As former longtime U.S. News & World Report columnist John Leo once noted: "Hollywood has such a long and honored tradition of misogyny."¹

Chicago Sun-Times TV critic Ginny Holbert referred to Hollywood's misogyny in an article she wrote about "this summer's [1994's] rash of misogynistic movies."²

Another Sun-Times writer, Cindy Pearlman, headlined one of her stories, "Clear and Present Danger: Season of Film Misogyny."³

Veteran movie critic Dave Kehr likewise drew attention to the phenomenon: "Like many action movies these days, 'Leviathan' contains a few blunt, ugly strokes of misogyny [e.g., men battering women]."⁴

Author Molly Haskell wrote a whole book on the history of misogyny in the cinema called From Reverence to Rape.

It seems as though many male Hollywood movers and shakers feel a deep, pathological anger toward and/or fear of women. For example, Roger Ebert pointed out that Joel Silver "has made violence toward women a key element in his films....The only consistent theme of the film ['The Last Boy Scout'] is its hatred of women....[The movie] hates women with a particular viciousness; the verbal violence begins by calling them bitches and whores and worse, over and over again, and the message is that a man can only really trust another man....[The film displays a] willingness to degrade women....[It's a] vilely misogynistic action thriller."⁵

Anger against women is a feature of Steve Martin's film "L.A. Story," according to Dave Kehr: "There is, in fact, a great deal of anger coursing beneath the surface of this seemingly benign film, much of it directed against the female sex."⁶

Roger Ebert on filmmaker David Lynch: The movie "'Wild at Heart' also exercises the consistent streak of misogyny in Lynch's work. He has a particular knack for humiliating women in his films,...[for portraying] women in a particularly hurtful and offensive light."⁷

"Lynch has a disturbing habit of casting women as victims in sadomasochistic scenarios. Consider that most female characters on [his TV show] Twin Peaks are beautiful, promiscuous young women who are routinely murdered, tortured, beaten, and manipulated by men, while the rest of the women are depicted as old and mentally ill....Lynch says: 'There are some women that you want to hit because you're getting a feeling from them that they want it, or maybe they upset you in a certain way. I see this happening. But I don't really understand it.'''⁸

A Chicago Tribune TV critic, Rich Kogan, says Lynch's "attitudes about women are disconcerting."⁹

Concerning screenwriter Joe Eszterhas, Roger Ebert has found that "a fear of women palpitates in all his best work."¹⁰

(Incidentally, misogyny can also be found on Broadway. Entertainment writer Frank Rich has this to say about Andrew Lloyd Webber: "The misogyny in this show ['Aspects of Love'] is more transparent than [the misogyny] in other Lloyd Webber musicals where the general rule is to present principal female characters as either prostitutes ('Evita,' 'Cats,' 'Starlight Express') or sainted virgins....Both heroines of 'Aspects of Love' frequently behave like bitches and whores."¹¹

(And theater critic Hedy Weiss on David Mamet's play "Oleanna": It "seems like little more than an excuse for the playwright to indulge in his characteristic female-bashing."¹²)

To return to moviedom, entertainment writer Lloyd Sachs drew attention to the "dissing of women issued freely forth in films such as 'Laws of Gravity' and 'Reservoir Dogs.'''¹³

A 1990 Screen Actors Guild study determined that "a growing number of movie roles that are going to women cast them as prostitutes, rape victims and needy companions to domineering men."¹⁴

The Chicago Tribune's Lynn Van Matre: "so many films out there...depict women as weak bimbos whose lives revolve around pleasing men."¹⁵ The Tribune's Michael Kilian discerns a "Hollywood prejudice against substantial roles for women."¹⁶

"Shirley McLaine...and Geena Davis are two actresses who have publicly lamented the shortage of meaningful leading parts [for women]. 'It's no secret that it's harder and harder for women to find good roles in Hollywood,' said Harriet Silverman, executive director of Women in Film, an industry group. 'When you finally do get a woman to star in a film, she's either giving it [sex] or getting it.'"¹⁷

Actress Susan Sarandon, perhaps exaggerating for effect: "Ninety-nine percent of all movies have women as caricatures."¹⁸

Nina Burleigh, another Tribune writer: "It's no news that decent, independent women are as common in American movies these days as palm trees along Lake Michigan. It's almost a maxim that if a female film character is self-sufficient, she's also evil."¹⁹

