Afterglow

Afterglow gives a differing perspective into the mind of Pauline Kael, a movie critic who made waves in movie criticism throughout her career. A reader usually doesn’t have a whole lot of background information about the person whose critique they are reading, although it would seem pertinent to do so to see how much weight their opinion should be have. But movie critiques have intentions and styles that are not determined from movie to movie. Pauline Kael liked taking a movie and making cultural critique out of it that embodied not just the movie itself but the public’s response to the movie. It is easy in Afterglow for her so seem arrogant in her opinions because with every movie that she thinks to be unappreciated she acts as if the viewers are simply stepping on their own toes. Her writing itself is entertaining to read and provides for a practical viewpoint of the movie.
For Pauline Kael movies are becoming more and more popular for being aesthetically pleasing than actually being original and daring. This is probably because that is the style from which Pauling Kael lived her own life but it brings forward a good point. Should a movie be good because it is easily entertaining and good looking? Perhaps it’s a mute point because a movie doesn’t change at all whatever our opinions may be.