James Rocchi, one of the best-dressed critics in San Francisco, is not from around here. But the Canadian-born film writer, blogger, radio and television critic is instantly recognizable among his peers. His is a unique voice — literally, it booms with the spirit of the Golden Age of radio; in practice, it lends his film reviews a terribly clever wit and knowledge.
You may have seen Rocchi doing film and festival coverage for Netflix, where he was head critic, or delivering reviews as CBS-5’s resident pundit in San Francisco. He might even look familiar to fans of Jeopardy! who saw him compete in 2000. “I was on exactly one show,” he recalls. “Bob, the returning champion, and I were tied going into Final Jeopardy. The category was ‘Historic Names.’ we both got it right, but he bet more.”
“The irony is that one of the categories was ‘Movie Quotes,'” he continues. “I did alright in that, but I also did startling well in ‘Third Party Presidential Candidates’ and ‘Famous Nebraskans.'”
Rocchi currently writes for Cinematical.com, for whom he’ll continue writing when he moves to Los Angeles in April. He writes a blog for The Huffington Post (The Moviegoer) and also contributes a weekly column, Rocchi’s Retro Rental, to the San Francisco Chronicle‘s SF Gate website. Minneapolis residents can still catch his film reviews and pop culture insights on 93X radio.
Name: James Rocchi
Age: 38
Hometown: Hamilton, Ontario
Years reviewing film: 10
Why and how did you become a critic?
James Rocchi: I’d been writing about movies and pop culture since university; after school, I found myself doing freelance work. After moving to America in 1996, I got a part-time, freelance job wrangling copy for a plucky start-up in Santa Cruz … called Netflix. That became a full-time job, and then I became one of Netflix’s reviewers, and then I became Netflix’s only reviewer, writing up theatrical films and doing TV and Radio reviewing movies on Netflix’s behalf. After leaving Netflix in October 2005, I came on board at Cinematical.com, and did TV for CBS-5 San Francisco 2005 to 2008. I also write a regular column for the San Francisco Chronicle‘s website, ‘Rocchi’s Retro Rental,’ a review of an older film based on whatever may be going on in the world of movies, and I also just began a new column for The Huffington Post, ‘The Moviegoer.’
Fill in the blank: “If I wasn’t a professional film critic, I’d be a…:”
JR: My dad wanted me to be a lawyer, and I’ve read just enough Ed McBain books to find the idea of working prosecution fascinating.
What is your favorite film?
JR: The answer to that’s not a simple as you’d think. I mean, I admire and adore The Godfather I and II; then again, Singin’ in the Rain is brilliant and fun. But, The Battle of Algiers is gripping and fascinating and thrilling; then again, The Wizard of Oz is a dream of a dream …
Who is your favorite director?
JR: Working today? I think a lot of people are doing amazing work, but the person whose career is the most interesting to me — because you never quite know what he’ll do next, but it’s guaranteed it’ll be fascinating — is Steven Soderbergh.
What’s the worst movie you’ve ever seen?
JR: I don’t know about ‘worst,’ but like any film critic I have a mental list of movies whose reception by the public and many critics mystifies me: the top two are Forrest Gump, and Million Dollar Baby. They’re both horrible cheats, and I find the level of adulation they receive undeserved and off-putting.
What was the biggest Oscar surprise last weekend?
JR: In retrospect, Marion Cotillard seemed like the obvious winner — a big, showy role with lots of disfiguring makeup in a movie about how hard it is to be an artist? Come on, how is that NOT going to win? At the same time, I was, in fact, rooting for Julie Christie, as that’s a truly impressive performance not held up by makeup and lip-syncing.
What was the most interesting film you’ve seen lately?
JR: I still have to go back and see There Will Be Blood on the big screen again; I can’t quite get it out of my head. And The Diving Bell and the Butterfly was, in the best sense of the phrase, pure cinema — an artistic and emotional experience you couldn’t recreate in any other medium. And I finally saw Michael Haneke‘s The Time of the Wolf — a tough sit, but brilliant and harsh and hopeful.
How in touch with the movie going public are most critics?
JR: I think that a critic has the same tastes as the public, by and large; they just, to extend the metaphor, eat a lot more. I see more films in a theater in a month than many of my culture-savvy, entertainment-loving friends see in a theater all year. I love a big-budget piece of well-made entertainment, and I’ve seen indie films as tedious and cookie-cutter as the worst of the studios. When I was in campus radio during the ’90s, a lot of good bands got signed to major labels, and a lot of bad bands put out records on Sub Pop; I think a good work is a good work, and a critic just has the job — and the responsibility — to articulate their immediate human subjective reaction in a way that makes sense to the objective reader.
Which other film critics/bloggers/entertainment journalists do you read
regularly?
JR: All my peers at Cinematical.com, of course; also David Poland (Movie City News), Jeffrey Wells (Hollywood Elsewhere), David Fear (Time Out New York, the brilliant B. Ruby Rich (The Guardian), genre titan Cheryl Eddy (San Francisco Bay Guardian), The Chicago Tribune‘s Michael J. Phillips … and, of course, Ebert — and Rotten Tomatoes, to take the temperature of my fellow writers.
What does it take to earn a 4/4 rating from James Rocchi?
JR: The big question — the one that separates good films from great ones
— is often “Could this story be as well-told, as moving, as engaging, in any other medium — or does it use the language and grammar and tradition and liberation and limitation of film in a way no other art form affords?”
How has the internet changed film criticism?
JR: Same way the Ramones changed rock ‘n roll — by making it so anyone could do it. And, much as the Ramones did for rock ‘n roll, that also raised the ongoing question of if anyone, in fact, should do it. The internet’s made it so that people with talent have a better chance of being heard, but talent still matters.
What is the state of current film criticism?
JR: As challenged — and as exciting — as the current state of film, I think.
What are the challenges of criticizing film in different mediums?
JR: Doing TV and radio is different from writing, absolutely — you have less time, you can’t digress, it may not be the best time to bring up the political and class subtext of Transformers. But, at the same time, you still have to say something about the movie, where it comes from, and if it’s worth someone’s time, money and attention — and while doing that in 45 seconds on-camera on or the mic is different from doing it in 1,000 words in print or on-line, they’re still the same thing at the end of the day.
What word or phrase do you over-use?
JR: I’m a big fan of the semi-colon, and I am a fool for alliteration.
When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?
JR: A marine biologist, thanks to the books of Jacques Cousteau and Gerald Durrell.
What is your most common concession stand purchase?
JR: A bottle of water.
What has been your most bizarre movie-going experience?
JR: There’s too many, from the super-sneak Cannes screening of Borat, sitting across the aisle from an incognito Sacha Baron Cohen, to the irreproducible triumph of Guy Maddin‘s live Brand Upon the Brain premiere in Toronto. Also, gasps and horror of the audience letting you know who had, and who hadn’t, seen the original when Haneke’s remake of Funny Games screened at Midnight at Sundance this year…and my older brother taking me to Aliens at the now-destroyed Tivoli in Hamilton, Ontario, a majestic old-school movie palace where you lined up around the block for every big film. …
BONUS QUOTE:
JR: Being a film critic is the best job a writer could have in many ways because, during any given week, you get to write about everything: Real wars, human drama, zombie attack, the nature of love, the physics of superpowers, the culture of capital, man’s inhumanity to man, sports, crime … everything. And the fact that the movie you’re writing about on Wednesday comes out on Friday has shattered many a writer’s block.
Read more of James Rocchi’s film reviews and writing at Cinematical.com, The Huffington Post, and The Rocchi Report.
