I'm just the guy that can't stand cant. ___________

 
MOVIE REVIEW OF THE YEAR: While the Self Made Pundit is generally content to limit these posts to matters political, occasionally contributions to the arts deserve recognition.

The movie review tends to generate little respect as a literary form. The great Pauline Kael, late of the New Yorker, has too few progeny among today's movie reviewers.

Yet, every now and then a movie reviewer will achieve that perfect expression of some truth or heartfelt emotion that deserves to be praised as a work of art. I believe the Dallas Observer's Gregory Weinkauf has achieved that state of grace in the closing lines of his review of "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets." (Link via Slate.)

Weinkauf concludes his mostly favorable review of this movie by musing on its place in the cultural landscape of today's America:

[T]he film of Chamber of Secrets is a welcome delivery of childlike wonder for a planet of ever-increasing ugliness. We've accidentally allowed a retarded monkey to rule America, but otherwise it's not such a whimsical place. Perhaps works like this can help set that to rights.

While I doubt that Warner Brothers Pictures will feature the above quote in its ads for "Chamber of Secrets," it has swayed me. I'm seeing the movie first thing tomorrow morning.
posted by Gary at 10:02 PM