A review by mistermetadata
Conversations with Pauline Kael by Pauline Kael

4.0

Chronological collection of interviews or profiles of America’s most irascible and indulgent (that’s praise) film critic—reading Kael opens me up to write from my own perspective, to evaluate my lived experience of a movie and share it with the full arsenal my vocabulary affords me. Peaks with a rollicking exchanging of barbs between Kael and JL Godard; even though the conversation never really goes anywhere it’s a delight to read these two giant intellects go at it. Wheels start spinning in place following that discussion, but further insights start to emerge again following her retirement from the New Yorker. She adopts a loose-never aloof-posture in the post 1991 interviews and shows no fear in describing the process of aging. Finishing the book felt Iike saying goodbye to a new friend—fortunately I have a lot of her actual writing waiting for me.