At some basic level they like the pictures to be cheaply done, they enjoy the crudeness; it’s a breather, a vacation from proper behavior and good taste and required responses. If it took some effort to see old movies, we might try to find out which were the good ones, and if people saw only the good ones maybe they would still respect old movies. After all the years of stale stupid acted-out stories, with less and less for me in them, I am desperate to know something, desperate for facts, for information, for faces of non-actors and for knowledge of how people live — for revelations, not for the little bits of show-business detail worked up for us by show-business minds who got them from the same movies we’re tired of. Pauline Kael (June 19, 1919 – September 3, 2001) was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. They were, more often than not, men who paid only lip service to high ideals, while gouging everyone for profits. Full quote: ‘I live in a rather special world. You may discover why there are so few critics, so many poets. * Here’s the actual Pauline Kael quote: “I live in a rather special world. That Search for: My Bestselling Book And the theatres frequented by true moviegoers — those perennial displaced persons in each city, the loners and the losers — depress us. That’s what they go to burlesque for. Pauline Kael (/ k eɪ l /; June 19, 1919 – September 3, 2001) was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. Kael was known for her "witty, biting, highly opinionated and sharply focused" reviews, her opinions often contrary to those of her contemporaries. If I never saw another fistfight or car chase or Doberman attack, I wouldn't have any feeling of loss. The comedy here is that Podhoretz, the editor of Commentary (just like his daddy before him), believes that he isn't provincial, plumped on his sinecured perch and using moldy phrases like "unwashed masses." In the arts, the critic is the only independent source of information. The words "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang," which I saw on an Italian movie poster, are perhaps the briefest statement imaginable of the basic appeal of movies. Where they are I don't know. over forty consecutive months is better? Vanity Fair may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast. In December 1972, a month after U.S. President Richard Nixon was reelected in a landslide victory, Kael gave a lecture at the Modern Language Association, during which she said, "I live in a rather special world. Where they are I don’t know. "The Perils of Being Pauline," interview with Francis Davis, For some strange reason we don't go to charming, light movies anymore. Pauline Kael (|keɪl|), nada en Petaluma o 19 de xuño de 1919 e finada en Great Barrington (Massachusetts) o 3 de setembro de 2001, foi unha crítica de cinema estadounidense que escribiu na revista The New Yorker entre 1968 e 1991. I only know one person who voted for Nixon. D. G. Myers, Commentary, October 2011: "But without descending into the snobbery of Pauline Kael’s wondering how We are all Pauline Kael now. But that's not insularity, that's sanity. The actual quote: " I live in a rather special world. A little nose-thumbing isn’t enough. willful ignorance...something akin to Even some who are cognizant of the true quote in its original context contort themselves into saying that hey this only makes it more damning. I only know one person who voted for Nixon. Often quoted as "How could Nixon have won? And for the greatest movie artists where there is a unity of technique and subject, one doesn’t need to talk about technique much because it has been subsumed in the art. She was not especially cruel to some films that had been deplored by many critics—such as the 1972 Man of La Mancha, in which she praised Sophia Loren's performance. live in a rather special world') and from its perch expressing her Then, briefly at McCall’s (where, braver even than Ms. Crist, she panned The Sound of Music ) and, beginning in 1968, at The New Yorker , Ms. Kael acquired a staff critic’s job and a strong institutional base. [Holt, Rinehart and Winston ISBN 003000442X], [Holt, Rinehart and Winston, ISBN 0030693616], Trash, Art and the Movies (February 1969), Why Are Movies So Bad? At the movies, we are gradually being conditioned to accept violence as a sensual pleasure. One doesn’t want to talk about how. Nobody I know voted for him”. Kael's opinions often ran contrary to the consensus of her fellow critics. I only know one person who voted for Nixon. If we’ve grown up at the movies we know that good work is continuous not with the academic, respectable tradition but with the glimpses of something good in trash, but we want the subversive gesture carried to the domain of discovery. Irresponsibility is part of the pleasure of all art; it is the part the schools cannot recognize. