No longer enough doubt

 

There is no longer enough doubt about artistic modes of operating, doubt concerning what the painter or filmmaker is searching for. It's terrible that a certain language and capacity to make judgments come so easily. It should be hard to write on these films. Whatever the film, we are told endlessly, shot by shot, scene by scene, what's good or bad. It's crazy, totally crazy. I'd like to see that mode of criticism applied to Cézanne or Mozart, saying what does and doesn't work at every step. [..] In short, the resistance posed to criticism by artistic material has vanished; it's turned into a pie that critics quickly slice into pieces.

 

• Manny Farber, in conversation with J.-P. Gorin, O. Ossayas, S. Le Péron, S. Toubiana, "Manny Farber: Cinema’s Painter-Critic", Cahiers du cinéma 334/335, 1982, translated by Noel King in Framework 40, 1999, 49