It’s hard to believe with all the divergent opinions floating around today about movies on Twitter, Facebook, Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic and dozens of other outlets, that there was a time when a handful of influential film critics wielded the power to make or break a movie.
And the most powerful of those critics was Pauline Kael, who held sway with a sharp tongue and corrosive wit at the New Yorker from 1967 to 1989. To see Rob Garver’s affectionate documentary about her career, “What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael,” is to be once again swept away by the excitement of cinema as she experienced it.
Born on a chicken farm in Northern California and raised in San Francisco, Kael was an outsider to the New York art scene, and that otherness gave her the temperament and cocksure confidence to find her own voice. She desperately wanted to be an artist,...
And the most powerful of those critics was Pauline Kael, who held sway with a sharp tongue and corrosive wit at the New Yorker from 1967 to 1989. To see Rob Garver’s affectionate documentary about her career, “What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael,” is to be once again swept away by the excitement of cinema as she experienced it.
Born on a chicken farm in Northern California and raised in San Francisco, Kael was an outsider to the New York art scene, and that otherness gave her the temperament and cocksure confidence to find her own voice. She desperately wanted to be an artist,...
- 12/13/2019
- by James Greenberg
- The Wrap
It’s the final month of the year and there’s no shortage of cinematic gifts. From long-awaited features from some of our favorite directors to genre-tinged delights to massive blockbusters, December is overflowing with films to see. We should note that Portrait of a Lady on Fire is an essential watch, but it’s only getting a one-week awards-qualifying run in NY/La, so we’ll wait to feature it when it opens wide this February. Check out our monthly picks below.
15. Little Joe (Jessica Hausner; Dec. 6)
After landing on our radar with the formally thrilling, adventurous Amour Fou, Jessica Hausner finally returned with Little Joe. Starring Emily Beecham, Ben Whishaw, and Kerry Fox, the Cannes winner is set in the near-future where a plant is invented that begins to psychologically alter those who come in contact with it. This plays out in the story of a mother who...
15. Little Joe (Jessica Hausner; Dec. 6)
After landing on our radar with the formally thrilling, adventurous Amour Fou, Jessica Hausner finally returned with Little Joe. Starring Emily Beecham, Ben Whishaw, and Kerry Fox, the Cannes winner is set in the near-future where a plant is invented that begins to psychologically alter those who come in contact with it. This plays out in the story of a mother who...
- 12/2/2019
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Pauline Kael was a great lover of cinema, a great critic, and a great writer. Her words elevated a picture and, as Rob Garver notes in his documentary What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, reading her work was often like watching a film for the second time from a different perspective.
And so, it is rather unfortunate that such a great and talented artist doesn't get a better film about her life and work.
While it features interviews with friends, family and colleagues, as well as excerpts from her various works, the information the film provides does little to illuminate or provide any new insight into Kael and her work. The interviews are mostly flat and uninteresting with a few notable exceptions and then only because the interview subjects themselves are interesting...
And so, it is rather unfortunate that such a great and talented artist doesn't get a better film about her life and work.
While it features interviews with friends, family and colleagues, as well as excerpts from her various works, the information the film provides does little to illuminate or provide any new insight into Kael and her work. The interviews are mostly flat and uninteresting with a few notable exceptions and then only because the interview subjects themselves are interesting...
- 10/2/2019
- QuietEarth.us
"She refused to be intimidated." Film Forum has unveiled an official trailer for the documentary What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, a biopic doc profiling the controversial film critic with a "sharp tongue". This originally premiered at the Telluride Film Festival last year, and it has gone on to play at numerous festivals all throughout this year so far. The film is a portrait of the work of controversial film critic Pauline Kael (who passed away in 2001 at the age of 82) and her influence on the male-dominated worlds of cinema and film criticism. It's an often humorous, searing look at the power of film criticism and the passion Kael had for speaking up and sharing her opinion - even when others didn't like it. "In an inspired and passionate mash-up of her own words, contemporary interviews and the films she wrote about, Rob Garver has crafted in his...
- 10/1/2019
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
What would legendary film critic Pauline Kael think about Rob Garver’s documentary about her own life and career? She might have loved the fawning introductions by both filmmakers and fellow critics alike or they might have repulsed her, but she certainly would have enjoyed the inherent weirdness of making a movie about someone who spent so much of her life watching movies. “What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael” looks at Kael’s career from its earliest stages, illuminating parts of her work that might be unfamiliar (from the free radio show to a gig working in advertising to a misbegotten attempt at playwriting), though it’s understandably more beefy when looking at the stuff people normally associate with her work.
