I Lost It at the Movies
Encyclopedia
Pauline Kael
Pauline Kael was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. Earlier in her career, her work appeared in City Lights, McCall's and The New Republic....
's first collection of reviews, covering the years 1954-1965, which was published prior to her long stint at The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
. As a result, the pieces in the book are culled from radio broadcasts that she did while she was at KPFA
KPFA
KPFA is a listener-funded progressive talk radio and music radio station located in Berkeley, California, broadcasting to the San Francisco Bay Area. KPFA airs public news, public affairs, talk, and music programming. The station signed on-the-air April 15 1949, as the first Pacifica Station...
, as well as numerous periodicals, including Moviegoer, the Massachusetts Review, Sight and Sound, Film Culture
Film Culture
Film Culture was an American film magazine started by Adolfas Mekas and his brother Jonas Mekas in 1954, and is now defunct. It is best known for exploring the avant-garde cinema in depth, but also published articles on all aspects of cinema, including Hollywood films.Past contributors include...
, Film Quarterly
Film Quarterly
Film Quarterly is a film journal published by University of California Press, in Berkeley, California, United States. It was first published in 1945 as Hollywood Quarterly, was renamed The Quarterly of Film Radio and Television in 1951, and received its current title in 1958...
and Partisan Review
Partisan Review
Partisan Review was an American political and literary quarterly published from 1934 to 2003, though it suspended publication between October 1936 and December 1937.-Overview:...
. It contains her negative review of the then widely-acclaimed West Side Story
West Side Story (film)
West Side Story is a 1961 musical film directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins. The film is an adaptation of the 1957 Broadway musical of the same name, which in turn was adapted from William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. It stars Natalie Wood, Richard Beymer, Russ Tamblyn, Rita Moreno,...
, glowing reviews of other movies such as The Golden Coach
The Golden Coach
The Golden Coach is a 1952 film directed by Jean Renoir that tells the story of a commedia dell'arte troupe in 18th century Peru. The screenplay was written by Renoir, Jack Kirkland, Renzo Avanzo and Giulio Macchi and is based on the play, Le Carrosse du Saint-Sacrement by Prosper Mérimée...
and Seven Samurai, as well as longer polemical essays such as her largely negative critical responses to Siegfried Kracauer
Siegfried Kracauer
Siegfried Kracauer was a German-Jewish writer, journalist, sociologist, cultural critic, and film theorist...
's Theory of Film and Andrew Sarris
Andrew Sarris
Andrew Sarris is an American film critic and a leading proponent of the auteur theory of criticism.-Career:Sarris is generally credited with popularizing the auteur theory in the U.S...
's Film Culture
Film Culture
Film Culture was an American film magazine started by Adolfas Mekas and his brother Jonas Mekas in 1954, and is now defunct. It is best known for exploring the avant-garde cinema in depth, but also published articles on all aspects of cinema, including Hollywood films.Past contributors include...
essay Notes on the Auteur Theory, 1962. The book was a bestseller upon its first release, and is now published by Marion Boyars Publishers
Marion Boyars Publishers
Marion Boyars Publishers is an independent publishing company located in Great Britain, publishing books that focus on the humanities and social sciences.-External links:*...
.
Kael's first book is characterized by an approach where she would often quote contemporary critics such as Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...
and Dwight Macdonald
Dwight Macdonald
Dwight Macdonald was an American writer, editor, film critic, social critic, philosopher, and political radical.-Early life and career:...
as a springboard to debunk their assertions while advancing her own ideas. This approach was later abandoned in her subsequent reviews, but is notably referred to in Macdonald's book, Dwight Macdonald On Movies (1969).
When an interviewer asked her in later years as to what she had "lost", as indicated in the title, Kael averred: "There are so many kinds of innocence to be lost at the movies." It is the first in a series of titles of books that would have a deliberately erotic connotation, typifying the sensual relation Kael perceived herself as having with the movies, as opposed to the theoretical bent that some among her colleagues had.
Contents
The book is divided into an introduction, and four sections. These sections are entitled as such: I) Broadsides; II) Retrospective Reviews: Movies Remembered with Pleasure; III) Broadcasts and Reviews, 1961–1963; and IV) Polemics.The introduction is entitled "Zeitgeist and Poltergeist; Or, Are Movies Going to Pieces?"
The contents of Section One (Broadsides):
- Fantasies of the Art-House Audience
- The Glamour of Delinquency
- Commitment and the Straitjacket
- Hud, Deep in the Divided Heart of Hollywood
Movies reviewed in Section Two (Retrospective Reviews):
- The Earrings of Madame de...The Earrings of Madame de...The Earrings of Madame de... is a 1953 drama film directed by Max Ophüls. It was adapted from Louise Leveque de Vilmorin's period novel.This film is considered as a masterpiece of the 1950s French cinema....
