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It's The Worst Kind Of Bad Film: The Kind That Gets You All Worked Up And Then Lets You Down, Instead Of Just Being Lousy From The First Shot.
-Roger Ebert
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It's The Worst Kind

Roger Ebert
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It's The Worst Kind Of Bad Film: The Kind That Gets You All Worked Up And Then Lets You Down, Instead Of Just Being Lousy From The First Shot.

Understanding the Quote: "it's the worst kind of bad film: the kind that gets you..."

This quote by Roger Ebert reflects deeply on the theme of firsts. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Firsts, Just Being, Kind, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Roger Ebert interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert is celebrated for insightful thoughts on firsts and just being. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Topic
Firsts
Just Being
Kind
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Important
Rooms
It's Easier To Identify With Loss Than Love, Because We Have Had So Much More Experience Of It.
Loss
Easier
The Purpose Of Civilization And Growth Is To Be Able To Reach Out And Empathize With Other People... For Me, The Movies Are Like A Machine That Generates Empathy.
Civilization
People
Empathy
Many Really Good Films Allow Us To Empathize With Other Lives.
Film
Good Films
Cinema, For Me, Has Always Been Something Like Music Composed With Photographic Images.
Cinema
What Every Human Being Should Do Is Eat A Vegetarian Diet Based On Whole Foods. Period.
Vegetarian Diet
Should
Periods
It Does Seem True That A Lot Of People Will Do Anything, However Humiliating, For Fame.
People
Doe
Fame
Life Is Made Up Of Challenges That Cannot Be Solved But Only Accepted.
Challenges
Life Is
Accepted
Samurai Films, Like Westerns, Need Not Be Familiar Genre Stories. They Can Expand To Contain Stories Of Ethical Challenges And Human Tragedy.
Challenges
Tragedy
Needs
I'm Told We Movie Critics Praise Movies That Are Long And Boring.
Long
Boring
Praise
I Do Not Fear Death. I Know It Is Coming, And I Do Not Fear It, Because I Believe There Is Nothing On The Other Side Of Death To Fear.
Believe
Sides
Fear Of Death
Some Of These People Make My Skin Crawl.
People
Skins
Yes, I Was Fat, But I Dealt With It By Simply Never Thinking About It. It Is Useful, When You Are Fat, To Have A Lot Of Other Things To Think About.
Beauty
Thinking
Fats
I Do Suspect My Star Ratings Average Too High. But, Of Course, Star Ratings Are Ridiculous. I'm Stuck With Them.
Stars
Average
Ridiculous
Dear Bill (o'reilly)...i Am Concerned That You Have Been Losing Touch With Reality Recently. Did You Really Say You Are More Powerful Than Any Politician? That Reminds Me Of The Famous Story About Squeaky The Chicago Mouse. It Seems That Squeaky Was Floating On His Back Along The Chicago River One Day. Approaching The Michigan Avenue Lift Bridge, He Called Out: Raise The Bridge! I Have An Erection!
Powerful
Reality
Bridges
I'm Kind Of Glad The Web Is Sort Of Totally Anarchic. That's Fine With Me.
Kind
Fine
Glad
The Fact Is, Most People Are Not Going To Be Rich Someday. And We've Had A Concerted Policy Of Taking Money Away From The Poor And Giving It To The Rich Wholesale, And At The Same Time, We Have The Runaway Corporations, And The Greed.
People
Giving
Greed
I Began To Realize That I Had Tended To Avoid Some People Because Of My Instant Conclusions About Who They Were And What They Would Have To Say. I Discovered That Everyone, Speaking Honestly And Openly, Had Important Things To Tell Me.
People
Important
Realizing
Your Intellect May Be Confused, But Your Emotions Will Never Lie To You.
Confused
Lying
Emotional
I Think Most People Are More Susceptible To Prejudice Than To Reason.
Thinking
People
Prejudice
I Was Perfectly Content Before I Was Born, And I Think Of Death As The Same State.
Thinking
States
Born
Dice Rules Is One Of The Most Appalling Movies I Have Ever Seen. It Could Not Be More Damaging To The Career Of Andrew Dice Clay If It Had Been Made As A Documentary By Someone Who Hated Him. The Fact That Clay Apparently Thinks This Movie Is Worth Seeing Is Revealing And Sad, Indicating That He Not Only Lacks A Sense Of Humor, But Also Ordinary Human Decency.
Thinking
Careers
Clay
One Difference Between Film Noir And More Straightforward Crime Pictures Is That Noir Is More Open To Human Flaws And Likes To Embed Them In Twisty Plot Lines.
Plot Lines
Differences
Noir
The Buried Code Of Many American Films Has Become: If I Kill You, I Have Won And You Have Lost. The Instinctive Ethical Code Of Traditional Hollywood, The Code By Which Characters Like James Stewart, John Wayne And Henry Fonda Lived, Has Been Lost.
Character
Hollywood
Film
I Believe Empathy Is The Most Essential Quality Of Civilization.
