films, or important developments that year.
Each year is larger than the one before it, but will still contain much older reviews. The newest guide always adds dozens of films from the previous year, but only loses a smaller number of reviews for films that he doesn’t feel the need to keep describing, or reviews he wasn’t as happy with.
He treats both the major Hollywood releases with equal respect as the art house and foreign films. He respects the large summer blockbusters that used to be much cheaper and simply called B-films. When rating and discussing them, he considers them based upon the audience they are aimed for. Even if you don't agree with his opinion on the film, when you read his review you will see that he is a great writer, and true to his feelings.
He is the only movie reviewer to win a Pulitzer Prize, and for good reason.
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