At the Movies

Author: Kevin Klawitter



“At The Movies”


Cast:

Roger Ebert: Phillip Seymour Hoffman

Charlie "Chaz" Ebert: Jennifer Hudson

Gene Siskel: Kevin Spacey

Richard Roeper: Vince Vaughn

Oprah Winfrey: Viola Davis

Russ Meyer: Edward Norton

Hugh Hefner: Robert Downey, Jr.

Werner Herzog: Sir Ian McKellen



Crew:

Directed by Martin Scorcese

Screenplay by John Logan and Grant Hezlov

Director of Photography: Robert Richardson

Editor: Thelma Schoonmaker

Executive Producers: Martin Scorcese, Werner Herzog, Grant Hezlov, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Michael Mann


Tagline: His entire life was a trip through the art of cinema… now he gets a movie of his own.


Synopsis:
This movie on the life of film critic Roger Ebert begins as he joins the team of the Chicago Sun-Times in 1965. He had already gained an interest in movies, and after an unpleasant experience that day during an interview with the publicity-hungry Jackie Susann, he decides to try to use the power of film to his advantage. He starts to write the screenplay to a satire of her best-selling novel, Valley of the Dolls. Years later, he is contacted by legendary sexploitation director Russ Meyer, and together they make the movie, which gets the movie studio into trouble. Although Ebert is never called to the stand, the experience forces him to (at Meyer’s request) to do any more screenwriting under an alias.


Not long after the experience, he meets another film critic from the rival newspaper The Chicago Tribune, Gene Siskel. Their meetings are uncomfortable, and the two find themselves arguing over which movies are the best, but they eventually become close friends. During one of their arguments, Siskel gets the idea of starting a TV show where the two compare their tastes. They go to a local public access station and pitch the idea. The head likes it, but is curious as to how they would decide which movies to recommend. Siskel wants to use the standard 4-star system, but Ebert comes up with a simpler, more novel idea: thumbs up or thumbs down.


The show is a hit, and the two are on their way to stardom. Ebert then begins to use his newfound celebrity to promote his movie tastes and get a show for his newfound girlfriend, Oprah Winfrey. However, years later disaster strikes as Gene Siskel becomes hospitalized with a brain tumor. He continues to screen movies and even contribute to his and Ebert’s show via telephone, but the disease is too much, and he dies during surgery.


Ebert falls into a depression, but soldiers on as a critic and television personality. He holds rehearsals for possible guest critics for the TV show, but none of them fill the hole left by Siskel’s death until he meets Richard Roeper, a young, quick-witted columnist from the Sun-Times staff. They start working together and eventually Ebert is lifted from his depression and begins have more fun. At one point, he has a feud with Vince Gallow, the director of a film known as “The Brown Bunny”, and Rob Schneider, for his movie “Deuce Bigelow: European Gigolo”. The former insults his weight, and he begins to exercise to lose it.


However, Ebert learns he has salivary cancer. He reluctantly leaves the show so he can have surgery to repair it, but the operation goes horribly wrong and he is forced to stay in the hospital under heavy sedation for several months. After his medication is reduced, he finds his attention span has disappeared and he can no longer watch movies or read novels. His wife Chaz eventually brings him out of it by reading to him in bed (starting with the Cormac McCarthy book Suttree), and after a while he gets back to work, starting by reviewing The Queen, and (at his publisher’s behest) beginning a blog. Despite several sugeries, he never regains his voice (which he lost after the failed operation), but still communicates to his friends and family via a computer-based voice simulator and his website.


The movie ends in 2009, when he and Chaz go to the Director’s Guild of America Awards Ceremony, where he is inducted as an official member. The award is presented to him by his longtime admiree (and DGA president) Michael Apted. Also at the ceremony are his two stepchildren and his friends Martin Scorcese and Werner Herzog. He starts using his voice simulator to read his acceptance speech, but a VO of his actual voice eventually replaces it while the image fades to documentary footage and flashbacks of the previous movie. As he finishes, he and Chaz walk off the stage together. A photographer asks for a picture, and Ebert gives a hearty “thumbs-up” to the camera. The picture freezes on that final image, and then fades to black.


Just before the credits roll, the audience is presented with a message about what happened to “At The Movies” since his absence, the fall of the art of film criticism, and how he thinks that since losing his voice, his “ability to communicate has increased”.


What the press would say:

Martin Scorcese has outdone himself this time, reuniting with his cinematographer and editor from his Oscar-winning The Aviator, and also teaming up with Grant Hezlov, producer and co-writer of the Oscar-nominated drama Good Night, and Good Luck, which also recreated a legendary TV show. Hoffman (chosen by Ebert himself) is cast in the lead role and recreates the man’s legendary voice and body language, giving his most remarkable performance since Capote, even going so far as to gain and lose weight in order to fit Ebert’s physical appearance throughout the years. In between the more dramatic scenes, we see montages of Roger watching movies, writing reviews, and speaking on his television show through split-screens, rapid cuts, and various film stocks representative of the different eras and moods.


FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION:
Best Picture
Best Director-Martin Scorcese
Best Actor-Phillip Seymour Hoffman
Best Supporting Actor-Kevin Spacey
Best Supporting Actor-Vince Vaughn
Best Supporting Actress-Jennifer Hudson
Best Original Screenplay: Grant Heslov and John Logan
Best Cinematography: Robert Richardson
Best Editing: Thelma Schoonmaker