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The Great Movies IV

With an Introduction by Chaz Ebert and a Foreword by Matt Zoller Seitz
No film critic has ever been as influential—or as beloved— as Roger Ebert. Over more than four decades, he built a reputation writing reviews for the Chicago Sun-Times and, later, arguing onscreen with rival Chicago Tribune critic Gene Siskel and later Richard Roeper about the movies they loved and loathed. But Ebert went well beyond a mere “thumbs up” or “thumbs down.” Readers could always sense the man behind the words, a man with interests beyond film and a lifetime’s distilled wisdom about the larger world. Although the world lost one of its most important critics far too early, Ebert lives on in the minds of moviegoers today, who continually find themselves debating what he might have thought about a current movie.

The Great Movies IV is the fourth—and final—collection of Roger Ebert’s essays, comprising sixty-two reviews of films ranging from the silent era to the recent past. From films like The Cabinet of Caligari and Viridiana that have been considered canonical for decades to movies only recently recognized as masterpieces to Superman, The Big Lebowski, and Pink Floyd: The Wall, the pieces gathered here demonstrate the critical acumen seen in Ebert’s daily reviews and the more reflective and wide-ranging considerations that the longer format allowed him to offer. Ebert’s essays are joined here by an insightful foreword by film critic Matt Zoller Seitz, the current editor-in-chief of the official Roger Ebert website, and a touching introduction by Chaz Ebert.

A fitting capstone to a truly remarkable career, The Great Movies IV will introduce newcomers to some of the most exceptional movies ever made, while revealing new insights to connoisseurs as well.
 

288 pages | 6 x 9 | © 2016

Film Studies

Reviews

“Ebert’s take-no-prisoners essays packed with insidery insights will send movie lovers back to the sofa for a second look at old favorites like Cool Hand Luke and My Fair Lady while introducing more offbeat picks like Sansho the Bailiff and Pixote.”

Parade, on the Great Movies collections

“Ebert offers informed critical appraisals, as well as background on the movies’ making and significance, that make these pieces rewarding for film buffs and ideal introductions for first-time viewers.”

Booklist, on the Great Movies collection

“No one has done as much as Ebert to connect the creators of movies with their consumers. He has immense power, and he’s used it for good, as an apostle of the cinema.”

Richard Corliss, Time, on the Great Movies collection

“Essential. . . . especially for those owning Ebert’s first collections.”

Library Journal, on the Great Movies collection

Table of Contents

Foreword by Matt Zoller Seitz

Introduction by Chaz Ebert

Selections from the Introductions to the Previous Volumes


25th Hour

A. I. Artificial Intelligence

An Autumn Afternoon

Badlands

The Ballad of Narayama

Barry Lyndon

The Big Lebowski

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

Caché

La Ceremonie

The Circus

La Collectionneuse

Come and See

Contact

Day for Night

Departures

Diary of a Country Priest

Diary of a Lost Girl

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

French Cancan

The Grey Zone

The Hairdresser’s Husband

Harakiri

Heart of Glass

In a Lonely Place

Ivan the Terrible, Parts I and II

The Killing

Leon Morin, Priest

Lost in Translation

Make Way for Tomorrow

A Man Escaped

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Man with a Movie Camera

The Match Factory Girl

Mon oncle d’Amerique

Monsieur Hire

Mulholland Dr.

Mystery Train

Night Moves

Nosferatu the Vampyre

The Only Son

Pale Flower

Pink Floyd: The Wall

The Pledge

Red Beard

Richard III

Rio Bravo

Senso

Seven

Shadow of a Doubt

Shoah

Smiles of a Summer Night

Souls for Sale

The Spirit of the Beehive

Spirited Away

Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter . . . and Spring

Stagecoach

Superman

Tender Mercies

Veronika Voss

Viridiana

Yellow Submarine
 

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