- The Golden CoachThe Golden CoachThe Golden Coach is a 1952 film directed by Jean Renoir that tells the story of a commedia dell'arte troupe in 18th century Peru. The screenplay was written by Renoir, Jack Kirkland, Renzo Avanzo and Giulio Macchi and is based on the play, Le Carrosse du Saint-Sacrement by Prosper Mérimée...
- Smiles of a Summer NightSmiles of a Summer NightSmiles of a Summer Night a.k.a. Smiles on a Summer Night is a 1955 Swedish comedy film directed by Ingmar Bergman. It was the first of Bergman's films to bring the director international success, due to its exposure at the 1956 Cannes Film Festival...
- La Grande Illusion
- Forbidden GamesForbidden GamesForbidden Games , is a 1952 French-language film directed by René Clément and based on François Boyer's novel, Jeux interdits.While not initially successful in France, the film was a hit elsewhere. It won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, and is still one of the most popular French films...
- Shoeshine
- The Beggar's OperaThe Beggar's OperaThe Beggar's Opera is a ballad opera in three acts written in 1728 by John Gay with music arranged by Johann Christoph Pepusch. It is one of the watershed plays in Augustan drama and is the only example of the once thriving genre of satirical ballad opera to remain popular today...
- Seven Samurai
Movies reviewed and titles of articles in Section Three (Broadcasts and Reviews):
- Breathless, and the Daisy Miller Doll
- The Cousins
- Canned Americana
- West Side StoryWest Side Story (film)West Side Story is a 1961 musical film directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins. The film is an adaptation of the 1957 Broadway musical of the same name, which in turn was adapted from William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. It stars Natalie Wood, Richard Beymer, Russ Tamblyn, Rita Moreno,...
- L'avventuraL'avventuraL'Avventura is a 1960 Italian film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni and developed from a story he created. Monica Vitti and Gabriele Ferzetti star. It is noted for its careful pacing, which puts a focus on visual composition and character development, as well as for its unusual narrative structure...
- One, Two, ThreeOne, Two, ThreeOne, Two, Three is a 1961 American comedy film directed by Billy Wilder and written by him and I.A.L. Diamond. It is based on the 1929 Hungarian one-act play Egy, kettö, három by Ferenc Molnár, with a "plot borrowed partly from" Ninotchka, a 1939 film co-written by Wilder...
- The Mark
- KagiOdd Obsessionis a 1959 Japanese drama film directed by Kon Ichikawa. It was entered into the 1960 Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Jury Prize. It was based on the novel The Key, by Japanese novelist Junichiro Tanizaki.-Plot:...
- The InnocentsThe InnocentsThe Innocents may refer to:* The Innocents , a 1917 novel by Sinclair Lewis* The Innocents , a 1950 play by William Archibald based on Henry James' The Turn of the Screw...
- A View from the BridgeA View from the BridgeA View from the Bridge is a play by American playwright Arthur Miller that was first staged on September 29, 1955 as a one-act verse drama with A Memory of Two Mondays at the Coronet Theatre on Broadway. The play was unsuccessful and Miller subsequently revised the play to contain two acts; this...
, and a Note on The Children's HourThe Children's Hour (1961 film)The Children's Hour is a 1961 American drama film directed by William Wyler. The screenplay by John Michael Hayes is based on the 1934 play of the same title by Lillian Hellman... - The Day the Earth Caught FireThe Day the Earth Caught FireThe Day the Earth Caught Fire is a British science fiction disaster film starring Edward Judd, Leo McKern and Janet Munro. It was directed by Val Guest and released in 1961....
- The Come-Dressed-As-the-Sick-Soul-of-Europe Parties: La notteLa NotteLa Notte is a 1961 Italian film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. It is considered the central film of a trilogy beginning with L'avventura and ending with L'Eclisse.- Plot :...
, Last Year at MarienbadLast Year at MarienbadL'Année dernière à Marienbad is a 1961 French film directed by Alain Resnais from a screenplay by Alain Robbe-Grillet....
, La dolce vitaLa Dolce VitaLa Dolce Vita is a 1960 comedy-drama film written and directed by the critically acclaimed director Federico Fellini. The film is a story of a passive journalist's week in Rome, and his search for both happiness and love that will never come... - A Taste of HoneyA Taste of Honey (film)A Taste of Honey is a 1961 British film adaptation of the play of the same name by Shelagh Delaney. Delaney adapted the screenplay herself, aided by director Tony Richardson, who had previously directed the first production of the play...
- Victim
- LolitaLolita (1962 film)Lolita is a 1962 comedy-drama film by Stanley Kubrick based on the classic novel of the same title by Vladimir Nabokov. The film stars James Mason as Humbert Humbert, Sue Lyon as Dolores Haze and Shelley Winters as Charlotte Haze with Peter Sellers as Clare Quilty.Due to the MPAA's restrictions at...
