January 7, 2020
DIRECTED AND EDITED BY ROB GARVER
12:30 2:30 4:30 7:00 9:10
“The most powerful, loved, and hated film critic of her time.” – Roger Ebert on Pauline Kael (1919-2001). In a field that has historically embraced few women film critics, Kael was controversial, witty, and fiercely discerning. Her decades-long berth at The New Yorker energized her fans (“Paulettes”) and infuriated her detractors on a weekly basis. Her turbo-charged prose famously championed the New Hollywood Cinema of the late 1960s and ‘70s (BONNIE AND CLYDE, NASHVILLE, CARRIE, TAXI DRIVER) and the work of major European directors (François Truffaut, Bernardo Bertolucci), while mercilessly panning some of the biggest studio hits (THE SOUND OF MUSIC, MIDNIGHT COWBOY, DIRTY HARRY). Her creepy battle with Andrew Sarris and his auteur theory was legendary, and her stint in Hollywood, trying her hand at producing, was a disaster. Sarah Jessica Parker voices Kael’s reviews; filmmakers Quentin Tarantino, Paul Schrader, and Francis Ford Coppola and critics Camille Paglia, Molly Haskell, Greil Marcus, and David Edelstein speak to her enormous gifts and influence.
Presented with support from the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Fund.
USA 2018 98 MINS. JUNO FILMS