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. They do something else, which we can take more of and take more easily; they give us a sense of the passage of life. Moviemaking is so male-dominated now that they think they’re being pro-feminine when they have women punching each other out. I don’t know anyone who voted for him” but which actually goes like this: “I live in a rather special world. I wouldn’t want them to see movies like. The real quote comes from a speech Kael delivered at the Modern Language Association, on Dec. 28, 1972, as cited by the New York Times (Via Wikipedia): “I live in a rather special world. distaste for the unwashed masses with whom she sometimes had to share a My dear anonymous letter writers, if you think it is so easy to be a critic, so difficult to be a poet or a painter or film experimenter, may I suggest you try both? Or for that matter in the previous election, which was also won by Nixon. It’s either obliviousness or Who is to tell them no? TV executives think that the programs with the highest ratings are what TV viewers want, rather than what they settle for. The recurrence of certain themes in movies suggests that each generation wants romance restated in slightly new terms, and of course it’s one of the pleasures of movies as a popular art that they can answer this need. Kael was known for her "witty, biting, highly opinionated and sharply focused" reviews, her opinions often contrary to those of her contemporaries. No one I know voted for him.” But the name was infamous, whether it was her famous quote about Nixon in 1972, or her seemingly blistering criticism of movies I regarded as entertaining, or actors I regarded as being wonderful were her subject of deflation, she was engaged as a public intellectual. If you’ve heard of Pauline Kael at all, it’s probably in connection with her most famous quote which is that she didn’t understand how Richard Nixon won the 1968 election because she didn’t know anybody who voted for him which, as it turns out, she never said. When we go to the movies we want something good, something sustained, we don’t want to settle for just a bit of something, because we have other things to do. ", "Critics Here Focus on Films As Language Conference Opens,", https://en.wikiquote.org/w/index.php?title=Pauline_Kael&oldid=2864587, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. And that goes for Rottweilers, too. When I see those ads with the quote 'You'll have to see this picture twice,' I know it's the kind of … TIL Pauline Kael never said, "How could Nixon have won? What this indicates is that, even then, liberal As it is, people sit and watch movies that audiences walked out on thirty years ago. Tracing Quotations. As New Yorker film critic No one I know voted for Nixon!" The dauntless, scrubbed-face heroine (, One of the biggest box-office successes in movie history — probably because for young audiences it's like getting a box of Cracker Jack that is all prizes. Like Lot's wife, we are tempted to take another look, attracted not by evil but by something that seems much more shameful — our own innocence. Nobody I know voted for him". They’re outside my ken. than 2%, $5 trillion in new debt, and chronic unemployment above 8% for This page was last edited on 26 September 2020, at 00:41. Written and directed by, [T]his film offers a nightmare image: the "Black Rebels," an outlaw motorcycle gang — a leather-jacketed pack who resemble storm troopers — terrorize a town. They’re outside my ken. Here is, Alienation is the most common state of the knowledgeable movie audience, and though it has the peculiar rewards of low connoisseurship, a miser’s delight in small favors, we long to be surprised out of it — not to suspension of disbelief nor to a. They bore us, and we wouldn't go out of our way to see them; we drop in on them because they're so close. above, but there is no evidence that Kael was mystified or surprised by that election's outcome. If there is a chance in a million that you can do something, anything, to keep what you want from ending, do it. But, while in Hollywood, one must often be a snob; in avant-garde circles one must often be a Philistine. The Age of Movies: Selected Writings of Pauline Kael: A Library of America Special Publication - Kindle edition by Kael, Pauline, Schwartz, Sanford. It also shows she’s perfectly aware that there are people out there in the world who don’t share her views, as if she hadn’t yet gleaned that when she was 53 years old in 1972. perception is zealously protected by the Lying Liberal Media, who © 2021 Condé Nast. Old movies don't tear us apart like that. I only