Siskel & Ebert (TV Series)

A Stranger Among Us/Man Trouble/Honey, I Blew Up the Kid/Cool World/The Hours and Times (1992)

Roger Ebert: Self - Host

Quotes 

• Gene Siskel - Host : "The Hours and Times" runs only 60 minutes. That will make booking it difficult. But I think it definitely has the heft and gravity of a full-blown feature film, with first-rate performances and the kind of mature conversation and emotion that is really missing from today's homogenized and often juvenile American movies.

  Roger Ebert - Host : I didn't react that way to it at all, Gene. I think that you're a little overwrought in calling it a "tragic love story". Have you ever spent a weekend with somebody that you wanted to sleep with and they didn't sleep- want to sleep with you? That's not tragedy, that's just life.

  Gene Siskel - Host : Oh, but Roger...

  Roger Ebert - Host : I didn't...

  Gene Siskel - Host : ...Lemme go back and explain why that's tragedy.

  Roger Ebert - Host : Why is that tragedy?

  Gene Siskel - Host : Why is that tragedy? If you REALLY love someone, okay? And they won't love you back? And why would you pull out- just lemme stay with this. Why would you pull out one weekend and say that's insignificant, when obviously, these two gentlemen have known each other, they're in Liverpool for a long time, they're gonna have a whole lifetime together, and that weekend stands for their whole life. I mean, you've heard of the concept of "microcosm"?

  Roger Ebert - Host : I've heard of the concept of having a crush on somebody and not getting anywhere with them, and that's just the way it goes. This movie, to me, would've had almost no interest to me if it hadn't involved Brian Epstein and John Lennon. If these people had been named Tom and Harry...

  Gene Siskel - Host : Okay?

  Roger Ebert - Host : ...Nobody would've cared about the story, this weekend, or this movie. And it's ONLY because of the celebrity connection with The Beatles that it was even made into a film. And there's no insight here that's particularly about either one of these people.

  Gene Siskel - Host : Well, I think, I think there are very clear portraits about the two guys. One is a very special character; he's not just a rock star manager, he's a guy who is a tortured soul.

  Roger Ebert - Host : "Tortured soul?"

  Gene Siskel - Host : Absolutely.

  Roger Ebert - Host : John Lennon?

  Gene Siskel - Host : No, rock star manager, he's just a tortured soul. Aren't you listening to me?

  Roger Ebert - Host : Tortured soul Brian Epstein, I'll say it that way.

  Gene Siskel - Host : Yeah, okay.

  Roger Ebert - Host : No!

  Gene Siskel - Host : NOT a tortured soul?

  Roger Ebert - Host : I don't think so. I don't think he's any more tortured than everybody watching this show has been on occasion.

  Gene Siskel - Host : Roger, I think the man ended his life, took his own life. You don't think he's a tortured soul?

  Roger Ebert - Host : Oh, Gene, this is just an utterly semantic argument.

  Gene Siskel - Host : "Semantic"? We're talking about a real person! And I think that we see a real person on the screen. I'm amazed at your reaction to this picture.

• Roger Ebert - Host : Now, I've been an admirer of Ralph Bakshi's work in the past, and I was looking forward to "Cool World" as his long-delayed return to feature film, but the sad fact is, this film is a mess. The story cannot be followed, the characters are badly-defined, and the animation is often so chaotic and overwrought and speeded-up that it's physically difficult for the human eye to perceive what's supposed to be happening. You can't read these images. I was also less than impressed with the way Bakshi combined the real and animated worlds. After the seamless special effects work in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", here is a movie where you can SEE the seams, and they were not particularly convincing.

  Gene Siskel - Host : Oh, absolutely, you could see the seams. And I think, uh, following on "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", which is a classic and which redefined and which re-energized the animated feature film, uh, you gotta go UP a level, or you have to BE at that level, or you're gonna come off REAL bad. So I think marketing this picture was a mistake if they weren't gonna play at that level. And on Ralph Bakshi, I think the way to honor him is not to see this picture, frankly, but to go back and look at some of his early '70s work, like "Fritz the Cat". I think that, uh, this didn't apply. This feels like it was made by a committee in some way. He farmed out some of the supporting animation, which you talk about as whizzing by real fast. That was, it WAS farmed out.