Gene Siskel & Roger Ebert

Notes and takeaways

As of today I have watched approximately 162 episodes of Gene Siskel & Roger Ebert discuss and argue and agree on the latest films circa 1975-1984 on both Sneak Previews and At The Movies, though the first three years are pretty sparse in content. It just so happened that a book chronicling their various shows and background information was released late last year that I ended up reading to supplement my latest binge. This is what I have taken from both the show and book and want to share with you.

What impresses me is despite being very experienced film critics for serious newspapers, they were able to present themselves and come across as simply individuals expressing their thoughts and opinions about movies. They famously argued and disagreed, but they also had their own blind spots and contradictions like we all have. The value in watching them argue or agree and detail their thoughts is not to agree with one over the other but to understand what their motivations are and compare them to your own to be better informed in how you will react to the same film, and therefore whether it will be worth your time and $4 ticket price. Ebert is more about entertainment, Siskel is more about something fresh and new, really hates movies that are predictable, even if they are well performed. Both look for people that convince them they are real, as well as scripts that don’t sound written. I think this dynamic is both why they sometimes argued so much and also why they were so valuable as people to listen to. You can listen to them argue over Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence and understand why Ebert couldn’t buy into the reality presented by the film with its contrasted acting between the Japanese and British acting and why Siskel felt that the movie’s ending was beautiful because of its message of, “the arrogance of thinking you’re right culturally and internationally is what starts wars and gets us into trouble.” I think too often people believe a good critic is one that agrees with their own opinion. You see this in the comments of the episodes as people will often comment how they’ve lost all respect for one of them for not liking a certain film. I know it isn’t truly that serious, but I do believe it represents the thinking that I can only like or find value out of something or someone that agrees and promotes the same things I do, which is ironically the sort of arrogance Siskel mentions the film as denouncing.

The things we are complaining about now are things they were complaining about then. Too many remakes, sequels, blockbusters without an idea in their head. 3D is a dumb gimmick that first appeared in the 1950s and now again in the early 1980s and the industry would try to sell it to us yet again in the 2010s. Oscar nominations and snubs that are baffling and winners who were overrated. “Frankly, in 1980 you could take most Hollywood films and throw them in a blender and it wouldn’t make that much difference how you reassembled them. Safe and boring describes most Hollywood products, with major stars selling their artistic souls in the name of sequels and big budget-action.” Siskel in the Chicago Tribune, 12/19/1980 review of Raging Bull. While recapping 1976 in their Opening Soon…At a Theater Near You (the predecessor to Sneak Previews) Siskel remarks, “"I thought 1976 was a pretty lousy year for movies. Too many sequels, too many remakes, and too much violence." Appearing on Late Night with David Letterman in January 1983 Siskel would remark, “There are nine sequels set for this coming year and I think it's amazing, probably 100 million dollars in production costs for nine pictures that I think not anyone would want to see… It’s a safe choice for an executive to make. They don’t get second guessed because they bet on it and they think if they don’t pick it some other executive is going to pick it.” This idea, that sequels are increasing in prevalence due to being the safe choice, was also mentioned by Nicolas Meyer in his autobiography The View from the Bridge: Memories of Star Trek and a Life in Hollywood that I also read in January. In it and on Siskel & Ebert shows they all comment on how Hollywood is being inundated with sequels, remakes, adaptations, and less and less new ideas, as well as adult films, not films with nudity or graphic violence but with actual mature subject matter about adult’s lives. Imagine what Siskel & Ebert would think of today, and think of how this seems to be an issue not restricted to just our own lifetime.

The saddest aspect, other than both hosts' tragic passings due to illness, is that their shows were not preserved for future generations to watch. The episodes I watch are thanks to people uploading recordings of the show, not from the original production companies that broadcast them. The same goes for their writing. They were newspaper critics first and foremost and despite that it can be difficult to find their writing easily compiled online. You can find excerpts and newspaper images of their writing, but why isn’t it simply kept altogether and available to read from the Chicago Sun-Times or Chicago Tribune’s websites? We are so spoiled with being able to watch every movie mentioned on the show after a few keystrokes, and yet there is also a lot of media that only exists due to the common man having the foresight to record their television and keep it around to be uploaded one day to YouTube. Part of it is that production companies always underestimate the longevity of a show like this. Two critics talking about the latest releases, in a time when a movie being taken out of the theaters meant you’d pretty much never see it again, especially if it was unsuccessful and wouldn’t be resurrected for anniversaries ala Disney and their animated films. And yet there is value in watching their show now, as I’ve been explaining this whole time.

