Tag: john damico

What Roger Ebert’s Death Means

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R.I.P. Roger Joseph Ebert. June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013

Today, John D’Amico was supposed to wax poetic about obscure zombie movies. That piece has been moved to next week. I don’t think anyone wants to read about zombie movies right now, or read about anything to do with movies, for that matter, unless it has to do with Roger Ebert. At least, I certainly don’t.

I expect that over the next few days, weeks, months, I will binge on everything Ebert. Episodes, books, interviews, etcetera. That’s the kind of death this is. A death where you are left speechless and searching, grasping for the artist’s soulful air as though it will wisp away into the ether if you don’t. But of course, it won’t. It will live on forever, and there is all the time in the world to experience and re-experience it. But the impulse is unavoidable.
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A Rebuttal to a Rebuttal: Favorite Equals Best, or, Why Back To The Future is Better Than The Godfather

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John,

I’ve been interested in movies for as long as I can remember.  The story I tell is that Jurassic Park started it all.  It certainly didn’t hurt, but movies had definitely been on my mind for way longer than that.  And my parents and grandparents were both movie buffs, so when the AFI released their ill-conceived 100 Best Movies of the First 100 Years of Movies, it was the talk of our family for an entire Thanksgiving dinner.  I was ten or twelve at the time.  By the time I was fifteen, I had seen 92 of the movies listed.
Continue reading A Rebuttal to a Rebuttal: Favorite Equals Best, or, Why Back To The Future is Better Than The Godfather

Advice Column #2 (3/25/13)

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Black comedy, something like: Arsenic and Old Lace, Dr. Strangelove. Or, some with dry British humour like Kind Hearts and Coronets. – Bawuk R.

Cody Clarke: I’m blanking on older black comedies besides what you mentioned. But hell, you didn’t specify old, so fuck it, here’s some non-old black comedies that are great:

Editor’s Note (12/4/14): We no longer answer movie questions through our advice column. We answer them in the mailbag segment of our podcast. Send them to Cody@SmugFilm.com and we will answer on the show!
Continue reading Advice Column #2 (3/25/13)

A Rebuttal to ‘The Idea of What a Movie Is’

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Greed (1924) | Directed by Erich von Stroheim

Greg,

There’s a film writer I like named Marya Gates who once tackled the idea that “old movies” aren’t worthwhile. In a short video overview of film history from inception to the present day, she concluded that “if you don’t love all of it, I don’t understand how you can watch any of it.”

This, to me, is the only valid way of viewing movies. Dismissive negativity is the cheapest commodity in the world and the culture of holding yourself in smug superiority over what you’re viewing seems only to grow in the echo chamber of the internet, full as it is of teenagers and self-proclaimed cynics who cling to their assumptions and prejudices as an essential and valuable part of themselves, not recognizing that those qualities are our greatest failings. So, I’m baffled by your piece The Idea of What a Movie Is.
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We Now Offer Free Movie Advice!

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Typical Smug Film reader at a movie store.

If cinema has taught us anything, it’s not to trust robots. So why get movie recommendations from robots? Robots don’t know anything about movies. If they did, they’d make ’em themselves or whatever. So fuck all that algorithmic nonsense on Netflix and Amazon and IMDb and countless other sites. Nothing beats good ol’ fashioned advice from a knowledgable film buff who enjoys stuff from all genres. But gone are the days when you could walk into a video store and get that sort of service. Which is why we have started a free movie advice column.

Every Monday (Beginning March 18th) Cody Clarke and John D’Amico will answer a new batch of your requests. Simply fill out the form below, and you can kiss your ‘what to watch’ woes away! (Form will not appear in RSS.)

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