Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

suntimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 171 posts

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#31

Post by chimeracoder »

danso wrote: post #21

Ebert made his name in movie criticism but he was one of my favorite writers, period. I've read him since I was in junior high...it sounds silly now, but the way he would give four stars to what seemed like just a shallow blockbuster action movie but then justify it for doing shallow action wonderfully ...that taught me a lot about how to judge things on what they purport to do, rather than just against what you, the…

> As good as his four-star reviews were, I still loved reading his 0 to 1 star reviews. He was at great at ripping movies as he was as exalting them.

It's typically harder to write a good positive review than a good negative one. It's often hard to come up with praise and word it so that it doesn't sound like a bunch of thinly-veiled cliches strung together. This was actually Ebert's greatest strength, in my opinion.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#32

Post by smacktoward »

DilipJ wrote: post #10

surprised to read that he was an early investor of Google. I wonder how that came about?

He was active in tech circles long before that sort of thing was cool. He was a passionate advocate for Apple and the Mac during the dark days before The Return of Steve, for instance, and used to write a regular column in one of the big Mac magazines (can't remember which one, unfortunately). You couldn't read the columns without realizing that he wasn't a non-techie posing as one -- he really was a power user, a gigantic nerd who loved everything Mac at heart.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#33

Post by atonse »

wcfields wrote: post #12

. I'll just leave one of my favorite quotes from Ebert about a movie that is actually one of my all time favorite comedy. "This movie doesn't scrape the bottom of the barrel. This movie isn't the bottom of the barrel. This movie isn't below the bottom of the barrel. This movie doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence with barrels." [1] - Roger Ebert review of "Freddy Got Fingered"; April 20, 2001 [1] http…

I always preferred his 0-1 star reviews to his 4 star reviews, only because he would skewer them with such masterful language. Ahh now what do I do when I want to laugh at a review about a woefully bad movie?

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#34

Post by GFischer »

suyash wrote: post #15

Someone needs to find 100% cure against this deadly disease. So much money is spent on cancer research every year and what are the results..almost zero.

I know a lot of people (including my grandmother) that extended their lifespan significantly thanks to cancer research.

It's still far from perfect - my grandmother ultimately died from cancer-related complications, but she got a 10-year extension on life, I'd say it has advanced.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#35

Post by bitwize »

suyash wrote: post #15

Someone needs to find 100% cure against this deadly disease. So much money is spent on cancer research every year and what are the results..almost zero.

As it turns out, fighting cancer is hard. Really, really fucking hard. "We have met the enemy and he is us." Or rather our own cells, mutated through a million different gene changes with a million different causes. Progress is being made every day; it only seems like nothing compared to the massive multidimensional scope of the problem.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#37

Post by clicks »

Very sad to hear. I read his reviews, not really to know how a movie was received and whether or not it is worth watching (though you can do that too), but to get a nice summary eloquently discussing the motifs, symbolism, and story line of a movie after actually having watched one. I don't know where I'll get that now.

Two big thumbs down :-(. RIP Ebert.

Re: Roger Ebert dies at 70 after battle with cancer

#40

Post by astrodust »

suyash wrote: post #15

Someone needs to find 100% cure against this deadly disease. So much money is spent on cancer research every year and what are the results..almost zero.

Results are not almost zero. Cancers that were once a death sentence before are now an inconvenience. Even though Roger Ebert ultimately died because of cancer, his life was extended at least a decade entirely because of treatments. This is progress.

The term "cancer survivor" didn't even exist prior to modern research.

Post reply on HN