There’s a look at her zeitgeist-shifting “Bonnie and Clyde” review, the adoration for the work of then-rising auteurs like Martin Scorsese and Brian DePalma, and Kael...
There’s a look at her zeitgeist-shifting “Bonnie and Clyde” review, the adoration for the work of then-rising auteurs like Martin Scorsese and Brian DePalma, and Kael...
- 9/30/2019
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
The CineStar’s eight screens host Panorama, Forum and Efm screenings.
The Berlin Film Festival is on the hunt for alternative screening venues for its 70th edition in February 2020 following news the CineStar cinema complex in the Sony Centre in Potsdamer Platz may be on the verge of shutting down.
Jörg Reichel, an official at German trade union ver.di representing the complex’s some 120 staff, told local Berlin TV station Rbb earlier this week the venue was under threat of closure.
If it happens, the Berlinale will have eight fewer screens available in and around its Potsdamer Platz hub for festival and market screenings.
The Berlin Film Festival is on the hunt for alternative screening venues for its 70th edition in February 2020 following news the CineStar cinema complex in the Sony Centre in Potsdamer Platz may be on the verge of shutting down.
Jörg Reichel, an official at German trade union ver.di representing the complex’s some 120 staff, told local Berlin TV station Rbb earlier this week the venue was under threat of closure.
If it happens, the Berlinale will have eight fewer screens available in and around its Potsdamer Platz hub for festival and market screenings.
- 6/19/2019
- by Martin Blaney
- ScreenDaily
The well-crafted What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael is a fascinating tribute to a maverick film critic who celebrated high and low art indiscriminately, and was also quick to point out in her reviews–even to the point of controversy–what she viewed as extreme pretensions. It’s no doubt that Kael influenced Roger Ebert’s primary rule of film criticism when she panned Claude Lanzmann’s universally acclaimed nine-hour Holocaust documentary Shoah, in which she received blowback for her scathing but not unfair words about the picture.
Kael’s far-reaching influence extended into the mainstreams of cinema and film criticism even as she continued to rally against the “sugar-coated lie” at the core of popular films that were consumer products of the era like The Sound of Music. The influential New Yorker critic typically held back, waiting for a consensus to build before launching her attack or support.
Kael’s far-reaching influence extended into the mainstreams of cinema and film criticism even as she continued to rally against the “sugar-coated lie” at the core of popular films that were consumer products of the era like The Sound of Music. The influential New Yorker critic typically held back, waiting for a consensus to build before launching her attack or support.
- 5/9/2019
- by John Fink
- The Film Stage
The Montclair Film Festival will hold the world premiere of the restoration of the 1959 movie “The Diary of Anne Frank,” Variety has learned exclusively.
The black-and-white film, directed by George Stevens, has been restored by Twentieth Century Fox and the Film Foundation. The holocaust drama was nominated for eight Academy Awards and won three, including best supporting actress for Shelly Winters.
The festival, now in its eighth year, will take place May 3-12 in Montclair, N.J., and features more than 150 films, events, discussions and parties. The festival had previously announced that it would open with a screening of Tom Harper’s “Wild Rose,” with star Jessie Buckley attending for a post-screening Q&A.
This year’s Storyteller Series will include A Conversation with Mindy Kaling, moderated by Stephen Colbert, taking place May 4 and A Conversation with Ben Stiller, moderated by Colbert, on May 5. Olympia Dukakis will attend for a...
The black-and-white film, directed by George Stevens, has been restored by Twentieth Century Fox and the Film Foundation. The holocaust drama was nominated for eight Academy Awards and won three, including best supporting actress for Shelly Winters.
The festival, now in its eighth year, will take place May 3-12 in Montclair, N.J., and features more than 150 films, events, discussions and parties. The festival had previously announced that it would open with a screening of Tom Harper’s “Wild Rose,” with star Jessie Buckley attending for a post-screening Q&A.
This year’s Storyteller Series will include A Conversation with Mindy Kaling, moderated by Stephen Colbert, taking place May 4 and A Conversation with Ben Stiller, moderated by Colbert, on May 5. Olympia Dukakis will attend for a...
