For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism

No film reviewer could be remotely objective about Boston Phoenix critic Peary’s long-gestating documentary. (Full disclosure: I’ve met the director and consider many of the interviewees to be friends and mentors.) But it may work better for those unfamiliar with the profession than those who are. The first half is a snappy rundown of film criticism’s early days, recalling a time when reviewer Frank E. Woods could go on to write for D.W. Griffith or Robert Sherwood would host Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford at his wedding. The film moves on to more-remembered critics, providing primers on Otis Ferguson and Manny Farber as well as a lively recap of the Kael-Sarris feud.

At times, Peary seems to buy the argument that film criticism’s heyday waned as the profession grew, with newer, less authoritative voices crowding out a handful of titans. One section, about the way blockbuster ad campaigns and home video changed reviewing, is absurdly titled “When Film Criticism Mattered, 1968–1980”—time bounds that don’t even encompass the careers of half the critics interviewed. Streamlining a complicated story, Peary sometimes equivocates. Yes, Star Wars was a landmark popular success, but it didn’t single-handedly make critics irrelevant. Yes, the Internet has been seen as giving voice to a more youthful crowd, but even influential print critics started young. If anything, the historical overview shows that criticism—like cinema—finds ways of surviving new challenges.

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