jonathan rosenbaum is teh roxxors

From Slate's 2005 Movie Club:

What David [Edelstein] reported earlier about an irate communication from a reader who wanted him to write simply about Munich "just" as a movie—in other words, to betray even Spielberg's intentions and reduce the movie to its Indiana Jones dimensions—I had to laugh out loud, because I've been getting blinkered letters and e-mails like that ever since I started writing for the Chicago Reader in 1987. But I hasten to add that I get far more letters and e-mails that actually engage with what I'm writing about, and that's justification and vindication enough for me. It also explains why I haven't returned to Slate's Fray ever since I caught a few ugly glimpses of it a few years back. When people in such places bitch about any of us critics writing about movies they haven't seen, what they're really saying is that the only new "information" they find permissible—and please note that we have to keep "information" in quotes—is some form of advertising. For me it parallels in an eerie way Bush tries so hard to limit what we can say about the occupation of Iraq. What they all should really be writing and saying is, "Don't tell us anything we haven't already heard." To which I can only reply—or would reply, if I was back in the Fray—"Please roll over and go back to sleep. The rest of us are having a fruitful discussion."

Thank you, J.R.