- 4/5/2019
- by Dave McNary
- Variety Film + TV
If I could demolish any one idea in the history of film criticism, I think it would be the often stated canard that Pauline Kael wrote flashy exuberant prose, spilling her gut reactions to a movie all over the page — but that she wasn’t an “analytical” writer. That opinion is miles-out-of-the-ballpark wrong, and it’s almost certainly sexist. Yet what’s most annoying about it is that it’s based on the whole second-rate, boring-college-seminar idea of what “analysis” is: a quality that somehow exists apart from emotional excitement. When Pauline Kael reviewed a movie, any movie at all, her writing pulsated with life, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t parsing everything with supreme braininess and reasoning and inquiry. The analysis was seared into every word, woven into the expressive power of her free-style flow. Her thoughts — incisive, incantatory, indelible — occupied the other side of the coin from her feelings.
- 2/10/2019
- by Owen Gleiberman
- Variety Film + TV
The final Panorama selection includes 45 films from 38 countries, including 34 world premieres.
The final titles for the 2019 Berlin Film Festival (Feb 7-17) Panorama programme have been revealed.
Among the new additions is Light Of My Life, directed by and starring Casey Affleck and co-starring Elisabeth Moss.
Titles revealed back in December include Joanna Hogg’s The Souvenir, Seamus Murphy’s Pj Harvey documentary A Dog Called Money and Rob Garver’s documentary What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael.
The final Panorama selection includes 45 films from 38 countries, including 34 world premieres. There are 29 features, 16 documentaries and 19 directorial debuts.
The full list...
The final titles for the 2019 Berlin Film Festival (Feb 7-17) Panorama programme have been revealed.
Among the new additions is Light Of My Life, directed by and starring Casey Affleck and co-starring Elisabeth Moss.
Titles revealed back in December include Joanna Hogg’s The Souvenir, Seamus Murphy’s Pj Harvey documentary A Dog Called Money and Rob Garver’s documentary What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael.
The final Panorama selection includes 45 films from 38 countries, including 34 world premieres. There are 29 features, 16 documentaries and 19 directorial debuts.
The full list...
- 1/21/2019
- by Orlando Parfitt
- ScreenDaily
Ghost Town AnthologyThe titles for the 69th Berlin International Film Festival are being announced in anticipation of the event running February 7-17, 2019. We will update the program as new films are revealed.COMPETITIONThe Ground Beneath My FeetThe Golden Glove (Faith Akin, Germany/France)By the Grace of GodThe Kindness of StrangersI Was at Home, but A Tale of Three SistersGhost Town Anthology (Denis Côté, Canada)Berlinale SPECIALGully Boy (Zoya Akhtar, India)BrechtWatergate (Charles Ferguson, USA)Panorama 201937 Seconds (Hikari (Mitsuyo Miyazaki), Japan)Dafne (Federico Bondi, Italy)The Day After I'm Gone (Nimrod Eldar, Israel)A Dog Called Money (Seamus Murphy, Ireland/UK)Waiting for the CarnivalChainedFlatland (Jenna Bass, South Africa/Germany/Luxembourg)Greta (Armando Praça, Brazil)Hellhole (Bas Devos, Belgium/Netherlands)Jessica Forever (Caroline Poggi, Jonathan Vinel, France)AcidMid90s (Jonah Hill, USA) Family MembersMonos (Alejandro Landes, Columbia/Argentina/Netherlands/Germany/Denmark/Sweden/Uruguay) O Beautiful Night (Xaver Böhm,...
- 1/2/2019
- MUBI
22 films in the Panorama programme so far, with nine directorial debuts.
The first 22 titles from the 2019 Berlin Film Festival (Feb 7-17) Panorama programme have been revealed.
Scroll down for the full line-up
The European premiere of UK director Joanna Hogg’s The Souvenir, starring Tilda Swinton, her daughter Honor Swinton-Byrne and Tom Burke, and the world premiere of Seamus Murphy’s Pj Harvey documentary A Dog Called Money are among the titles confirmed today.
The line-up also includes the directing debuts of actors Jonah Hill (Mid90s) and Alexander Gorchilin (Acid), and Rob Garver’s documentary What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael,...
The first 22 titles from the 2019 Berlin Film Festival (Feb 7-17) Panorama programme have been revealed.
Scroll down for the full line-up
The European premiere of UK director Joanna Hogg’s The Souvenir, starring Tilda Swinton, her daughter Honor Swinton-Byrne and Tom Burke, and the world premiere of Seamus Murphy’s Pj Harvey documentary A Dog Called Money are among the titles confirmed today.
The line-up also includes the directing debuts of actors Jonah Hill (Mid90s) and Alexander Gorchilin (Acid), and Rob Garver’s documentary What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael,...