Wisdom
Believe
Civilization
Life's Missed Opportunities, At The End, May Seem More Poignant To Us Than Those We Embraced — Because In Our Imagination They Have A Perfection That Reality Can Never Rival.
Opportunity
Reality
Imagination
It's Rare To Find A Film That Goes For Broke And Says, 'to Hell With The Consequences.'
Film
Hell
Broke
I Wear A Pedometer, A Little Device That Counts Every Step. It Works As A Goad, Because You Walk Additional Distances To Pile Up The Numbers. The Average Person Walks 2,000 To 3,000 Steps A Day. I Walk 10,000 Steps A Day. I Have Lost A Lot Of Weight As A Result.
Distance
Average
Numbers
Blockbusters Run The Mainstream Industry. We May Never Again Have A Decade Like The 1970s, When Directors Were Able To Find Such Freedom.
Running
Directors
May
The Layout Was Griping, The Glide Is Awesome. Two Ten-inch Fins Up, Way Up.
Two
Surfing
Way
The Movie "ed Wood," About The Worst Director Of All Time, Was Made To Prepare Us For "stargate."
Directors
Woods
Made
They're Not Trying To Prevent Hollywood From Making Movies. They're Asking That The Most Powerful Image-building Machinery In The World Stop Grinding Out Killer Dykes And Twisted Homo Sex Fiends As If Sexual Orientation Had Anything To Do With Criminal Behavior.
Sex
Powerful
Trying
(guy) Pearce, As The Hero, Makes The Mistake Of Trying To Give A Good And Realistic Performance. (jeremy) Irons At Least Knows What Kind Of Movie He's In, And Hams It Up Accordingly.
Mistake
Hero
Iron
The Moment A Man Stops Dreaming Is The Moment He Petrifies Inside.
Dream
Men
Moments
Because We Are Human, Because We Are Bound By Gravity And The Limitations Of Our Bodies, Because We Live In A World Where The News Is Often Bad And The Prospects Disturbing, There Is A Need For Another World Somewhere, A World Where Fred Astaire And Ginger Rogers Live.
Needs
News
World
No Movie Featuring Either Harry Dean Stanton Or M. Emmet Walsh In A Supporting Role Can Be Altogether Bad.
Roles
Dean
Supporting Roles
Life Always Has An Unhappy Ending, But You Can Have A Lot Of Fun Along The Way, And Everything Doesn't Have To Be Dripping In Deep Significance.
Fun
Unhappy
Way
I've Never Found Kicks To The Groin Particularly Funny, Although Recent Work In The Genre Of The Buddy Movie Suggests Audience Research Must Prove Me Wrong.
Research
Found
Genre
I Am Grateful For The Gifts Of Intelligence, Love, Wonder And Laughter. You Can't Say It Wasn't Interesting.
Laughter
Grateful
Interesting
The Academy Is Paranoid About Its Image.
Paranoid
Academy
One, Don't Wait For Inspiration, Just Start The Damned Thing. Two, Once You Begin, Keep On Until The End. How Do You Know How The Story Should Begin Until You Find Out Where It's Going?
Inspiration
Two
Waiting
Movies Are Like A Machine That Generates Empathy.
Empathy
Machines
I Believe That Young People Wearing Hoods, Unless They Are Very Young, Can Be Frightening. What Are They Hiding? Why Don't They Want To Come Out Into The Light With The Rest Of Us? They May Be Perfectly Nice, But The Hoods Send An Uncertain Statement.
Nice
Believe
Light
The Right Really Dominates Radio, And It's Amazing How Much Energy The Right Spends Telling Us That The Press Is Slanted To The Left When It Really Isn't. They Want To Shut Other People Up. They Really Don't Understand The First Amendment.
People
Energy
Want
I Have No Fear Of Death. We All Die. I Consider My Remaining Days To Be Like Money In The Bank. When It Is All Gone, I Will Be Repossessed.
Gone
No Fear
Fear Of Death
Absolutists Frighten Me. During All The Endless Discussions On My Blog About Evolution, Intelligent Design, God, And The Afterworld, Numbering Altogether Thousands Of Comments, I Have Never Named My Beliefs, Although Readers Have Freely Informed Me That I Am An Atheist, And Agnostic, Or At The Very Least A Secular Humanist - Which I Am.
Atheist
Intelligent
Design
James Cameron's Films Have Always Been Distinguished By Ground-breaking Technical Excellence.
Excellence
Film
Distinguished
Gene [siskel] Often Mentioned Something François Truffaut Once Told Him: The Most Beautiful Sight In A Movie Theater Is To Walk Down To The Front, Turn Around, And Look At The Light From The Screen Reflected On The Upturned Faces Of The Members Of The Audience.
Beautiful
Light
Sight
In The Vast Majority Of Movies, Everything Is Done For The Audience. We Are Cued To Laugh Or Cry, Be Frightened Or Relieved; Hitchcock Called The Movies A Machine For Causing Emotions In The Audience. Bresson (and Ozu) Take A Different Approach. They Regard, And Ask Us To Regard Along With Them, And To Arrive At Conclusions About Their Characters That Are Our Own. This Is The Cinema Of Empathy.
