Mourning Manny Farber.

2008-08-20 19:00:01

More on the passing of critic Manny Farber: J. Hoberman at the Village Voice (alongside a reprint of his 1981 essay "Termite Makes Right"): Farber wasn't like other critics. He didn't proselytize and he didn't create systems. Rather, he articulated his idiosyncratic perception, which is to say: He had a sensibility. Farber was as punchy and hardboiled, at least in his prose, as Sam Fuller (a director he admired) and as masterful a vernacular stylist as S. J. Perelman (who, knowledgeable as he was, nodded to Farber in one of his pieces). As was said of Perelman, before they made Manny they broke the mold. Jonathan Rosenbaum offers "They Drive by Night: The Criticism of Manny Farber," written for his 1993 collection "Placing Movies: The Practice of Film Criticism." Roger Ebert has an anecdote: I met Manny and Patricia for the first time at the 1972 Venice Film Festival, where,...

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