Roger Ebert

Catching Fire: The Story of Anita Pallenberg
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"I've been called a witch, a slut, and a murderer. Maybe people confuse me with the characters I play in films ... like I'm an empty vessel onto which they project their fantasies and their shortcomings, but I don't need...
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The Weight of Smoke (and Blue in the Face): The Magic of Paul Auster
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"Smoke" was the perfect title for a movie written by the late Paul Auster. Not just because it's set in and around a Brooklyn cigar store but because the smoke has a shape that is ever-changing and ephemeral: within moments of...
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Retrospective: Oscar Micheaux and the Birth of Black Independent Cinema
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To watch an Oscar Micheaux film is to see the miracle of a tragedy.  Though Michaeux produced over forty pictures — spanning the pre-classical silent era and through the advent of sound — only eighteen such works survive (nearly all...
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Phil Lord and Chris Miller Made the Multiplex Safe for ‘The Fall Guy’
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In “The Fall Guy,” Ryan Gosling plays Colt, a veteran stunt performer whose real life becomes an action movie once he’s tasked with finding an egotistical movie star (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) who’s gone missing. Colt jumps over a wall of fire...
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Initially Promising Dark Matter Sinks Under Weight of Prestige TV Bloat
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There’s a decent movie buried in the bloated “Dark Matter,” the latest expensive venture from the good folks at Apple TV+, a streamer that's developed something of an identity as a platform for adult sci-fi with shows like “Silo,” “Constellation,” “Invasion,”...
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The Idea of You
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Tell me if this sounds familiar: A romantic couple, one American, one British, one the proprietor of a small, very narrow business, happy with family and friends but lonely and a little lost, one a global superstar, but lonely and...
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Tomorrow There Will Be Fine Weather: A Preview of NYC’s Upcoming Hiroshi Shimizu Retrospective
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There's such a rich pleasure in diving deep into the work of one filmmaker: you watch them perfect their craft while seeing which themes and motifs anchor their body of work through time. Such was the case as previewed the...
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A Man in Full
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One of my very favorite television genres is Jeff Daniels conducting business while chewing scenery. Whether playing a news anchor in "The Newsroom" or a detective in "American Rust," he always carries himself with such studious charisma. David E. Kelley's "A Man in...
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The Contestant
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Sometimes, the revolution is televised. In 1998, an aspiring comedian auditioned for a Japanese TV show that put young people in difficult situations and filmed them for entertainment. By the luck of the draw, he won the chance to pursue...
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AMC’s Interview with the Vampire Has a Different Flavor in Season Two
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Less than two years after it premiered, “Interview with the Vampire,” AMC’s bold, delightfully garish Anne Rice adaptation returns for another bloody installment. With a new Parisian locale and a recast Claudia, “Interview with the Vampire” continues to deliver vibrant...
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