- Shoot the Piano PlayerShoot the Piano PlayerShoot the Piano Player is a 1960 French film directed by François Truffaut, starring Charles Aznavour.The film is loosely based on the novel Down There by David Goodis.- Plot summary :...
- Jules and JimJules and JimJules and Jim is a 1962 French film directed by François Truffaut based on Henri-Pierre Roché's 1953 semi-autobiographical novel about his relationship with writer Franz Hessel and his wife, Helen Grund....
- Hemingway's Adventures of a Young ManAdventures of a Young ManAdventures of a Young Man is a 1939 novel by John Dos Passos, which eventually became the first in this writer's District of Columbia Trilogy....
- Fires On The PlainFires on the Plain (film)is a 1959 Japanese war film directed by Kon Ichikawa, starring Eiji Funakoshi. The screenplay, written by, Natto Wada, is based on the novel Nobi by Shohei Ooka, translated as Fires on the Plain. It initially received mixed reviews from both Japanese and international critics concerning its...
- Replying to Listeners
- Billy BuddBilly Budd (film)Billy Budd is a 1962 film produced, directed, and co-written by Peter Ustinov. Adapted from the stage play version of Herman Melville's short novel Billy Budd, it starred Terence Stamp as Billy Budd, Robert Ryan as John Claggart, and Ustinov as Captain Vere...
- Yojimbo
- DeviDeviDevī is the Sanskrit word for Goddess, used mostly in Hinduism, its related masculine term is deva. Devi is synonymous with Shakti, the female aspect of the divine, as conceptualized by the Shakta tradition of Hinduism. She is the female counterpart without whom the male aspect, which represents...
- How the Long Distance Runner Throws the Race
- 8½8½8½ is a 1963 Italian fantasy film directed by Federico Fellini. Co-scripted by Fellini, Tullio Pinelli, Ennio Flaiano, and Brunello Rondi, it stars Marcello Mastroianni as Guido Anselmi, a famous Italian film director...
: Confessions of a Movie Director
Contents of Section Four (Polemics):
- Is There a Cure for Film Criticism? Or, Some Unhappy Thoughts on Siegfried Kracauer's Theory of Film: The Redemption of Physical Reality
- Circles and Squares
- Morality Plays Right and Left
Critical responses
In Dwight Macdonald On Movies, Macdonald includes a brief five-page review of I Lost It at the Movies. While he states in the beginning of his review that he has, on the whole, favorable sentiments towards the book, he nevertheless criticizes Kael for being "stronger on the intellectual side than on the aesthetic side" as well as her persistence in quoting other critics out of context. In the process, Macdonald confutes some of the assertions Kael makes about his own opinions regarding certain movies.Dwight Macdonald writes:
Nevertheless, Macdonald goes on to say that some of the quotes that Kael utilizes in her reviews are often used incorrectly especially in regards to him, creating a distorted view of the opinions he had on certain movies such as Jules and Jim
Jules and Jim
Jules and Jim is a 1962 French film directed by François Truffaut based on Henri-Pierre Roché's 1953 semi-autobiographical novel about his relationship with writer Franz Hessel and his wife, Helen Grund....
. He also questions the validity of some of her assessments of a few movies, including Hiroshima Mon Amour
Hiroshima Mon Amour
Hiroshima mon amour is an acclaimed 1959 drama film directed by French film director Alain Resnais, with a screenplay by Marguerite Duras. It is the documentation of an intensely personal conversation between a French-Japanese couple about memory and forgetfulness...
, 8½
8½
8½ is a 1963 Italian fantasy film directed by Federico Fellini. Co-scripted by Fellini, Tullio Pinelli, Ennio Flaiano, and Brunello Rondi, it stars Marcello Mastroianni as Guido Anselmi, a famous Italian film director...
, and Last Year in Marienbad, stating that she is "perversely literal-minded" and comments upon "her ascetic insensibility to the sensual pleasures of cinema...when she dislikes the literary content." When Kael ponders in the book "it [is] difficult to understand why Dwight Macdonald with his dedication to high art sacrifices his time to them," Macdonald contends that he has always considered movies to be a high art. This, in a way, highlights the differences in their perspectives on movies: Pauline Kael sees movies as a fusion of pop and art elements (a mixture of lowbrow and highbrow), while Macdonald sees it in more highbrow terms. On the whole, Macdonald seems to respect her critical acumen, but not her methods.
A more adverse reaction comes from the auteurist Andrew Sarris, mainly as a result of the essay '"Circles and Squares", which was originally published in Film Quarterly
Film Quarterly
Film Quarterly is a film journal published by University of California Press, in Berkeley, California, United States. It was first published in 1945 as Hollywood Quarterly, was renamed The Quarterly of Film Radio and Television in 1951, and received its current title in 1958...
