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Filed under: The Squib Report Tagged: Barry Levinson, James Wolcott, movies, Pauline Kael
Don’t look now, but James Wolcott’s been on fire lately. This meditation on hellish gridlock under a President McCain is brilliant, right up to the last deliciously weltschmerz-soaked line. And this reminiscence of Pauline Kael’s connection to Barry Levinson’s Diner really gets me where I live. I spent my college years inhaling as many of Kael’s words as I could get my hands on, and Diner, which came out when I was 12, was the sort of quirky “how can this be a classic when TBS plays it every weekend?” gem that impressed me a lot during the same period. I didn’t know that she rescued the movie; more people should.
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Hello! We're a small band of culture writers, editors, and artists based in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Emdashes, which spent its formative years as a New Yorker blog, is our collection of conversations—mostly civilized—about magazines, movies, design, punctuation, and other things that stir us.
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Dashes, some say, “are particularly useful in a sentence that is long and complex.” Emdashes—like an em dash itself—provides a thoughtful pause amid the hubbub.
Emdashes, founded in 2004, is written and drawn by Emily Gordon, Martin Schneider, Pollux, Jonathan Taylor, and Benjamin Chambers, as well as occasional guest contributors. All posts before October 2008 are by Emily Gordon.
The site was designed by House of Pretty with illustrations by Jesse R. Ewing.
Additional drawings are by Carolita Johnson and Pollux (author of our web comic, "The Wavy Rule"). The Emdashes pencil logo is by Jennifer Hadley, based on a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad.
Other writing by Emily Gordon
- Reviews: theater writing (for Time Out Chicago)
- Profile: Valerie Casey, Designers Accord founder, is spearheading the design of sustainability (for SXSW World)
- Feature: Rea Irvin: visionary art director, bon vivant, New Yorker founding father (for Print)
- Slide show: the Coney Island Mermaid Parade (for NYCgo.com)
- Feature: Muslim immigration iconography in the Netherlands, and an interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (for Print)
- Review: King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
- Homage: Celebrating lindy-hop legend Frankie Manning (for NYCgo.com)
- Inquiry: Does a New Republic redesign mean a change of tune? (for Print)
- Interview: James Surowiecki on what's next for the wisdom of crowds (for Assignment Zero)
- Interviews: four up-and-coming designers under 30 (for Print)
- Profile: novelist and dance critic Laura Jacobs (for Newsday)
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Comments
I too was a Kael inhaler. Her reviews are what hooked me on The New Yorker. I still read her, not so much for what she has to say about this or that old movie, but for the pleasure of reading her great, conversational prose. Her “Diner” review is a good example of her style, but she doesn’t let rip in it like she does in, say, her review of “Shoot The Moon,” which came out in the magazine the same year (1982) as her “Diner” piece did. She was a great champion of non-blockbusters. As a result of her reviews, I took in countless movies I wouldn’t have gone to otherwise. Kael truly is one of the all-time great New Yorker writers. I sorely miss her.
Corroborating your point, I don’t remember Kael’s “Diner” review at all, but I do remember that “Shoot the Moon” review very well. It is truly one of the best examples of her championing a smaller movie.