Vincent Gallo Has Put A Curse On My Colon And A Hex On My Prostate. He Called Me A 'fat Pig' In The New York Post And Told The New York Observer I Have 'the Physique Of A Slave-trader.' He Is Angry At Me Because I Said His 'the Brown Bunny' Was The Worst Movie In The History Of The Cannes Film Festival... It Is True That I Am Fat, But One Day I Will Be Thin, And He Will Still Be The Director Of 'the Brown Bunny.'

-Roger Ebert

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Roger Ebert

Topic

New York

Pigs

Cannes Film Festival

More From Roger Ebert

One Of The Most Sublime And Hazardous Moments In Human Experience Comes When Two People Lock Eyes And Realize That They Are Sexually Attracted To One Another. They May Not Act On The Knowledge.they May File It Away For Future Reference. They May Deny It. They May Never See Each Other Again. But The Moment Has Happened, And For An Instant All Other Considerations Are Insignificant.

Eye

Two

People

All I Require Of A Religion Is That It Be Tolerant Of Those Who Do Not Agree With It.

Tolerance

Agree

Catholic Theology Accounts For The Fact That There's Evil In The World. People Say, Well, How Could God Let This Happen. Well, What God Did Was Set The Mechanism In Motion And Then Allow People To Do The Best They Can Under The Circumstances That They're Dealt In Order To Gain Grace And Get Into Heaven.

Order

People

Evil

If A Movie Isn't A Hit Right Out Of The Gate, They Drop It. Which Means That The Whole Mainstream Hollywood Product Has Been Skewed Toward Violence And Vulgar Teen Comedy.

Teenager

Mean

Hollywood

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

Steve Coogan Picks Up Enough To Lecture An Interviewer: This Is A Postmodern Novel Before There Was Any Modernism To Be Post About. Later It's Claimed That Tristram Shandy Was No. 8 On The Observer's List Of The Greatest Novels, Which Cheers Everyone Until They Discover The List Was Chronological.

Cheer

Book

Lists

I Value The Kind Of Prayer When You Stand At The Edge Of The Sea, Or Beneath A Tree, Or Smell A Flower, Or Love Someone, Or Do A Good Thing. Those Prayers Validate Existence And Snatch It Away From Meaningless Routine.

Prayer

Flower

Smell

To Make Others Less Happy Is A Crime. To Make Ourselves Unhappy Is Where All Crime Starts. We Must Try To Contribute Joy To The World. That Is True No Matter What Our Problems, Our Health, Our Circumstances. We Must Try. I Didn't Always Know This And Am Happy I Lived Long Enough To Find It Out.

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Mind

I Am Utterly Bored By Celebrity Interviews. Most Celebrities Are Devoid Of Interest.

Bored

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Interest

When I Go To The Movies, One Of My Strongest Desires Is To Be Shown Something New. I Want To Go To New Places, Meet New People, Have New Experiences. When I See Hollywood Formulas Mindlessly Repeated, A Little Something Dies Inside Of Me: I Have Lost Two Hours To Boors Who Insist On Telling Me Stories I Have Heard Before.

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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

To Call It An Anticlimax Would Be An Insult Not Only To Climaxes But To Prefixes. It's A Crummy Secret, About One Step Up The Ladder Of Narrative Originality From It Was All A Dream. It's So Witless, In Fact, That When We Do Discover The Secret, We Want To Rewind The Film So We Don't Know The Secret Anymore. And Then Keep On Rewinding, And Rewinding, Until We're Back At The Beginning, And Can Get Up From Our Seats And Walk Backward Out Of The Theater And Go Down The Up Escalator And Watch The Money Spring From The Cash Register Into Our Pockets.

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Spring

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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

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When I Am Writing My Problems Become Invisible And I Am The Same Person I Always Was. All Is Well. I Am As I Should Be.

Writing

Problem

Invisible

All But A Very Few Of Us Are In Debt. We Exist As Entities Who Borrow Money And Spend The Rest Of Our Lives Making Interest Payments On A Debt Tally That Never Seems To Budge. Whatever Wealth We Have, In Labor, Property Or Cash, Is Suctioned To The Top.