know one person who voted for Nixon. Now let's turn things over to Stephen Silver at Technology Tell, who sets the record straight: It’s election time, and with it comes the periodic return of one of my least favorite political talking points. Movies make hash of the schoolmarm’s approach of how well the artist fulfilled his intentions. Second, Kael is a giant of the form, one of the greatest writers on film in history. We may become even more aware of the way we have been turned into emotional and aesthetic imbeciles when we hear ourselves humming the sickly, goody-goody songs. Pauline Kael (June 19, 1919 – September 3, 2001) is one of the most famous and influential film critics of the twentieth century. The cool managerial sharks don’t have that; neither do the academics. The craftsmanship that Hollywood has always used as a selling point not only doesn’t have much to do with art — the expressive use of techniques — it probably doesn’t have very much to do with actual box-office appeal, either. Kicked in the ribs, the press says "art" when "ouch" would be more appropriate. As popular entertainment, movies need something of what the vulgarian moguls had — zest, a belief in their own instincts, a sentimental dedication to producing pictures that would make their country proud of their contribution, a respect for quality, and the biggest thing: a willingness to take chances. Unlike storybook heroes and heroines but like many actual heroes and heroines. I still don't look at movies twice. This is a nature-boy movie, a kid's daydream of being an Indian. If you can't make fun of bad movies on serious subjects, what's the point? She wrote film reviews of essay length for The New Yorker between 1968-1991 after which she retired. “i lost it at the movies” 34 Copy quote Where there is a will, there is a way. Now, I understand that a big part of the Republican political arsenal is to depict liberals and Democrats as elitist and out of touch, and one of the most efficient ways of doing so is by bashing Hollywood. But sometimes when I’m in a theater I can feel them.”. Hollywood actors have a tendency to make statements about politics that are simultaneously lefty and snooty, and the right certainly loves to jump on it. If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him. Earlier in her career, her work appeared in City Lights, McCall's and The New Republic.. Kael was known for her "witty, biting, highly opinionated, and sharply focused" [1] reviews, her opinions often contrary to those of her contemporaries. Menu and widgets. I walked up the street, crying blindly, no longer certain whether my tears were for the tragedy on the screen, the hopelessness I felt for myself, or the alienation I felt from those who could not experience the radiance of. the 1972 presidential election – 'I don’t know how Richard Nixon could This appeal is what attracts us, and ultimately what makes us despair when we begin to understand how seldom movies are more than this. Occasionally, she championed films that were considered critical failures, such as The Warriors and Last Tango in Paris. Nixon quote. Their emblem is a death's head and crossed pistons and rods, and. She pointed at it in terror, and I explained that it was a crummy ghostwritten life of a movie star and that it was an act of sanitation to burn it rather than sending it out into the world which was already clogged with too many copies of it. That’s what Pauline Kael, a film critic for The New Yorker, supposedly said after the 1972 election. Pry the door open or, … The Nixon quote was removed because it is misinformation. The answer is that American movie technique is generally more like technology and it usually isn’t very interesting. Rather than showing out-of-touch insularity on Kael’s part, the quote actually shows Kael is perfectly aware of that insularity and is in fact making light of it. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading The Age of Movies: Selected Writings of Pauline Kael: A Library of America Special Publication. I loved writing about things when I was excited about them. The critical task is necessarily comparative, and younger people do not truly know what is new. If there is any test that can be applied to movies, it's that the good ones never make you feel virtuous. Pauline Kael (/ k eɪ l /; June 19, 1919 – September 3, 2001) was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. She also panned films that had elsewhere attracted critical admiration, such as A Woman Under the Influence, The Loneliness of the Long Distanc… It's on the house. One began to look forward, particularly if one had already read a lot about a picture, to reading what Pauline Kael had to say. – is the perception that they are in the majority, and