Ebert on Scorsese

Roger Ebert has a new book out called Scorsese by Ebert, which I'm sure will be wonderful. Maybe he is going to start doing a series of such biographical-themed books? We can only hope. Only Ebert can write the Spielberg book, or should. Here's the dust jacket for the Scorsese book.

From Publishers Weekly

Ebert, film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, is an unabashed fan of Scorsese, whom he considers the most gifted director of his generation. To prove it, he's compiled his reviews of every Scorsese film—beginning with I Call First in 1967 to his latest, Shine a Light. Along the way, Ebert pays special tribute to five masterpieces, including Taxi Driver, Raging Bull and Mean Streets, which he calls one of the source points of modern movies. These three films in particular, Ebert argues, reflect Scorsese's ongoing preoccupation with sex and guilt, themes fueled by a Catholic upbringing and his childhood in New York City's Little Italy. Citing the director's strong collaboration with actor Robert De Niro and screenwriter Paul Schrader, Ebert says all three men seem fascinated by the lives of tortured, violent, guilt-ridden characters, usually men who cannot relate to women, such as Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver or Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull. Of special note are interviews with Scorsese over a 25-year period, in which the director candidly discusses his body of work. (Oct.)
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Review
"This book is proof that the greatest criticism is simply careful and educated observation that connects a filmmaker with his subject, his audience, and his time. Ebert is one of the most acclaimed and perceptive critics of his time, and this unique book is an invaluable study in the canon of both film and criticism."-Library Journal (Library Journal )

Product Description
Roger Ebert wrote the first film review that director Martin Scorsese ever received—for 1967’s I Call First—when both men were just embarking on their careers. Ebert had never been touched by a movie in quite the same way before, and this experience created a lasting bond that made him one of Scorsese’s most appreciative and perceptive commentators. Scorsese by Ebert offers the first record of America’s most respected film critic’s engagement with the works of America’s greatest living director. The book chronicles every single feature film in Scorsese’s considerable oeuvre, from his aforementioned debut to his 2008 release, the Rolling Stones documentary, Shine a Light.

Here Ebert puts Scorsese’s career in illuminating perspective, exploring the different phases of his development and the abiding themes (many of which reflect Scorsese’s Catholicism) that give his work such complexity and depth. All of Ebert’s incisive reviews of Scorsese’s individual films are here, of course, but there is much more. In the course of eleven interviews done over almost forty years, the book includes Scorsese’s own insights on both his accomplishments and disappointments. One of these interviews, the single longest ever conducted with Scorsese, appears here for the first time. Ebert has also written and included six new reconsiderations of the director’s less commented upon films, as well as a substantial introduction that provides a framework for understanding both Scorsese and his profound impact on American cinema.

As Scorsese himself notes in his foreword to this volume, history is the only critic that counts, but the dialogue from which its judgments arise begins with the kind of emotionally alert, historically informed, and intellectually honest writing that Ebert has collected here in this, the ideal pairing of filmmaker and critic.

For those who know my wife, they are now given permission to recommend this book to her for my imminent birthday.