Debt

Cash

Wealth

Why Are Some People Bullied? Because They Are Different. How? It Doesn't Matter.

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Film Has Become A Marketed Commodity, And The Opportunities And Audiences For Art Cinema Have Grown Smaller. There Is A General Downturn In Cultural Literacy, Perhaps Because Of Television.

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Opportunity

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Beguiled By George S. Bush's Easy Smile And Casual Indifference To The Details, We Are On The Brink Of Electing Him To Office. This Isn't Choosing A President, It's Casting The Lead In A Sitcom About The Presidency.

Office

President

Politics

Sometimes Two People Will Regard Each Other Over A Gulf Too Wide To Ever Be Bridged, And Know Immediately What Could Have Happened, And That It Never Will.

Two

People

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It's Not What A Movie Is About, It's How It Is About It.

Film

Occasionally An Unsuspecting Innocent Will Stumble Into A Movie Like This And Send Me An Anguished Postcard, Asking How I Could Possibly Give A Favorable Review To Such Trash. My Stock Response Is Ebert's Law, Which Reads: A Movie Is Not About What It Is About. It Is About How It Is About It.

Law

Giving

Asking

Battlefield Earth Is Like Taking A Bus Trip With Someone Who Has Needed A Bath For A Long Time. It's Not Merely Bad; It's Unpleasant In A Hostile Way.

Long

Earth

Way

The Moment A Man Stops Dreaming Is The Moment He Petrifies Inside.

Dream

Men

Moments

The Genius Is Not In How Much Stanley Kubrick Does In “2001: A Space Odyssey,'' But In How Little. This Is The Work Of An Artist So Sublimely Confident That He Doesn't Include A Single Shot Simply To Keep Our Attention. He Reduces Each Scene To Its Essence, And Leaves It On Screen Long Enough For Us To Contemplate It, To Inhabit It In Our Imaginations. Alone Among Science-fiction Movies, “2001'' Is Not Concerned With Thrilling Us, But With Inspiring Our Awe.

Artist

Space

Essence

Friends Don't Let Jackasses Drink And Drive.

Drink

Jackasses

Drink And Drive

Aren't You Getting Tired Of People Hating One Another? What Do They Think They Get Out Of It?

Hate

Tired

Thinking

I Urgently Advise Hospitals: Do Not Make The Dvd Available To Your Patients; There May Be An Outbreak Of Bedpans Thrown At Tv Screens.

Dvds

May

Tvs

Because Of The Rush Of Human Knowledge, Because Of The Digital Revolution, I Have A Voice, And I Do Not Need To Scream.

Technology

Digital Revolution

Voice

If You Have To Ask What It Symbolizes, It Didn't.

Asks

Ifs

We Live In A Box Of Space And Time. Movies Are Windows In Its Walls. They Allow Us To Enter Other Minds, Not Simply In The Sense Of Identifying With The Characters, Although That Is An Important Part Of It, But By Seeing The World As Another Person Sees It.

Wall

Character

Space

It's A Good Question, Because A Movie Isn't Good Or Bad Based On Its Politics. It's Usually Good Or Bad For Other Reasons, Though You Might Agree Or Disagree With Its Politics.

Good Questions

Might

Reason

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

3-d Is A Waste Of A Perfectly Good Dimension. Hollywood's Current Crazy Stampede Toward It Is Suicidal. It Adds Nothing Essential To The Moviegoing Experience. For Some, It Is An Annoying Distraction. For Others, It Creates Nausea And Headaches.

Crazy

Suicidal

Perfectly Good

It Is More Erotic To Wonder If You're About To Be Kissed Than It Is To Be Kissed.

Erotic

Wonder

Ifs

(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

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How Quickly Do We Grow Accustomed To Wonders. I Am Reminded Of The Isaac Asimov Story Nightfall, About The Planet Where The Stars Were Visible Only Once In A Thousand Years. So Awesome Was The Sight That It Drove Men Mad. We Who Can See The Stars Every Night Glance Up Casually At The Cosmos And Then Quickly Down Again, Searching For A Dairy Queen.

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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.