The Chicago Sun-Times's Richard Roeper: "Fantasies and romances, comedies and Westerns, dramas and thrillers—the hooker has a place in all genres. It's a historical phenomenon that speaks volumes about the male Hollywood view of women."²⁰

Producer Julia Phillips: "There is an old saying that Hollywood makes whores out of the women. That hasn't changed. These guys [male Hollywood executives, directors, etc.] really do feel more comfortable in the company of hookers because that is how they see women."²¹

The Sun-Times's Peter Keough: "Bimbos, housewives, femme fatales, sex objects: The list of women's roles available in Hollywood is a short and demeaning one. Most pervasive and insidious is the role of victim."²²

Cindy Pearlman: "Once again, ditzes and bimbos and hookers constitute the majority of female roles this season....Violence and a general disrespect toward women on screen is commonplace."²³

Gene Siskel once noticed that: "Professional women are often punished for their success in movies today."²⁴

Anne Thompson, another Chicago Tribune writer, believes "the dearth of decent starring roles for women in the movies"²⁵ is due to "sexist Hollywood executive suites."²⁶

Actress Shelly Long on Hollywood sexism: "When I came here, I truly believed Hollywood was not a sexist industry....I was wrong. But it took me a while to see that and make adjustments."²⁷

Actress Donna Mills on Hollywood sexism: "[S]exism and sexual harassment still exist to a great extent in this business."²⁸

Gene Siskel once made a statement about Hollywood sexism in a review of the movie "Bad Influence": "The value system of 'Bad Influence' is materialistic, sexist, Hollywood trash."²⁹ He also headlined another movie review: "Weak story, crass sexism made 'True Lies' a real dud."³⁰

Ginny Holbert described the TV show "Princesses" as "shrill, sexist, insulting drivel based on the outdated notion that a single woman is just an unfortunate maiden waiting for a white knight to drive up in a BMW."³¹

Entertainment writer Kevin M. Williams referred to "the obligatory Idiotic Female [in many movies], whose sole reason for existence is to get in the way of and be saved by the hero."³²

The public is not exactly pleased by Hollywood's and TV's treatment of women. According to a study: "85 percent of those surveyed said they disapproved of the way women are depicted on the tube. Pollsters were surprised that males and females were almost neck and neck in believing that women are portrayed in a degrading manner on TV—with 88 percent of women and 82 percent of men accepting that proposition."³³

Despite the public's general displeasure with Hollywood and TV regarding their treatment of women, they continue to go their merry sexist way. It's almost like they have their own agenda, the public be hanged. A couple of quotes might clue us in on what that agenda might be.

The first from Ginny Holbert: "Like many network made-fors [i.e., movies made for network TV], which are also geared toward women, the movie ['Dancing in the Dark'] suggests that men are lecherous, insensitive pigs."³⁴

The second from longtime Chicago Sun-Times columnist Richard Roeper: "Women are constantly reinforced in their anti-male sentiments by watching [the TV show] 'Sisters.'''³⁵ That's from a column of his titled "These 'Sisters' Should Join Man-Haters Anonymous."

(Some colleges are likewise contributing to the spread of sexist, anti-male propaganda. For example, John Leo wrote: "Several women warn that rape-prevention and sexual harassment workshops on campus are hardening into mind-bending anti-male programs....[R]adical feminists are making a power play on campus, 'trying to dictate the curriculum and write campus codes that would turn 90 percent of the men into rapists.'''³⁶ Leo also observed: "In the secular convents of feminist studies, abstruse man-hating and galloping heterophobia are absolutely routine."³⁷ And Diana Trilling, in Newsweek, drew attention to "a feminist culture which appears to be bent upon raising always-new and higher barriers between men and women."³⁸

(And the publishing industry may likewise be a contributor. According to columnist Asa Baber: "Since the 1960s, publishers have maintained that men don't think, don't read, and couldn't care less. These publishers were both molding and reflecting popular opinion, and they financed an exclusively feminist literature that, at its core, was frequently anti-male."³⁹ Baber's also observed that "a fair share of feminist rhetoric has the corrupting tinge of sexism about it—anti-male sexism."⁴⁰)

To return to moviemakers, it seems like some Hollywood bigwigs may be trying to turn women against men and men against women, may be trying to drive a wedge between the sexes. Ominously, Hollywood appears to be somewhat successful in fostering antagonism between the sexes. Witness the soaring divorce rate, number one. Then there is this remark by author Tama Janowitz: "This will sound goofy, but I think they put something in the water in New York to make men not like women very much....They don't seem to have much use for women. They're either interested in other men, or if by some freak chance they still want to have sex with women, maybe they want to go to some sex club where women are not a threat to them on a personal level but are still some kind of object."⁴¹