- 12/18/2018
- by Orlando Parfitt
- ScreenDaily
Jonah Hill’s directorial debut, “mid90s,” about a 13-year-old skateboarder’s coming of age, and a documentary on influential film critic Pauline Kael are among the works that will screen in the Panorama section of the upcoming Berlin Film Festival.
Films starring Tilda Swinton and Jamie Bell and titles from countries including Israel, Brazil and Japan were also announced in the first batch of 22 Panorama selections unveiled by the Berlinale on Tuesday. Nine of the films are debut works, and 14 will have their world premiere in the German capital. The section is curated by Paz Lázaro and co-curator and program manager Michael Stütz.
“mid90s” follows teenage Stevie as he joins up with four skateboarding punks who take him under their wing. Variety described Hill’s debut film as “a slice of street life made up of skittery moments that achieve a bone-deep reality. And because you believe what you’re seeing,...
Films starring Tilda Swinton and Jamie Bell and titles from countries including Israel, Brazil and Japan were also announced in the first batch of 22 Panorama selections unveiled by the Berlinale on Tuesday. Nine of the films are debut works, and 14 will have their world premiere in the German capital. The section is curated by Paz Lázaro and co-curator and program manager Michael Stütz.
“mid90s” follows teenage Stevie as he joins up with four skateboarding punks who take him under their wing. Variety described Hill’s debut film as “a slice of street life made up of skittery moments that achieve a bone-deep reality. And because you believe what you’re seeing,...
- 12/18/2018
- by Henry Chu
- Variety Film + TV
The Panorama section of the Berlin International Film Festival has unveiled its first selection of titles for the 2019 edition, announcing 22 features that will screen in the sidebar.
The 17 features and five documentary titles are a mix of international art house and politically-themed dramas that has come to exemplify Panorama.
Highlights include Mid90s, Oscar-nominated actor Jonah Hill's directorial debut, Guy Nattiv's neo-Nazi drama Skin starring Jamie Bell and A Dog Called Money, a documentary from award-winning photographer Seamus Murphy on seminal British pop musician Pj Harvey. What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, Rob Garver's documentary on the ...
The 17 features and five documentary titles are a mix of international art house and politically-themed dramas that has come to exemplify Panorama.
Highlights include Mid90s, Oscar-nominated actor Jonah Hill's directorial debut, Guy Nattiv's neo-Nazi drama Skin starring Jamie Bell and A Dog Called Money, a documentary from award-winning photographer Seamus Murphy on seminal British pop musician Pj Harvey. What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, Rob Garver's documentary on the ...
- 12/18/2018
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
The Panorama section of the Berlin International Film Festival on Tuesday unveiled its first selection of titles for the 2019 edition, announcing 22 features that will screen in the sidebar.
The 17 features and five documentary titles are a mix of international art house and politically themed dramas that has come to exemplify Panorama.
Highlights include Mid90s, Oscar-nominated actor Jonah Hill's directorial debut; Guy Nattiv's neo-Nazi drama Skin, starring Jamie Bell; and A Dog Called Money, a documentary from award-winning photographer Seamus Murphy on seminal British pop musician Pj Harvey. What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, Rob Garver's doc about ...
The 17 features and five documentary titles are a mix of international art house and politically themed dramas that has come to exemplify Panorama.
Highlights include Mid90s, Oscar-nominated actor Jonah Hill's directorial debut; Guy Nattiv's neo-Nazi drama Skin, starring Jamie Bell; and A Dog Called Money, a documentary from award-winning photographer Seamus Murphy on seminal British pop musician Pj Harvey. What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, Rob Garver's doc about ...
- 12/18/2018
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Film critic Pauline Kael might have hated the first eight minutes or so of Rob Garver’s “What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael,” a fawning introduction to the life and times of the author and cultural icon. Or, she might have adored it. Halfway through Garver’s film, one of Kael’s own contemporaries laments that sometimes the former New Yorker critic would sit down for a film that seemed tailor-made for her sensibilities, only to lambast it later.
No matter how Kael might have felt about the doc’s opening minutes, she would have at least stuck around to see the whole thing through, and other audiences will benefit from the same. Despite that iffy start, Garver’s film blossoms into something more comprehensive than complimentary, a film that doesn’t balk at the trickier aspects of Kael’s career, even as it never fully engages with the tensions that informed her.