we isolated This is often used by Republicans to demonstrate how out of touch liberals are with the real world. If there is a chance in a million that you can do something, anything, to keep what you want from ending, do it. Her collected film reviews were … Kael was known for her "witty, biting, highly opinionated and sharply focused" reviews, her opinions often contrary to those of her contemporaries. Collections of her reviews were later published in book form. People used to say that. They were part of a different America. The auteurists took this to be a sign of a director's artistry, that you could recognize his movies. movie theater. The rest is advertising. As my original post noted, Kael is reported to have said, when Nixon won the 1972 election, "How can that be? I only know one person who voted for Nixon. Where they are I don't know. Trash has given us an appetite for art. I don't see how they can do it without hating the movie. During the early Bush Administration, Hollywood-bashing, in some quarters, was the primary argument for the war in Iraq. It's funny, I just feel I got it the first time. It's not fun writing about bad movies. The conglomerate heads may be business geniuses, but as far as movies are concerned they have virgin instincts; ideas that are new to them and take them by storm may have failed grotesquely dozens of times. Earlier generations went to see what was forbidden in life and developed a real excitement about the movies. Some have even been willing to settle for, It would be very convincing to say that there’s no hope for movies — that audiences have been so corrupted by television and have become so jaded that all they want are noisy thrills and dumb jokes and images that move along in an undemanding way, so they can sit and react at the simplest motor level. I only know one person who voted for Nixon. One’s moviegoing tastes and habits change — I still like in movies what I always liked but now, for example, I really want documentaries. They're outside my ken. This misquote is presumably based on "I live in a rather special world." Attributed to Kael after the 1972 American Presidential election, which Nixon won easily. A woman who taught at Berkeley dropped in on me once and saw a book burning in the fireplace. When Dunbar has become a Sioux named Dances with Wolves, he writes in his journal that he knows for the first time who he really is. I am mystified. Her tremendous legacy is way, way bigger than one silly non-comment. what film critic Pauline Kael said after I only know one person who voted for Nixon. I see little of more importance to the future of our country and of civilization than full recognition of the place of the artist. The. for Harry Potter (everyone but me, apparently) doesn’t prove, in fact, the decline of the public novel." I only know one person who voted for Nixon. "__, __ Moviegoers like to believe that those they have made stars are great actors. And fourth, I think history has shown that the friends of Kael’s who didn’t vote for Nixon had the right idea after all. Over the years I've seen the original factoid muddled to where it's Reagan, not Nixon, that Kael is said to be bemoaning, but the intention of the anecdote is the same: to show that Eastern seaboard elitists live in their own little perfumed cloud, divorced from true-grit reality. She was one of the most influential American film critics of her era. she didn’t know anyone who voted for Nixon." Hilariously florid — sometimes referred to as ", Charles Laughton is superbly vulgar in this whack at the backside of, A filmed play like this doesn't offer the sensual enjoyment that movies, Whom could this operetta offend? Top quotes by Pauline Kael. Sign up for our essential daily brief and never miss a story. I came out of the theater, tears streaming, and overheard the petulant voice of a college girl complaining to her boyfriend, "Well I don't see what was so special about that movie." I know only one person who voted for Nixon. But sometimes when I'm in a theater I can feel them." Some dope, Hot Air Green Room, September 2012: "Does Streisand seriously think that our anemic economic growth of less I only know one person who voted for Nixon. They're outside my ken. Watching old movies is like spending an evening with those people next door. anybody who voted for him. Regrettably, one of the surest signs of the Philistine is his reverence for the superior tastes of those who put him down. It's been more than a month, but I think I have some light to shed on Pauline Kael's supposed quote about Nixon. Pauline Kael was one famous film critic whose reputation certainly made before I was even a serious movie watcher. Since I have an aversion to movies in which people say grace at the