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People Read The Papers Not In The Hopes Of Learning Something New, But In The Expectation Of Being Told What They Already Know. This Is A Form Of Living Death. Its Apotheosis Is The Daily Poll In Usa Today, Which Informs Us What Percentage Of A Small Number Of Unscientifically Selected People Called A Toll Number To Vote On Questions That Cannot Possibly Be Responded To With A Yes Or No.

Learning Something New

Small Numbers

Media

The Muse Visits During The Process Of Creation, Not Before.

Muse

Creation

Process

When I Had Been A Film Critic For Ten Minutes, I Treated Doris Day As A Target For Cheap Shots. I Have Learned Enough To Say Today That The Woman Was Remarkably Gifted.

Film Critics

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It Is Strange How The Romances Of The Teenage Years Retain A Poignancy All Through Life - How A Girl Who Turns You Down When You're 16 Retains An Aura In Your Memory Even Long After You, And She, Have Ceased To Be Who You Were Then. I Attended My High School Reunion A Couple Of Weeks Ago And Discovered, In The Souvenir Booklet Assembled By The Reunion Committee, That One Of The Girls In My Class Had A Crush On Me All Those Years Ago. I Would Have Given A Great Deal To Have Had That Information At The Time.

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Girl

Teenage

No Matter What They're Charging To Get In, It's Worth More To Get Out.

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Bad Movies

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

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.

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Genre

It's Funny That There Was So Much Disturbance About Having A Catholic In The White House With Kennedy, And When We Finally Get A Religion In The White House That's Causing A Lot Of Conflicts, And Concerns, And Disturbances For A Lot Of People, It's In The Bush Administration.

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House

Grave Of The Fireflies Is An Emotional Experience So Powerful That It Forces A Rethinking Of Animation... It Belongs On Any List Of The Greatest War Films Ever Made.

Powerful

War

Firefly

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

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

Movies Are Not About Moving, But About Whether To Move.

Moving

[marlon] Brando Was The Only Guy Who Could Step Out Of That Shadow At The End Of That Movie And Be Worth The Wait.

Guy

Waiting

Shadow

I Was Instructed Long Ago By A Wise Editor, "if You Understand Something You Can Explain It So That Almost Anyone Can Understand It. If You Don't, You Won't Be Able To Understand Your Own Explanation." That Is Why 90% Of Academic Film Theory Is Bullshit. Jargon Is The Last Refuge Of The Scoundrel.

Wise

Long Ago

Editors

I Felt It Would To Add A Great Deal To My Legend For Eccentricity.

Add

Legends

Deals

My Newspaper Job … Is My Identity.

Jobs

Identity

Newspapers

It's Strange: We Leave The Movie Having Enjoyed Its Conclusion So Much That We Almost Forgot Our Earlier Reservations. But They Were There, And They Were Real.

Real

Strange

Reservations

The Last Airbender Is An Agonizing Experience In Every Category I Can Think Of And Others Still Waiting To Be Invented.

Thinking

Waiting

Agonizing

When I Write, I Fall Into The Zone Many Writers, Painters, Musicians, Athletes, And Craftsmen Of All Sorts Seem To Share: In Doing Something I Enjoy And Am Expert At, Deliberate Thought Falls Aside And It Is All Just There. I Think Of The Next Word No More Than The Composer Thinks Of The Next Note.

Fall

Writing

Athlete

We Are Born Into A Box Of Time And Space. We Use Words And Communication To Break Out Of It And To Reach Out To Others.

Motivation

Communication

Inspiration

Matthew Mcconaughey And Kate Hudson Star. I Neglected To Mention That, Maybe Because I Was Trying To Place Them In This Review's Version Of The Witness Protection Program. If I Were Taken Off The Movie Beat And Assigned To Cover The Interior Design Of Bowling Alleys, I Would Have Some Idea Of How They Must Have Felt As They Made This Film.

Stars

Taken

Ideas

If There's Anything I Hate More Than A Stupid Action Comedy, It's An Incompetent Stupid Action Comedy. It's Not So Bad It's Good. It's So Bad It's Nothing Else But Bad.