. Sarris's reaction was in response to Kael's denunciation of the Auteur theory's merits, and has, in later years, occasionally jabbed at Kael's work. Examples of his critical observations are available in his books, e.g., The Primal Screen and Politics and Cinema. With the exception of "Circles and Squares", Kael has rarely responded. Notwithstanding Kael's unresponsive silence, this has gone down in film lore as the Sarris-Kael feud.
Further reading
The book actually does not contain the full range of Kael's writings published in magazines from this period. From 1962-64, Kael had written for a short-lived section of Film QuarterlyFilm Quarterly
Film Quarterly is a film journal published by University of California Press, in Berkeley, California, United States. It was first published in 1945 as Hollywood Quarterly, was renamed The Quarterly of Film Radio and Television in 1951, and received its current title in 1958...
entitled Films of the Quarter, alongside other critics such as Stanley Kauffmann
Stanley Kauffmann
Stanley Kauffmann is an American author, editor, and critic of film and theatre. He has written for The New Republic since 1958 and currently contributes film criticism to that magazine....
and the screenwriter Gavin Lambert
Gavin Lambert
Gavin Lambert was a British-born screenwriter, novelist and biographer who lived for part of his life in Hollywood...
. Some, but not all, of these writings are included in this book.
Miscellaneous
In reference to the title of the book, the critic Jonathan RosenbaumJonathan Rosenbaum
Jonathan Rosenbaum is an American film critic. Rosenbaum was the head film critic for the Chicago Reader from 1987 until 2008, when he retired at the age of 65...
wrote an article entitled "I Missed It at the Movies: Objections to Raising Kane" as a rebuttal to Kael's essay on Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane is a 1941 American drama film, directed by and starring Orson Welles. Many critics consider it the greatest American film of all time, especially for its innovative cinematography, music and narrative structure. Citizen Kane was Welles' first feature film...
, which had been entitled "Raising Kane".
- In Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized AutobiographyLemony Snicket: The Unauthorized AutobiographyLemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography was first released on May 1, 2002. The book's content relates to the author Lemony Snicket and his series of books, A Series of Unfortunate Events...
, the book is referenced under the parody title I Lost Something at the Movies, and a short snippet of the made-up book is included, where the author theorizes (correctly) that the (fictional) film titled Zombies in the Snow awkward dialogue is actually written as such in order to pass on messages in a secret code. The name of the fictional author given, "Lena Pukalie", is also an anagram of Pauline Kael.
Quotes
- I would like to suggest that the educated audience often uses "art" films in much the same self-indulgent way as the mass audience uses the Hollywood "product," finding wish fulfillment in the form of cheap and easy congratulation on their sensitivities and liberalism. - Fantasies of the Art-house Audience
- Siegfried Kracauer is the sort of man who can't say "It's a lovely day" without first establishing that it is day, that the term "day" is meaningless without the dialectical concept of "night," that both these terms have no meaning unless there is a world in which day and night alternate, and so forth. By the time he has established an epistemological system to support his right to observe that it's a lovely day, our day has been spoiled. - Is There a Cure for Film Criticism?
- When a really attractive Easterner said to me, "I don't generally like musicals, but have you seen West Side Story? It's really great," I felt a kind of gnawing discomfort. I love musicals and so I couldn't help being suspicious of the greatness of a musical that would be so overwhelming to somebody who didn't like musicals. - Kael on West Side Story
- There is a standard answer to this old idiocy of if-you-know-so-much-about-the-art-of-the-film-why-don't-you-make-movies. You don't have to lay an egg to know if it tastes good. - Replying to Listeners
- Can we conclude that, in England and the United States, the auteur theory is an attempt by adult males to justify staying inside the small range of experience of their boyhood and adolescence - that period when masculinity looked so great and important but art was something talked about by poseurs and phonies and sensitive-feminine types? - Circles and Squares
- When Shoeshine opened in 1947, I went to see it alone after one of those terrible lovers' quarrels that leave one in a state of incomprehensible despair. I came out of the theater, tears streaming, and overheard the petulant voice of a college girl complaining to her boyfriend, "Well I don't see what was so special about that movie." I walked up the street, crying blindly, no longer certain whether my tears were for the tragedy on the screen, the hopelessness I felt for myself, or the alienation I felt from those who could not experience the radiance of Shoeshine. For if people cannot feel Shoeshine, what can they feel? My identification with those two lost boys had become so strong that I did not feel simply a mixture of pity and disgust toward this dissatisfied customer but an intensified hopelessness about everything. - Kael on Shoeshine
External links
- 8 ½ : Confessions of a Movie Director"
- Excerpts from 'Is There a Cure for Film Criticism? (or, Some Unhappy Thoughts on Siegfried Kracauer's Theory of Film: The Redemption of Physical Reality)'"
- Link to 'Fantasies of the Art-House Audience' essay"