And Ellis Cose, a contributing editor to Newsweek, noticed: "Instead of developing intergender empathy, many men and women seem to be cultivating higher levels of antipathy. As Aaron Kipnis and Elizabeth Heron put it in 'Gender War, Gender Peace,' 'Many women and men today express their issues by firing bigger and more articulate missles across the gender gap, at each other.'"⁴²

Why may some Hollywood bigwigs be trying to foster antagonism between the sexes? The answer quite possibly involves homosexuality. As Roger Ebert has noted: "[G]ays were everywhere in the movies, right from the beginning."⁴³ Ebert again, on the connection between Hollywood and homosexuals: "Hollywood [in the 1930s] was filled with homosexuals who stayed adamantly in the closet."⁴⁴ Others, like U.S. News & World Report's Betsy Streisand, have also mentioned "Hollywood's huge gay community."⁴⁵ When homosexual actor Rock Hudson was asked "how many top actors in Hollywood were homosexual, Hudson replied:...'If you mean gay, or 'bisexual'...then maybe most...Trust me...America does not want to know.'"⁴⁶

Now, it's a well-established fact, as various homosexual and lesbian authors, like Professor Martin Duberman⁴⁷ and Lillian Faderman⁴⁸ have attested, that sexist attitudes and behaviors are rampant in the homosexual community. Indeed, some lesbians even claim that male homosexuals have discriminated against them in the workplace.

One has to wonder: Are some heterophobic homosexual Hollywood bigwigs trying to divide the men from the women?

There is some evidence that movies are being used to subtly condition men to "bond" with other men at the expense of women. Movie critic Dave Kehr has observed that "male buddy films are driven by an undercurrent of [homo]eroticism."⁴⁹ An example of such a buddy film is "Days of Thunder," about which Kehr says: Actor Tom "Cruise's relationship with [actress Nicole] Kidman takes a definite back seat to his more passionate [though non-sexual] involvement with his male colleagues....[T]he homoerotic subtext is unmistakable."⁵⁰ Kehr also notes: "It's a Spielberg trait, too, that the bonding [which takes place in his films] is exclusively male."⁵¹

Peter Keough on buddy films: "In 'Casablanca,' as in all buddy movies, the real source of dread and danger is losing one's independence to a woman."⁵²

To return to the feminist movement for a moment, a piece in the "Los Angeles Times Magazine argued that a minority of lesbians dominate the women's movement, which boasts that it represents the majority of women."⁵³ And we have already mentioned that some feminists (heterophobic lesbians?) on college campuses are spreading anti-male propaganda.

Now, given the credible evidence that the so-called "Battle of the Sexes" is being insidiously encouraged by influential people who may be profoundly heterophobic, who may be somewhat mentally unstable, we need to start giving this real possibility the attention it deserves. Mass anti-heterosexual psychological manipulation by a powerful, driven, sexually aberrant, psychologically disturbed minority is very conceivable. The world has seen much stranger things.

Let me close by citing one other influential source of sexist, misogynistic "programming." This one particularly merits our consideration because it is aimed almost solely at impressionable teens. That source is the music, or more specifically, the lyrics, of certain rock and roll bands. Greg Kot, music critic for the Chicago Tribune, wrote a piece about misogynistic music titled "Rock turns mean and ugly."⁵⁴ Bands like Guns N' Roses and Genocide and Rigor Mortis have actually sung about killing women. Other bands like the Rolling Stones and Motley Crue sing about subjugating or domineering over women. Many "Rap" singers stereotype women as bitches and whores. Does the reader really believe that is having no negative effect on our society, on our relations with the opposite sex? And can all those sources of sexist misogyny (movies, music, jokes, etc.) be contributing to the formation of homosexual or bisexual orientations in certain heterophobic people? Psychology does know that we can be conditioned to be practically anything: greedy or generous, loving or hateful, violent or nonviolent, racist or nonracist, sexist or nonsexist, etc., etc. Why not heterosexual or homosexual or bisexual or asexual or transsexual?

