Hated the implied insult to the audience by its belief that anyone would be entertained by it.' Hated the sensibility that thought anyone would like it. Hated every simpering stupid vacant audience-insulting moment of it. Hated hated hated hated hated this movie. In one of his most infamous reviews, Ebert said of North: 'I hated this movie. I still yearn and dream, but it is so hard for me to communicate that–not literally, but figuratively. Now, half a century after its release, it is about the arc of my life, and its closing scene is an eerie reflection of my wordlessness and difficulty in communicating. ' La Dolce Vita has become a touchstone in my life: A film about a kind of life I dreamed of living, then a film about the life I was living, the about my escape from that life. I was hoping maybe the boyz n the hood would carjack the General, which would provide a fresh twist to the story, but no, the scene sinks into the mire of its own despond.' Bo and Luke are involved in a mishap that causes their faces to be blackened with soot, and then, wouldn't you know, they drive into an African-American neighborhood, where their car is surrounded by ominous young men who are not amused by blackface, or by the Confederate flag painted on the car. As this list grows, it provides more and more clues about why I am so smart and cheerful…. Yes, it is still another TV program I have never ever seen. 'It's a retread of a sitcom that ran from about 1979 to 1985, years during which I was able to find better ways to pass my time. While recounting his favorite films of all time, Ebert had but a simplistic comment for the Orson Welles drama: ' Citizen Kane speaks for itself.' 'If I could quote the whole poem instead of completing this review, believe me, we'd all we happier. 'This is an old idea, beautifully expressed by Wordsworth, who said, 'Heaven lies about us in our infancy,'' wrote Ebert.

In his review of Herzog's Aguirre, Wrath of God, he described the film as 'one of the great haunting visions of the cinema' Werner Herzog was among Ebert's most celebrated filmmakers. Of Francis Ford Coppola's 1979 war epic, Ebert said: ' Apocalypse Now is a film which still causes real, not figurative, chills to run along my spine, and it is certainly the bravest and most ambitious fruit of Coppola's genius' The only way to save this film would be to trim 86 minutes,' wrote Ebert.

'In taking his name off the film, Arthur Hiller has wisely distanced himself from the disaster, but on the basis of what's on the screen I cannot, frankly, imagine any version of this film that I would want to see.

It was a statement that came at a time which now looks something like the peak of humanity's technological optimism.' Roger Ebert called Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, 'a great visionary leap, unsurpassed in its vision of man and the universe.

The great movies ii roger ebert