I still don't get your point.
When you say "At least with Sicko, Moore is covering the middle class and not slumming around trying to pretend he is a working person." I mean the only reason I am asking for an explanation is because I don't get your point. So I suppose there is implied criticism, like when Denby says that Moore is a "bully," but a person that only "bullies" people who are much more powerful than he is I don't think fits the definition. You say he usually pretends to be a working person. As far as I can see Moore's persona has not changed since the 1980s when he used to live in Flint. When he was there, if I remember correctly his fellow towns people (the ones who took notice) thought he was a working class bum pretending to be a hippie. Now that he lives in New York you think that he is a middle class bum (stating your case over-strongly) pretending to be working class. Yet, his persona is the same. Maybe you are just prejudiced against guys who make who happen to come from rusted out industrial towns and still sound and act like they come from those towns. In that case you would hate most of my relatives.
I don't think you are trying to sound like a reverse snob but that is what you sound like. Which is why I ask... what is your point?
Blackmail <blackmail.is.my.life at gmail.com> wrote "Denby is one of the worst film critics I've ever read. He took a Tory approach to V for Vendetta too."
I think he is bored with movies but it is his job and doesn't have the guts to get out of the business. His reviews are mercifully short and painfully lack insight. He used to have at least a sense of history. He has never been really fun to read. At least Anthony Lane, the New Yorker's other critic is fun to read, but I keep on thinking what a good critic, say our own Brian, could do with this column. I was never the greatest Pauline Kael fan but I miss her. She used to really try to pack a wallop and she practically always, even when you agreed with her, provoked an argument.
As I said Anthony Lane is amusing: for example this recent bit:
"How do you solve a problem like Angelina? Ms. Jolie is now more of a brand than a person, and she comes in six flavors:
1. The celebrity. Angelina Jolie is so famous that when she looks in the mirror her reflection asks for an autograph. The only publication in this country yet to feature her on its cover is The American Numismatic Magazine, and even that will change the moment she bends down to pick up a nickel.
2. The sexpot. In this she is unchallenged, and yet her timing is off by fifty years. When it comes to channelling her carnal appeal, no current film director has a clue; the guy she needs is Frank Tashlin, who guided Jayne Mansfield through "The Girl Can't Help It" (1956) and "Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?" (1957), and whose eyeballs, if confronted with Jolie in the flesh, would pop out on cartoon springs and bob around.
3. The Brad handler. She took one look at the world's most widely desired man and scooped him up with no more ado than a Parisian grande dame tucking a Chihuahua into her clutch bag.
4. The mother. Official estimates as to how many children Jolie now possesses, and from how many continents, change on a weekly basis. When not giving birth herself, she likes to order in. How this has affected Mr. Pitt is unclear, but his expression is sometimes that of a man who stepped out to hail a cab and got run over by a fleet of trucks.
5. The world saver. Jolie is a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Her father, Jon Voight, told the Biography Channel that "she's developed into one of our great humanitarians." This was clearly on the minds of political leaders when they met Jolie at a summit of the World Economic Forum in Davos two years ago. Half of them offered their entire foreign-aid budget for a chance to fetch her a mai tai.
6. Oh yes, the actress. This last talent, so often neglected, is displayed in her new film, "A Mighty Heart," and without it the legend of Angelina Jolie would be little more than a vaporous joke."
http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/cinema/2007/06/25/070625crci_cinema_lane
But he doesn't hit for the fences, he doesn't provoke thoughts and arguments about what the movies are about, he doesn't even make you nostalgic for the time when you used to love waiting for the movies and talking about movies. All you can say is that Lane is worth reading for the chuckles.
Denby used to be worth reading as a guide to movies you might want to see but now he is simply boring and he is never insightful. I could not be wittier than Lane but I certainly could have more fun and be more insightful than Denby. It is such a shame that the New Yorker hasn't done better than this.
So my proposal (which won't be accepted because there cannot be agreement on anything lbo-talk) is that we started a campaign to get Brian hired by "The New Yorker" and that for the time being we get Brian to write bi-weekly movie reviews for the list and collectively send them to The New Yorker saying hire this guy!
Jerry
Jerry