No matter how Kael might have felt about the doc’s opening minutes, she would have at least stuck around to see the whole thing through, and other audiences will benefit from the same. Despite that iffy start, Garver’s film blossoms into something more comprehensive than complimentary, a film that doesn’t balk at the trickier aspects of Kael’s career, even as it never fully engages with the tensions that informed her.
- 11/16/2018
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
by Glenn Dunks
Doc NYC is still going in New York, running until this Thursday the 15th. We’re looking at just a very small selection of films screening at the festival including these today based around three iconic names in American cinema: film critic Pauline Kael, and Oscar-winning actors Jane Fonda and Olympia Dukakis.
What She Said: The Art Of Pauline Kael
I noted on social media as I sat down to watch my screener of Rob Garver’s biography that there were certainly worse ways to spend one’s Sunday evening that surrounded by the words of the late, great Pauline Kael and an abundance of film clips. Sometimes a film can give you exactly what you ask for and that’s exactly what I received from What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael about the much loved (and loathed) film critic...
Doc NYC is still going in New York, running until this Thursday the 15th. We’re looking at just a very small selection of films screening at the festival including these today based around three iconic names in American cinema: film critic Pauline Kael, and Oscar-winning actors Jane Fonda and Olympia Dukakis.
What She Said: The Art Of Pauline Kael
I noted on social media as I sat down to watch my screener of Rob Garver’s biography that there were certainly worse ways to spend one’s Sunday evening that surrounded by the words of the late, great Pauline Kael and an abundance of film clips. Sometimes a film can give you exactly what you ask for and that’s exactly what I received from What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael about the much loved (and loathed) film critic...
- 11/13/2018
- by Glenn Dunks
- FilmExperience
The last thing any film critic might imagine is that he or she would one day become the subject of a documentary. Could anyone be a less likely object of cinematic scrutiny than someone who sits in the dark watching movies and then sits at a desk writing about them? However improbably, there are now two very good films about two leading luminaries of American film criticism, Steve James' Life Itself, about Roger Ebert, from 2014, and the latest, What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, by Rob Garver. A niche on the festival circuit and at docu-friendly venues on screens ...
- 8/31/2018
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
The last thing any film critic might imagine is that he or she would one day become the subject of a documentary. Could anyone be a less likely object of cinematic scrutiny than someone who sits in the dark watching movies and then sits at a desk writing about them? However improbably, there are now two very good films about two leading luminaries of American film criticism, Steve James' Life Itself, about Roger Ebert, from 2014, and the latest, What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael, by Rob Garver. A niche on the festival circuit and at docu-friendly venues on screens ...
- 8/31/2018
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
We’re huge fans of the Roger Ebert documentary Life Itself, but now we could be getting a movie based on the life of a critic who inspired even him. What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael is a documentary based on the life of New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael, and you can help the documentary get made by donating to a Kickstarter for the film.
Director Rob Garver has made a number of shorts and TV projects, and for the purpose of this documentary he’s gathered together an A-list assortment of directors, actors, and film critics, all of whom were either inspired or scorned her work. The list of names is long, but here’s a short list via their Kickstarter: Quentin Tarantino, David O. Russell, Paul Schrader, Robert Towne, Greil Marcus, Francis Ford Coppola, David Edelstein, Molly Haskell, and Alec Baldwin.
Kael wrote for the...
Director Rob Garver has made a number of shorts and TV projects, and for the purpose of this documentary he’s gathered together an A-list assortment of directors, actors, and film critics, all of whom were either inspired or scorned her work. The list of names is long, but here’s a short list via their Kickstarter: Quentin Tarantino, David O. Russell, Paul Schrader, Robert Towne, Greil Marcus, Francis Ford Coppola, David Edelstein, Molly Haskell, and Alec Baldwin.
Kael wrote for the...
- 7/10/2015
- by Brian Welk
- SoundOnSight
Here's your daily dose of an indie film, web series, TV pilot, what-have-you in progress -- at the end of the week, you'll have the chance to vote for your favorite. In the meantime: Is this a project you’d want to see? Tell us in the comments. Logline: Our movie attempts to reveal who Pauline Kael was, how she became a creative force, and her distinctive view of 20th century movies. Elevator Pitch: This is the story of maybe America's most compelling, popular and divisive critic, in any art form -- Pauline Kael, who had so much to say that she published 13 books of her work. Our film is an attempt to show a history of late 20th century movies through her insightful and sensitive lens, and find out who she was. Production Team: Rob Garver (Producer, Director, Writer): New York-based filmmaker Rob Garver has written, produced, and...
- 7/8/2015
- by Indiewire
- Indiewire
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.