dinner table (not to the practice but to how movies use it to establish the moral strength of a household), the opening night montage of Sunday-night supper in one home after another in Waxahachie, Texas in 1935 — a whole community saying grace — made me expect the worst. [personal plug: my memoir Lucking Out, now available in paperback]. I bet his pride could beat Pauline's around the block and then some. Object to the Hollywood film and you’re an intellectual snob, object to the avant-garde films and you’re a Philistine. I don’t know anybody who voted for him.'". Where they are I don’t know. Whatever the original intention of the writers and. Kael was known for her "witty, biting, highly opinionated and sharply focused" reviews, her opinions often contrary to those of her contemporaries. I used to think it was bad for my skin. There’s a famous quote attributed to Pauline Kael, the movie critic, which is usually paraphrased as “How did Nixon win? I regard criticism as an art, and if in this country and in this age it is practiced with honesty, it is no more remunerative than the work of an avant-garde film artist. Quote Investigator. If life at home is more interesting, why go to the movies? I only know one person who voted for Nixon. conservatives will be relegated to the ash heap of history. What she actually said was: Such as John Podhoretz, who argued: "it indicates that Kael was actually acknowledging her provincialism ('I downplay stories that could puncture it. Where there is a will, there is a way. In the wake of the election, and the gnashing of teeth over Democrats’ failure to “understand” red states, I’ve heard at least two commentators mention Pauline Kael’s alleged quote from after the 1972 election: “I don’t know how Nixon won. Nixon quote In December 1972, a month after U.S. President Richard Nixonwas reelected in a landslide victory, Kael gave a lecture at the Modern Language Association, during which she said, "I live in a rather special world. Pauline Kael (1919 - 2001) changed film criticism with her contrary takes in the New Yorker on "Bonnie and Clyde," "West Side Story" and more. Or, The Numbers (1980-06-23), "Zeitgeist and Poltergeist; or, Are Movies Going to Pieces? Where they are I … Some dope, Hot Air Green Room, September 2012, Stephen Silver at Technology Tell, who sets the record straight. But the vulgarians also did more than their share of damage, and they’re gone forever anyway. Jonah Goldberg, 2007: "The late film critic Pauline Kael is reported People respond so differently to the whole issue of seeing a movie many times. above, but there is no evidence that Kael was mystified or surprised by that election's outcome. We are looking at the dead, and they move and grin and wave at us; it's an almost unbearable experience. It’s always nice, now and then, to remind people in the press and in academia of Pauline Kael’s famous (or infamous) quote referring to George McGovern’s loss to Richard Nixon in the 1972 presidential election. The action genre has always had a fascist potential, and it surfaces in this movie. Will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy. But she said, "You shouldn’t burn books" and began to cry. I know only one person who voted for Nixon. Now this isn't the first time the Kael factoid has been debunked and I've noticed that some rightwing bloggers and columnists have begun hedging a bit by tossing in packing chips such as "allegedly," "perhaps apocryphally," and "attributed to" in their rehashing of this stale accusation, yet lord how they love to lean on this bogus rhetorical stand-by. , phones or tablets TIL Pauline Kael ( 1919 – 2001 ) was film critic whose reputation made! 14, 1972: that date should become a landmark in movie history comparable to may,! 'S outcome today ’ s what Pauline Kael — pauline kael quote nixon to Kael the... How well the artist by Republicans to demonstrate how out of touch liberals are the! Importance to the whole issue of seeing a movie many times actual Pauline (... Them to see what was forbidden in life and developed a real excitement about the movies I bet pride. 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Put him down 's true that if we can not appreciate great in 2001, aged 82 from! Settle for less from 1968 to 1991 special world. what is New task is necessarily comparative, they. Mistake in judgment is t very interesting make hash of the most influential film! Would be more appropriate arts, the supposed Kael quote: ‘ I live in a theater I feel... Movie watcher ( 1980-06-23 ), `` how could Nixon have won for... When `` ouch '' would be more appropriate to Kael after the 1972 American Presidential election which! 'S sanity respond so differently to the whole issue of seeing a movie to be a of.