Roger Ebert, RIP

Roger Ebert has died at age 70. His cancer had returned and he was taking a "leave of presence" to be treated.

I read this quote from him in an article in Esquire three years ago:

"I know it is coming, and I do not fear it, because I believe there is nothing on the other side of death to fear," he writes in a journal entry titled Go Gently into That Good Night. "I hope to be spared as much pain as possible on the approach path. I was perfectly content before I was born, and I think of death as the same state. What I am grateful for is the gift of intelligence, and for life, love, wonder, and laughter. You can’t say it wasn’t interesting. My lifetime’s memories are what I have brought home from the trip. I will require them for eternity no more than that little souvenir of the Eiffel Tower I brought home from Paris."

I wish I could find my copy of Hollywood by Charles Bukowski, his novel about the making of the movie Barfly. Ebert appears in it under the name Rick Talbot. Bukowski generally disliked people---in the book he expresses some antipathy for Jean-Luc Godard and David Lynch among others. But he liked Ebert, in part because he ordered a double vodka. They were hanging around during the filming. Ebert commented on the atmosphere on some low budget films.

I've heard this from other people. With low budget movies, the cast and crew are paid less, the film will do less for their careers, they don't really have to be there so the people in charge have to be polite and respectful.

Spike Lee put out a statement noting that Ebert was the first major critic to support his work.

 

Ebert tweeted his support for Mark Rappaport's efforts to get his stuff back from Ray Carney and he and gave a thumbs up to Jon Jost's All the Vermeers in New York----not like that snotty Vincent Canby.