Roger Ebert's Blog, page 3

We will continue to highlight filmmakers and actors that Roger championed throughout his career. Click here for a full table of contents for our "Roger's Favorites" entries. Below is an entry on filmmaker Agnès Varda.

Agnès Varda wasn’t only one of Roger’s favorite filmmakers, she was “one of the nicest people” he had ever met. The mere mention of her name would cause Roger to reflect on their memorable encounters: a 1976 dinner with Varda, her husband Jacques Demy and Pauline Kael in Cannes;...

I am so happy to announce that "Life Itself," the wonderfully life-affirming documentary about my late husband Roger Ebert, was nominated for a Best Documentary Emmy by The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS). The film was directed by award winning director, Steve James, and was produced by CNN Films and Kartemquin Films. It was nominated in the the 37th annual News & Documentary Emmy awards, which will be presented at the Lincoln Center on September 21, 2016. "Life Itself"...

HOW DO I LOVE THEE: SONNET 43: Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways....I love thee with the breath, smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death....

When I was a young girl with thoughts of romantic fancy dancing through my head, I envisioned the day when a suitor would write a poem or song dedicated to me. During our courtship, Roger wooed me with Shakespeare, often quoting from "Sonnet 18: Shall I Compare Thee To A...

The following article was originally published on May 17th, 2010.

When I began as a film critic, Jean-Luc Godard was widely thought to have reinvented the cinema with "Breathless" (1960). Now he is almost 80 and has made what is said to be his last film, and he's still at the job, reinventing. If only he had stopped while he was ahead. That would have been sometime in the 1970s. Maybe the 1980s. For sure, the 1990s. Without a doubt, before he made his Cannes entry, "Film Socialisme."

The thou...

This is absolutely one of my favorite articles Roger ever wrote about the movies, originally published in 1992.—Chaz Ebert

For many years I remembered the name of the first film I ever reviewed, but now I find it has left my mind. It was a French film, I remember that much. I watched it from a center seat in the old World Playhouse, bursting with the awareness that I was reviewing it, and then I went back to the office and wrote that it was one more last gasp of the French New Wave, rolling as...

This is one of myfavorite pieces that Roger wrote summarizing his beliefs about life. It garnered 582 comments following its publication on May 2nd, 2009. A special thanks to Facebook user Keith Shapiro for reminding us about this piece.—Chaz Ebert

I know it is coming, and I do not fear it, because I believe there is nothing on the other side of death to fear. I hope to be spared as much pain as possible on the approach path. I was perfectly content before I was born, and I think of death as t...

Every single week, we get mail asking what Roger would think of the current presidential campaign, and particularly what he would think of Donald Trump. I have my suspicions, however, I wouldn't presume to put words in his mouth. Nevertheless, we came cross this article he wrote about disgraced Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich on January 29th, 2009. A reader pointed out that if you substitute "Trump" for "Blagojevich," you may have an idea of what Roger could have written about him. Again, I...

Editor's Note: RogerEbert.com is proud to reprint Roger Ebert's 1978 entry from the Encyclopedia Britannica publication "The Great Ideas Today," part of "The Great Books of the Western World." Reprinted with permission fromThe Great Ideas Today1978 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

It's a measure of how completely the Internet has transformed communication that I need to explain, for the benefit of some younger readers, what encyclopedias were: bound editions summing up all available knowledge, de...

Thank you. Forty-six years ago on April 3, 1967, I became the film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times. Some of you have read my reviews and columns and even written to me since that time. Others were introduced to my film criticism through the television show, my books, the website, the film festival, or the Ebert Club and newsletter. However you came to know me, I'm glad you did and thank you for being the best readers any film critic could ask for.

Typically, I write over 200 reviews a year f...

PRESS RELEASE: CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Terrence Malick's 1978 film "Days of Heaven" won an Oscar for best cinematography, and Roger Ebert likely found that no surprise. It is "above all one of the most beautiful films ever made," Ebert said in a 1997 review. So it's only appropriate that the film will open the 15th annual Roger Ebert's Film Festival on April 17 in the big-screen, newly renovated Virginia Theater in downtown Champaign.

Also among the 12 features and two shorts to be screened during...