Hate

Stupid

Comedy

There Must Be A Better Reason To Have A Baby Than To Provide A Plot Point In A Rom-com. Don't You Think?

Baby

Thinking

Plot

An Actress Should Never, Ever, Be Asked To Run Beside A Van In Red Disco Boots For More Than About Half A Block, And Then Only If Her Child Is Being Kidnapped.

Running

Children

Block

We Can't Help Identifying With The Protagonist. It's Coded In Our Movie-going Dna.

Dna

Helping

Protagonists

We Spend Too Much Time Hiding Illness.

Health

Too Much

Illness

I'll Tell You, I Think That The Internet Has Provided An Enormous Boost To Film Criticism By Giving People An Opportunity To Self Publish Or To Find Sites That Are Friendly.

Opportunity

Thinking

Self

A Truly Strong Woman Will Choose A Stong Man Who Disagrees With Her Over A Weak One Who Goes Along.

Wisdom

Strong Women

Weak

Artists Are Rarely Members Of The Popular Crowd.

Artist

Crowds

Members

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

Socrates Told Us, "the Unexamined Life Is Not Worth Living." I Think He's Calling For Curiosity, More Than Knowledge. In Every Human Society At All Times And At All Levels, The Curious Are At The Leading Edge.

Thinking

Curiosity

Calling

Fellini Was More In Love With Breasts Than Russ Meyer, More Wracked With Guilt Than Ingmar Bergman, More Of A Flamboyant Showman Than Busby Berkeley... Amarcord Seems Almost To Flow From The Camera, As Anecdotes Will Flow From One Who Has Told Them Often And Knows They Work. This Was The Last Of His Films Made For No Better Reason Than Fellini Wanted To Make It.

Guilt

Cameras

Anecdotes

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

No Movie Featuring Either Harry Dean Stanton Or M. Emmet Walsh In A Supporting Role Can Be Altogether Bad.

Roles

Dean

Supporting Roles

A Film Is A Terrible Thing To Waste.

Waste

Film

Terrible

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

And The Sexes Eyeing Each Other Uneasily, For Nothing Is Easier For A Teenager To Imagine Than Rejection.

Sex

Teenager

Rejection

While I Am Usually In Despair When A Movie Abandons Its Plot For A Third Act Given Over Entirely To Action, I Have No Problem With The Way Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets Ends, Because It Has Been Pointing Toward This Ending, Hinting About It, Preparing Us For It, All The Way Through. What A Glorious Movie.

Secret

Despair

Plot

The Idea That A Book Can Advise A Woman How To Capture A Man Is Touchingly Naive. Books Advising Men How To Capture A Woman Are Far Less Common, Perhaps Because Few Men Are Willing To Admit To Such A Difficulty. For Both Sexes, I Recommend A Good Novel, Offering Scenarios You Might Learn From, If Only Because They Reflect A Lot Of Doubt.

Sex

Book

Men

Teenagers Used To Go To The Movies To See Adults Having Sex. Today Adults Go To The Movies To See Teenagers Having Sex.

Sex

Teenager

Adults

What Every Human Being Should Do Is Eat A Vegetarian Diet Based On Whole Foods. Period.

Vegetarian Diet

Should

Periods

Lebanon Was At One Time Known As A Nation That Rose Above Sectarian Hatred; Beirut Was Known As The Paris Of The Middle East. All Of That Was Blown Apart By Senseless Religious Wars, Financed And Exploited In Part By Those Who Sought Power And Wealth. If Women Had Been In Charge, Would They Have Been More Sensible? It's A Theory.

Religious

War

Paris

Dogs Notice, They Share, They Draw Conclusions, They Like It When They're Able To Be Of Service And Are Touchingly Grateful When They're Praised.

Dog

Grateful

Able

Low Self Esteem Involves Imagining The Worst That Other People Can Think About You.

Self Esteem

Thinking

People

We All Are Born With A Certain Package. We Are Who We Are: Where We Were Born, Who We Were Born As, How We Were Raised. We're Kind Of Stuck Inside That Person, And The Purpose Of Civilization And Growth Is To Be Able To Reach Out And Empathize A Little Bit With Other People. And For Me, The Movies Are Like A Machine That Generates Empathy. It Lets You Understand A Little Bit More About Different Hopes, Aspirations, Dreams And Fears. It Helps Us To Identify With The People Who Are Sharing This Journey With Us.