Supplementary material

Noted previously was playwright David Mamet's penchant for "female-bashing" in his plays. More evidence of that: According to theater critic Chris Jones of the Chicago Tribune Mamet's play "Edmund" is "an intensely sexist script (the thematic concerns are overwhelmingly male, and the female characters are all hookers, neurotics or shrews)."⁵⁵

"In a Mamet play [according to a Chicago Sun-Times critic], a homoerotic subtext almost always lurks beneath the surface male-bonding. The hustlers, the salesmen, the drinkers and con men of Mamet's world find a satisfaction—however unexpressed—with other men that they cannot find with the women whom they put down and even fear."⁵⁶

Playwright Eugene O'Neill apparently was also somewhat afflicted with misogyny. According to a Chicago Sun-Times critic: "There's a truly scary streak of misogyny at work in [his play] 'Iceman' [i.e., 'The Iceman Cometh']."⁵⁷ According to another Sun-Times critic: "O'Neill sees [love] as a form of enslavement."⁵⁸

To return to films, Roger Ebert on the misogyny found in the film "Tomcats": "The men in 'Tomcats' [a sex comedy written and directed by Gregory Poirier] are surrounded by beautiful women, but they hate and fear them....[T]he film humiliates the women....All sex comedies have scenes in which characters are embarrassed, but I can't remember one in which women are so consistently and venomously humiliated, as if they were some kind of hateful plague."⁵⁹

Roger Ebert on filmmaker Neil LaBute: "The world of Neil LaBute is a battleground of carnage between the sexes. Men and women distrust one another, scheme to humiliate one another, are inspired to fearsome depths of cruelty....[LaBute] has a distinctive view of life, in which men and women are natural enemies."⁶⁰

A Chicago Tribune critic, Roger Moore, called LaBute "cinema's leading misogynist."⁶¹ And a Chicago Sun-Times critic, Christy Lemire, noted that LaBute has experienced "years of being accused of misogyny."⁶²

A film by Catherine Breillat, "Romance," is described thusly by Chicago Tribune film critic Michael Wilmington: "'Romance' is a movie that may well divide not the men from the boys but the men from the women....I felt disaffected, dissatisfied. Why divide men and women anyway?"⁶³ (One has to wonder if Breillat is a heterophobic, psychologically disturbed lesbian.)

On so-called "buddy films," Dave Kehr noted above that he finds they are driven by undercurrents of homoeroticism. Movie critic Michael Wilmington seems to agree. Writing about western buddy films he noted: "[T]he homoerotic undercurrents of the buddy-buddy western have been analytic fodder for years."⁶⁴

On the possibility that Hollywood homosexuals are trying to psychologically condition straight men to love other men and ignore women, a couple quotes:

1) Uli Schmetzer in the Chicago Tribune: "And salvation, so we are promised again and again by this year's scripts, comes through personal bonds forged between two men. This steely male bonding in the era of burgeoning female rights appears as the central theme of many of the [latest] films....Men die for each other or with each other."⁶⁵

And 2) Michael Wilmington: "There's a tendency to view action movies as covert male love stories, but here, instead of disguising the implications, the film ['Blood Work'] flaunts them, almost joyously."⁶⁶

All these male love stories Hollywood is creating—can they have an ulterior purpose, like psychologically conditioning normal men to become homosexual?

Roger Ebert opines: "One of the reasons we have so many buddy pictures is that Hollywood doesn't understand female characters (there are so many hookers in the movies because, as characters, they share the convenience of their real-life counterparts: They're easy to find and easy to get rid of)."⁶⁷ Homosexual men have little use for and little understanding of women, though homosexual filmmakers can exploit them in their movies to attract viewers.

And lastly here: "Homoerotic fixation and thwarted masculinity are the signature themes of [filmmakers] Alfred Hitchcock and Claude Chabrol"⁶⁸—that from Patrick C. McGavin, another writer for the Chicago Tribune.

(Those readers who want to delve a little deeper into the abnormal psychology of many Hollywood "players" can read another article, Hollywood---According To Those "In The Know", Lela had published a few years ago. This is the original, unedited version, except for several small, more recent additions.)

Footnotes

1. John Leo, "Toxic feminism on the big screen," U.S. News & World Report, June 10, 1991, p. 20.

2. Ginny Holbert, "It's Prime Time For Women On Networks," Chicago Sun-Times, Sept. 11, 1994, "Arts & Show" section, p. 1.

3. Cindy Pearlman, "Clear and Present Danger: Season of Film Misogyny," Chicago Sun-Times, Aug. 21, 1994, "Arts & Show" section, p. 1.

4. Dave Kehr, '''Leviathan': A fun, schlock thriller," Chicago Tribune, March 23, 1989, section 5, p. 10.

5. Roger Ebert, "Be prepared: Thrilling 'Boy Scout' does bad turn to women," Chicago Sun-Times, Dec. 13, 1991, "Weekend Plus" section, p. 41.

