At some point in the early naughts, Roger Ebert went from being a film critic trusted for his centrist viewpoint by a large mainstream audience via his TV show and Chicago Sun-Times newspaper column, to becoming increasingly shrill and hyperpartisan. Ebert admitted his leftwing politics in a 2003 interview with the Progressive, and shortly thereafter, as the left’s post-9/11 pressure cooker began to burst, in his reviews of films such as Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11, Ebert began to increasingly let it all hang out. Just check his Twitter stream these days.
Today, center-right film critic Christian Toto asks if there’s one review in particular Ebert would like to walk back:
Film critics usually file a review or two they’d like to take back.
This critic still winces over giving “Win a Date with Tad Hamilton!” a passing grade.
So it’s likely legendary film critic Roger Ebert wouldn’t mind amending a critique or two from his Pulitzer Prize-winning career.
But I wonder what he thinks of this review he wrote after seeing “An Inconvenient Truth” in today’s post Climategate world:
“Global warming is real.
It is caused by human activity.
Mankind and its governments must begin immediate action to halt and reverse it.
If we do nothing, in about 10 years the planet may reach a “tipping point” and begin a slide toward destruction of our civilization and most of the other species on this planet.
After that point is reached, it would be too late for any action.”
Earth to Roger: Have you read the news lately?
Of course, Ebert might not be the only group who has — or at the least should have — regrets about Al’s movie.
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