Dream

Journey

Civilization

We Exist To Have Our Wealth Moved Up The Economic Chain Out Of Our Reach.

Wealth

Economic

Chains

Resentment Is Just A Way Of Letting Someone Else Use Your Mind Rent-free.

Mind

Use

Way

I Stopped Taking Notes On My Palm Pilot And Started Playing The Little Chess Game.

Games

Chess Game

Littles

And I Think Both The Left And The Right Should Celebrate People Who Have Different Opinions, And Disagree With Them, And Argue With Them, And Differ With Them, But Don't Just Try To Shut Them Up.

Thinking

People

Trying

Mad Dog Time Is The First Movie I Have Seen That Does Not Improve On The Sight Of A Blank Screen Viewed For The Same Length Of Time. Oh, I've Seen Bad Movies Before. But They Usually Made Me Care About How Bad They Were. Watching Mad Dog Time Is Like Waiting For The Bus In A City Where You're Not Sure They Have A Bus Line.

Dog

Sight

Cities

Who Was The Real Hitchcock? I Interviewed Him Once And Haven't A Clue.

Real

Clue

Hitchcock

A Depressing Number Of People Seem To Process Everything Literally. They Are To Wit As A Blind Man Is To A Forest, Able To Find Every Tree, But Each One Coming As A Surprise.

Depressing

Men

Numbers

Because We Can Engineer Genetics, Because We Can Telecast Real Lives-of Course We Must, Right? But Are These Good Things To Do? The Irony Is, The People Who Will Finally Answer That Question Will Be The Very Ones Produced By The Process.

Real

Science

People

If There Is Such A Thing As A Lock On An Oscar Nomination, ... Hoffman Has One.

Locks

Oscars

Nominations

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

Open-heart Surgery Is Now Part Of A Typical Life Experience For Many People. Folks Talk Casually About 'having A Stent Put In,' As If They Had Their Tires Rotated.

Heart

People

Typical

Never Marry Anyone You Could Not Sit Next To During A Three-day Bus Trip.

Inspirational

Marriage

Men

I Just Assume I'm Right. Partially Out Of Conviction And Partially As A Pose.

Assuming

Conviction

It's Rare To Find A Film That Goes For Broke And Says, 'to Hell With The Consequences.'

Film

Hell

Broke

The Children Of Birmingham Did Not Really Die In The State Of Alabama, However, Because Alabama Is A State Of Mind, And In The Minds Of The [white] Men Who Rule Alabama, Those Children Had Never Lived [...] Their Blood Is On So Many Hands, That History Will Weep In The Telling...and It Is Not New Blood. It Is Old, So Very Old.

Children

Men

White Man

To Know Me Is To Love Me. This Cliche Is Popular For A Reason, Because Most Of Us, I Imagine, Believe Deep In Our Hearts That If Anyone Truly Got To Know Us, They'd Truly Get To Love Us - Or At Least Know Why We're The Way We Are. The Problem In Life, Maybe The Central Problem, Is That So Few People Ever Seem To Have Sufficient Curiosity To Do The Job On Us That We Know We Deserve.

Life

Jobs

Believe

I Had A Hard Time Watching "wolf Creek." It Is A Film With One Clear Purpose: To Establish The Commercial Credentials Of Its Director By Showing His Skill At Depicting The Brutal Tracking, Torture And Mutilation Of Screaming Young Women. When The Killer Severs The Spine Of One Of His Victims And Calls Her "a Head On A Stick," I Wanted To Walk Out Of The Theater And Keep On Walking.

Hard Times

Skills

Directors

Improvisation Is A Weird Word Because We Often Think It Means That You Make Things Up Out Of Whole Cloth Right There On The Spot, And That's Rarely The Case In Acting. You Have To Know Who The Character Is, What The Situation Is And What Is Needed.

Character

Mean

Thinking

To Make Others Less Happy Is A Crime. To Make Ourselves Unhappy Is Where All Crime Starts.