6. Dave Kehr, "Sap and satire don't mix in bitter 'L.A. Story,'" Chicago Tribune, Feb. 8, 1991, section 7, p. B.

7. Roger Ebert, "'Wild at Heart' cop-outs make the film offensive," Chicago Sun-Times, Aug. 17, 1990, "Weekend Plus" section, p. 21.

8. Laurie Ouellette, "Is David Lynch Creepier Than His Movies," Utne Reader, Jan./Feb. 1991, p. 15.

9. Rich Kogan, "The descent of 'Twin Peaks' into tedium," Chicago Tribune, Oct. 12, 1990, section 5, p. 5.

10. Roger Ebert, "A Triumph for Trash," Chicago Sun-Times, Sept. 22, 1995, "Weekend Plus" section, p. 21.

11. Frank Rich, "Lloyd Webber is way out of his league in 'Love,'" Chicago Tribune, April 11, 1990, section 1, p. 24.

12. Hedy Weiss, "Lesson in Rage," Chicago Sun-Times, Nov. 17, 1992, p. 27.

13. Lloyd Sachs, "A Fusillade of Violence," Chicago Sun-Times, Sept. 27, 1992, "Arts & Show" section, p. 13.

14. "Women fading from films," Chicago Tribune, Aug. 2, 1990, section 1, p. 24.

15. Lynn Van Matre, "Meanwhile, the Women's Auxiliary favors films with powerful ladies," Chicago Tribune, Feb. 16, 1992, section 13, p. 19.

16. Michael Kilian, "Daryl Hannah's doing swimmingly, thanks," Chicago Tribune, Feb. 23, 1992, section 13, p. 4.

17. Jessica Siegel, "And the winner is...," Chicago Tribune, Jan. 10, 1993, section 13, p. 6.

18. Peter Keough, "'Thelma and Louise' shoots down cinema stereotypes," Chicago Sun-Times, May 26, 1991, p. 3.

19. Nina Burleigh, "Again, Hollywood finds an evil core in self-sufficiency," Chicago Tribune, Dec. 23, 1990, section 6, p. 5.

20. Richard Roeper, "Hollywood's hooked on lurid female roles," Chicago Sun-Times, Oct. 23, 1991, p. 11.

21. Dean E. Murphy and Terry Pristin, '''Hollywood Madam' Is the Talk of Tinseltown," Chicago Sun-Times, Aug. 9, 1993, p. 24.

22. Peter Keough, "'Thelma and Louise' shoots down cinema stereotypes," Chicago Sun-Times, May 26, 1991, p. 3.

23. Cindy Pearlman, "Clear and Present Danger: Season of Film Misogyny," Chicago Sun-Times, Aug. 21, 1994, "Arts & Show" section, p. 1.

24. Gene Siskel, "Lowbrow 'Juror' imposes stiff sentence on audiences," Chicago Tribune, Feb. 2, 1996, section 7A, p. B.

25. Anne Thompson, "Hollywood's female stars an endangered species," Chicago Tribune, May 18, 1990, section 7, p. B.

26. Ibid.

27. Nancy Mills, "Still battling," Chicago Tribune, May 30, 1994, section 5, p. 7.

28. Lon Grahnke, "Grim prison drama 'scares' Donna Mills," Chicago Sun-Times, Oct. 30, 1991, p. 41.

29. Gene Siskel, "The acting is fine, script cheap in 'Bad Influence,'" Chicago Tribune, March 9, 1990, section 7, p. C.

30. Gene Siskel, "Weak story, crass sexism made 'True Lies' a real dud," Chicago Tribune, July 15, 1994, section 7, p. B.

31. Ginny Holbert, "Preposterous 'Princesses, '" Chicago Sun-Times, Sept. 27, 1991, "Weekend Plus" section, p. 33.

32. Kevin M. Williams, "Firestorm," Chicago Sun-Times, Jan. 9, 1998, p. 38.

33. Stephen Galloway, "Poll: 79% of viewers link TV shows to violence," Chicago Tribune, July 30, 1993, section 5, p. 5.

34. Ginny Holbert, "'Dancing' Follows Lifetime's Formula," Chicago Sun-Times, July 4, 1995, p. 23.

35. Richard Roeper, "These 'Sisters' Should Join Man-Haters Anonymous," Chicago Sun-Times, Oct. 8, 1995, "Showcase" section, p. 2.

