I am having a hard time believing I’m writing this.
Roger Ebert was an icon of film reviewing and the Chicago Sun-Times, the newspaper where he reviewed films for almost 50 years, is reporting that he has succumbed in his long battle with cancer and poor health.
For me, a filmmaker and film lover, Ebert was a teacher and a barometer for films and filmmaking. His commentaries on movies like Dark City, Casablanca, and Citizen Kane are essential viewing for anyone learning how to make movies.
More than anything, he was a fantastic writer who loved movies. Even when I disagreed with a review he’d written, vehemently even, I could not argue with the care and mastery of craft he infused with every piece. And let’s be honest, his review of The Phantom Menace is a masterpiece of film criticism.
Perhaps my favorite personal moment that involved Roger Ebert was while my friend and filmmaking colleague, Ryan Williams, was in the midst of making his film Abby Singer. The entire conceit of the film was that it was ad-libbed and the actors would interact with celebrities to secure their cameo in the film, hopefully making it more salable. Being based in Utah made Sundance an easy target for these cameos and Ryan had been up there gathering cameos in his guerilla fashion.
I got a call one night from Ryan, who knew I was a fan of Ebert. Ryan and I had watched many of his commentaries repeatedly together, discussing technique and filmmaking. “I got Roger Ebert in the can,” he said.
“What? Roger Ebert? That’s amazing. What did he do?”
“The White Parasol monologue from Kane.”
Ryan had bumped into Ebert, explained what he was doing, asked the legendary critic to participate and participate he did. He didn’t just relay the White Parasol monologue once or twice, he allowed Ryan to film it many times, with his actor, in the middle of the Sundance bustle, to get it right.
I’m still looking for a version of Ebert doing it to show to you, but it was incredible. (Here’s the “>trailer for the film with a snippet from the Ebert scene in the meantime.)
We’ve lost truly one of the great writers and newspapermen of our time. Neither journalism nor the world of film will be the same after the passing of Roger Ebert. And we’re all poorer for it.
Hell, I’ve been holding back tears the entire time I wrote this. I’ve watched his show so much and listened to his commentaries and read his books so often that I can still hear his voice quite clearly whenever I read anything associated with him. I hope I never forget.
And so we can be sure to end on a happier note, here’s his cameo on The Critic:
I know I’ll be listening to one of his commentaries tonight. It’s the least I can do.