While reading Opposable Thumbs: How Siskel & Ebert Changed Movies Forever by Matt Singer it was very amusing to hear about the contempt and rivalry between the two behind the scenes. Some real pains in the ass when it comes to production. Always needing to make sure the other wasn’t getting better treatment or more words and screen time, getting angry at someone changing their writing, ordering the same lunch everyday to avoid arguments. Never would have thought of that if I just continued watching the series. As just a viewer I saw their disagreements but I never thought that sort of rivalry existed behind the scenes or they were contentious to that extent with the other when the cameras were off. This ignorance is similar to people who get really attached to on-screen personalities and their personal lives. Oftentimes fan-fictioning relationships that don’t exist. I mostly have Jeff Gerstmann and Nextlander in mind when thinking about this. Obviously Siskel and Ebert did care for each other as time went on but they also were not hanging out and getting drinks, shooting the shit together outside of the production of the show or appearances promoting the show. They had an on-screen chemistry and relationship but that didn’t extend to their personal lives, at least not until much later, and even then not to the extent people likely believed. I am curious as to the way fandom would react to them had they existed during our time, specifically how people would react to hearing that their favorite internet personalities actually didn’t like each other despite appearing on-screen together would probably shake people to their core.

At The Movies being a network show means commercials. These reduced the overall runtime of the show as it remained a half hour production now reduced by the runtime set aside for commercials. It also means the flow of the show has hard stop and starts reducing the overall energy of the conversation. Siskel or Ebert having to pause and address the camera with a sign off and then coming back to a recap or preamble reduces the actual conversation even further. The show is still enjoyable, and the arguments still continue, just overall shorter and less of a convincing free flowing conversation between two individuals like it was before. Siskel even explicitly mentions this during their first appearance on David Letterman in March of 1982 and answering the question if they would ever go on commercial television (this is also mentioned in the book) saying, “There may be a flow too, a continuity, we can refer to you know what you mentioned before, here’s the same thing going on in this film, that if it is interrupted by a commercial I think would make us less likely and so we would do little pieces and try and hit peaks right before the commercial break. Which is the problem with made for tv movies as opposed to regular movies.” Of course due to WTTW not wanting to dish out more money, they would transfer shortly after to Tribune and network tv. One small comment is that the Sneak Previews’ theme song was better than At The Movies. However I do like the At The Movies intro bit where Gene and Roger sneak up to the closed balcony.

After reading the book and how the show slowly wound down after Siskel’s tragic passing, I had a few spiritual successors in my mind: Adam Kempenaar & Josh Larsen (formerly with Sam Van Hallgren [2005-2007] and Matty Robinson [2007-2011]) from 2005-now with the podcast Filmspotting. They were very early to the podcast game, were two Chicago film critics, and were also early to the listener funded game. I have mostly listened to their 2009 episodes as part of another project focusing on that year and find them to be the second closest equivalent to Siskel & Ebert in my life. The closest is Mike Stoklasta & Jay Bauman from 2011-now with Half in the Bag. For some reason pretty much all YouTube film criticism channels are just one person monologues into the camera about their opinion on the film. Stoklasta started out as one of the earliest video essayists online with the famous Plinkett review of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. In order to talk about the latest films Stoklasta and Bauman began recording themselves talking about new releases in 2011 on Blip.tv and eventually migrated to YouTube. Their discussions are bookended by comedy skits that tell an overarching story, the amount of which really depends on their motivation during that day. They disagree, though never argue as intently as Siskel & Ebert could, and are entertaining and have their own opinions and taste and blind spots you learn and pick up on by watching them. I think they are pretty aware that their format is essentially the Siskel & Ebert format, replacing thumbs with answering the question, “Would you recommend [x]?”

I found a lot to like watching Siskel & Ebert, and a lot of new movies to add to my watch list, a couple of which I’ve already watched. My one resolution this year was to try and watch more movies than I have been. I have really been neglecting discovering new films which is always such a joy. It is the same kind of joy on display when Siskel & Ebert discuss a great new film. Their enthusiasm and conversations have been a great kick in the ass in that regard. I think that is the greatest accomplishment they could have hoped for, and as evidenced by the book, by the people working to compile their show and find its missing pieces, and by my own viewing and reaction, they accomplished just that during their time among us.