Unhappy

Crime

Nothing Ever Seems Straightforward In Venice, Least Of All Its Romances.

Venice

Romance

Straightforward

In Thinking About 'depressing Movies,' Many People Don't Realize That All Bad Movies Are Depressing, And No Good Movies Are.

Depressing

Thinking

People

Not Everyone Needs To Be Slammed Into A Category And Locked There.

Needs

1. Defining Quotes

A quote is a repetition of someone else's statement or thoughts. It can be a direct replication of words spoken or written by another individual, often used to support arguments, provide evidence, or convey profound insights.

2. The Importance of Quotes

2.1. Enhancing Credibility

Incorporating quotes from authoritative sources can bolster the credibility of your work. By referencing experts or primary sources, you demonstrate thorough research and a solid foundation for your arguments.

2.2. Providing Evidence

Quotes serve as concrete evidence to support claims. In academic and professional writing, they validate points made, offering readers a basis to trust the information presented.

2.3. Conveying Emotions and Perspectives

Quotes can encapsulate emotions and perspectives succinctly. They allow writers to express complex feelings or viewpoints through the words of others, often more eloquently than paraphrasing.

3. Types of Quotes

3.1. Direct Quotes

Direct quotes involve copying the exact words from a source, enclosed in quotation marks. They are used when the original wording is significant or particularly well-expressed.

3.2. Indirect Quotes (Paraphrasing)

Indirect quotes restate the original message in your own words. While not enclosed in quotation marks, they still require proper attribution to the original source.

3.3. Block Quotes

Block quotes are lengthy direct quotations, formatted as a separate block of text. They are typically used for quotes exceeding a certain length, varying by citation style. For instance, in APA style, quotes longer than 40 words are formatted as block quotes.

4. Proper Usage of Quotes

4.1. Contextual Relevance

Ensure that the quote you choose is relevant to the topic and adds value to your content. Avoid inserting quotes solely for decorative purposes.

4.2. Integration into Your Writing

Seamlessly integrate quotes into your writing. Introduce them appropriately and follow up with analysis or commentary to connect them to your main points.

4.3. Attribution and Citation

Always attribute quotes to their original authors and provide proper citations according to the required style guide (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).

5. Common Mistakes to Avoid

5.1. Overusing Quotes

Relying too heavily on quotes can overshadow your voice. Use them sparingly to support your arguments, not replace them.

5.2. Lack of Analysis

Presenting a quote without analysis or explanation can leave readers questioning its relevance. Always follow up with your interpretation or discussion.

5.3. Misquoting or Taking Out of Context

Ensure that quotes are accurate and not taken out of context, as this can mislead readers and undermine your credibility.

6. Quotes in Different Contexts

6.1. Academic Writing

In academic writing, quotes are used to support arguments, provide evidence, and engage with existing literature. Proper citation is crucial to avoid plagiarism.

6.2. Journalism

Journalists use quotes to provide firsthand accounts, add authenticity, and present multiple perspectives within a story.

6.3. Literature and Creative Writing

In literature, quotes can be used to convey character voices, themes, and stylistic elements. They enrich narratives and provide depth to storytelling.

7. Punctuation and Formatting

Understanding the correct punctuation and formatting of quotes is essential:

Quotation Marks: Always enclose direct quotes within quotation marks.

Punctuation Placement: In American English, periods and commas are placed inside quotation marks, while colons and semicolons are placed outside.

Block Quotes: For longer quotes, format them as block quotes without quotation marks, and indent the entire block.

8. Ethical Considerations

Ethical use of quotes involves accurate representation, proper attribution, and respect for intellectual property. Misuse can lead to plagiarism, which carries serious academic and professional consequences.

9. Tools for Managing Quotes

Utilize tools like citation generators and plagiarism checkers to manage quotes effectively. These tools help ensure proper formatting and originality in your writing.

Conclusion

Quotes are invaluable in enriching content, providing evidence, and conveying complex ideas succinctly. When used appropriately, they enhance the quality and credibility of your writing. Always ensure relevance, proper integration, and ethical usage to maximize their impact.

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