36. John Leo, "De-escalating the gender war," U.S. News & World Report, April 18, 1994, p. 24.

37. John Leo, "The trouble with feminism," U.S. News & World Report, Feb. 10, 1992, p. 19.

38. Diana Trilling, "Sexual Separatism," Newsweek, June 6, 1994, p. 12.

39. Asa Baber, "Celebrating the masculine," Chicago Sun-Times, Dec. 9, 1990, "Arts & Show" section, p. 14.

40. Ibid.

41. Mimi Read, "Literary Misfit," Chicago Tribune, Sept. 27, 1992, section 6, p. 12.

42. Ellis Cose, "The Daddy Trap," Chicago Tribune, June 18, 1995, section 10, p. 19.

43. Roger Ebert, "Second Take: 'Closet' Looks Back at Movies' Gay Subtext," Chicago Sun-Times, April 26, 1996, "Weekend Plus" section, p. 20.

44. Roger Ebert, "The Bride of Frankenstein," Chicago Sun-Times, Jan. 3, 1999, "Showcase" section, p. 5E.

45. Betsy Streisand, "Pam Teflon bowls 'em over," U.S. News & World Report, July 1, 1996, p. 16.

46. Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen, After the Ball (NY: Doubleday, 1989), pp. 11-12.

47. Martin Duberman, About Time (NY: Gay Presses of New York, 1986), p. 336.

48. Lillian Faderman, Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers (NY: Columbia U Press, 1991), p. 212.

49. Dave Kehr, "In 'Beaches,' music is fine but drama's pitch is off key," Chicago Tribune, Jan. 13, 1989, section 7, p. G.

50. Dave Kehr, "'Days of Thunder' sounds more like an echo," Chicago Tribune, June 27, 1990, section 5, p. 7.

51. Dave Kehr, "'Dad' refuses to confront realities of dying," Chicago Tribune, Oct. 27, 1989, section 7, p. G.

52. Peter Keough, "Black-White Buddies: Inseparable on Film, But still Unequal," Chicago Sun-Times, June 21, 1992, "Arts & Show" section, p. 4.

53. Suzanne Fields, "Feminists have a new enemies list," Chicago Sun-Times, May 12, 1992, p. 27.

54. Greg Kot, "Rock turns mean and ugly," Chicago Tribune, Nov. 18, 1990, section 13, p. 5.

55. Chris Jones, "Early Mamet is politically incorrect but compelling," Chicago Tribune, Feb. 18, 1999, section 5, p. 2.

56. Andrew Patner, "The Shawl," Chicago Sun-Times, Feb. 8, 2000, p. 38.

57. Michael Phillips, "'The Iceman Cometh' on Broadway," Chicago Sun-Times, April 10, 1999, "Showcase" section, p. 18.

58. Hedy Weiss, "'Iceman' sizzles at Goodman," Chicago Sun-Times, May 4, 2012, p. 31.

59. Roger Ebert, "Mangy 'Tomcats' has offensive odor," Chicago Sun-Times, March 30, 2001, "Weekend Plus" section, p. 31.

60. Roger Ebert, "Strength of 'Shape' is what lies beneath the story surface," Chicago Sun-Times, May 9, 2003, "Weekend Plus" section, p. 25.

61. Roger Moore, "'Wicker Man' just the latest failed horror movie remake," Chicago Tribune, Sept. 2, 2006, section 1A, p. 5.

62. Christy Lemire, "'Wicker' finds good ways to be bad," Chicago Sun-Times, Sept. 2, 2006, p. 16.

63. Michael Wilmington, "Explicit 'Romance' a study in joyless lovemaking," Chicago Tribune, Nov. 12, 1999, section 7, p. L.

64. Michael Wilmington, "'Brokeback' rides high in deluxe edition," Chicago Tribune, Jan. 26, 2007, section 7A, p. 2.

65. Uli Schmetzer, "Despair—and hope—at Venice Film Festival," Chicago Tribune, Sept. 7, 2002, section 1, p. 31.

66. Michael Wilmington, "Eastwood at heart of 'Blood Work' for good reason," Chicago Tribune, Aug. 9, 2002, section 7A, p. 5.

67. Roger Ebert, "A cinematic snapshot of the '60s," Chicago Sun-Times, Oct. 24, 2004, "Showcase" section, p. 3D.

68. Patrick C. McGavin, "'Matter of Taste' has black wit," Chicago Tribune, Feb. 22, 2002, section 7A, p. 4.