Character
Laughing
Empathy
My Newspaper Job … Is My Identity.
Jobs
Identity
Newspapers
It Has Been Said That The Reason We Establish Relationships Is To Assure Ourselves Of A Witness To Our Lives.
Love
Reason
Said
We Spend Too Much Time Hiding Illness.
Health
Too Much
Illness
But Considering That I Walked In Expecting No Complexity At All, Let Alone The Visual Wonderments, "snow White And The Huntsman" Is A Considerable Experience.
White
Snow
Expecting
A Remarkable Documentary That's Also One Of The Most Beautiful Nature Films I've Seen.
Beautiful
Documentaries
Film
Dr. Leonard Shlain, Chairman Of Laparoscopic Surgery At California Pacific Medical Center, Said They Took Some Four And Five Year-olds And Gave Them Video Games And Asked Them To Figure Out How To Play Them Without Instructions. Then They Watched Their Brain Activity With Real-time Monitors. At First, When They Were Figuring Out The Games, He Said, The Whole Brain Lit Up. But By The Time They Knew How To Play The Games, The Brain Went Dark, Except For One Little Point.
Real
Dark
Years
Clint, My Hero, Is Coming Across As Sad And Pathetic. He Didn't Need To Do This To Himself. It's Unworthy Of Him.
Hero
Needs
Pathetic
It's Not What A Movie Is About, It's How It Is About It.
Film
On This Ancient And Miraculous World, Where Such Beautiful Natural And Living Things Have Evolved, Something Has Gone Wrong When Life Itself Is Used As A Manufacturing Process.
Beautiful
Gone
World
One Of The Gifts One Movie Lover Can Give Another Is The Title Of A Wonderful Film They Have Not Yet Discovered
Giving
Titles
Lovers
The Time In Between My Clapping Is Ma. If You Just Have Non-stop Action With No Breathing Space At All, It's Just Busyness, But If You Take A Moment, Then The Tension Building In The Film Can Grow Into A Wider Dimension. If You Just Have Constant Tension At 80 Degrees All The Time You Just Get Numb.
Breathing Space
Degrees
Dimensions
We Are The Playthings Of The Gods.
Skateboarding Is Forever, And Things Like College And Girls Only Ruin An Endlessly Savored Adolescence.
Girl
College
Forever
In Hollywood, 'under Development' Means 'all I Have Is The Title.'
Mean
Hollywood
Titles
Parents And Schools Should Place Great Emphasis On The Idea That It Is All Right To Be Different. Racism And All The Other 'isms' Grow From Primitive Tribalism, The Instinctive Hostility Against Those Of Another Tribe, Race, Religion, Nationality, Class Or Whatever. You Are A Lucky Child If Your Parents Taught You To Accept Diversity.
Children
School
Ideas
Last Year, I Reviewed A Nine-hour Documentary About The Lives Of Mongolian Yak Herdsmen, And I Would Rather See It Again Than Sit Through The Frighteners.
Years
Nine
Lasts
In Blue Crush , We Meet Three Hawaiian Surfers Who Work As Hotel Maids, Live In A Grotty Rental, And Are Raising The Kid Sister Of One Of Them. Despite This Near-poverty, They Look Great; There Is Nothing Like A Tan And A Bikini To Overcome Class Distinctions.
Crush
Kids
Blue
Someone Once Said The Fundamental Reason We Get Married Is Because Have A Universal Human Need For A Witness.
Needs
Fundamentals
Married
A Lot Of People Just Go To Movies That Feed Into Their Preexisting And Not So Noble Needs And Desires: They Just Go To Action Pictures, And Things Like That. But If You Go To Foreign Films, If You Go To Documentaries, If You Go To Independent Films, If You Go To Good Films, You Will Become A Better Person Because You Will Understand Human Nature Better. Movies Record Human Nature In A Better Way Than Any Other Art Form, That's For Sure.
Art
Independent
People
Films To The Degree That They Glorify Mindlessness And Short Attention Span They Are Bad, To The Degree That They Encourage Empathy With People Not Like Ourselves And Encourage Us To Think About Life, They Are Good.
Thinking
People
Empathy
A Few Actresses Have All But Set Up Shop As Women Of A Certain Age Who Attract Younger Lovers. I Think Of Susan Sarandon, Cameron Diaz And Isabelle Huppert.
Thinking
Age
Actresses
We Must Try To Contribute Joy To The World. That Is True No Matter What Our Problems, Our Health, Our Circumstances. We Must Try.
Joy
Trying
World
People Never Think Of Themselves As Choosing To Be Politically Correct. They Simply Think In The Way That They Do.
Thinking
People
Way
It Goes To Show You How We In The Press So Often Miss The Big Stories That Are Right Under Our Noses. There Is A Famous Journalistic Legend About The Time A Young Reporter Covered The Johnstown Flood Of 1889. The Kid Wrote: God Sat On A Hillside Overlooking Johnstown Today And Looked At The Destruction He Had Wrought. His Editor Cabled Back: Forget Flood. Interview God.
Kids
Editors
Missing
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