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Panel Nerds: Movie Night With The Lumets, Plus Way Too Much Morgenstern

by Panel Nerds | 2:22 pm, July 22nd, 2009

» 6 comments

pnerds Who: Sidney Lumet & Jenny Lumet, moderated by Joe Morgenstern

What: The Wall Street Journal’s “Movie Night with the Lumets”

Where: Walter Reade Theatre

When: July 21, 2009

Thumbs: Way Down

It’s difficult to spoil a night of discussing movies with legendary director Sidney Lumet and “Rachel Getting Married” scribe Jenny Lumet, but “Movie Night with the Lumets” proved that although difficult, it is not impossible. The evening was moderated by Wall Street Journal film critic Joe Morgenstern who badly mishandled the event by structuring it around the viewing of an inordinate number and seemingly unrelated group of movie clips. For much of the evening, Morgenstern and the Lumets simply sat in directors chairs, watching the 30 or so pre-selected clips. It all had the feel of a much less interesting VH1 special; let’s call it “I Love Joe Morgenstern Talking About Movies.”

The weak structure probably still could have worked, though, if the audience would have been given a little more information and background. The vast majority of movie clips were played with no setup at all. Instead of telling the audience what movie clip was about to be screened or why he was screening it, Morgenstern often declared “let’s see the next clip,” and summed it up with “don’t you just love that?” He did not do nearly enough to clue the audience in to what was being discussed, nor did he amply mine father or daughter Lumet for insight. Morgenstern and Sidney Lumet also had too many discussions of individual people without explaining who they were. A five minute discussion on “Pauline,” turned out to refer to New Yorker critic Pauline Kael, but it took a Google search after the event to find that out. Google was not as immediately generous in discerning the “Candy” who was discussed for another few minutes.

The disappointing panel was even more of a shame because the isolated moments of interesting discussion were riveting. Sidney Lumet delved into two real topics – the technological advances of digital film making, which he loves for color presentation, and the importance of tempo to story telling, and how he likes to make the audience work. Mr. Lumet was also able to describe intricate questions about scenes from movies shot decades ago and acting techniques of old stars like Paul Newman, Errol Flynn, Marlon Brando, and Spencer Tracy. But those moments were too few and far between in the two hour discussion. Mrs. Lumet, who was so expressive in her speaking that she seemed to sit actively, was also wasted. There is no doubt Mrs. Lumet could have added much to the conversation, but next to her father and Mr. Morgenstern, she often came off as the youngster peppering the adults with questions as they showed off slides from their vacation.

What They Said

“It’s apt now, much more than having a black president.”

- Jenny Lumet explaining why she is pushing her father to direct Othello.

“Don’t pick a kids movie, pick what you like… they’ll at least get a connection to you.”

– Sidney Lumet offering some fatherly advice for family movie nights.

“This next movie, I hope needs no introduction and we’ll certainly not get one.”

– Joe Morgenstern introduces a clip to a movie. We can’t tell you which movie because it apparently needed no introduction.

“Most critics know nothing about movies, in terms of how they’re technically put together.”

– Sidney Lumet explaining his general frustration with critics, and why he invited critic Pauline Kael to see how he made movies.

“I married a Latin man because of Raul Julia.”

– Jenny Lumet, in what we hope wasn’t new information for her in-audience husband, explaining the extent of her love for old movies

What We Thought

This whole evening would have probably been better as a conversation between father and daughter. Jenny Lumet had a lot of questions for her father about his films and decisions. With Morgenstern there, her inquisitiveness was not put to good use. We would have much rather watched an up and coming writer ask questions to a brilliant director. The moderator here only took away from the evening.
Because Morgenstern set the order of movie clips beforehand, there was no way for him to tailor his questions to the actual tempo of the discussion. Instead, he would wait for the conversation to die down and then ask for the next clip.
Joe Morgenstern showed clips that neither Sidney nor Jenny Lumet had ever seen before. What was possibly the point of that?
A number of people walked out early. That’s always a very bad sign.

PANEL RULES!

Some audience behavior seems to repeat itself panel after panel. We’ll be updating a running list of “PANEL RULES!” that will help ensure that you are not the dweeb of the Panel Nerds.

Panel Nerds don’t like…. Bogarting Moderators

Don’t bogart the mic, moderators; Let the audience take a turn – This panel featured no questions from the audience. Uncool, moderator. Uncool.

Want the Panel Nerds to cover your panel? Email them here: PanelNerds@mediaite.com

Danny Groner, Etan Bednarsh, Jenny Lumet, Joe Morgenstern, Panel Nerds, Pauline Kael, Sidney Lumet, wall street journal

http://www.facebook.com/people/John-Anderson/823814656 John Anderson

so Rachel, you were there? If so, you’re substantiating the suspicion that people who blog, especially about such innocent events as Joe Morgenstern’s Lumet evening simply don”t have enough worthwhile to do. It also seems to me (and I’m no Paulette) that if you didn’t know who “Pauline” was in those circumstances, you’re probably in the wrong place, to say nothing of the wrong line of work. If that’s what it is.
Rachel Sklar

Hi John – I just went in and corrected that. The byline should have said “Panel Nerds” and I don’t know why it didn’t “catch” in the system when I inputted this but mea culpa, I should have noticed (in my defense, the “name” field is down at the bottom of the page in our blogging software). But hopefully the pic of the Panel Nerds et al meant the confusion was kept to a minimum. Answering your question though: The Panel Nerds go to panels – Etan and Danny are panel addicts, you can read about it at their first post. I think that seems pretty worthwhile a thing to do – and to write about. As for Pauline Kael, it’s the job of a good moderator to make sure the audience is clued in – that includes clarifying side minutiae like that. They’re not film critics, they’re panel critics – as such, they did a great job in pointing out where this one was lacking.
andrea

I was there and noticed folks walking out, but who knows why? SOme came back in, so it might have been to answer cel phones or take bathroom breaks, or even eat as it started at 7 and no time to eat really beforehand.

That said, I agree with some of what Rachel said…it would have been great to have the clips ALL be from Lumet films…as everything he said was fascinating. It didn’t make sense to have some nevr-before-seen clips with no real discussion before or after.
But I think Joe M did a great job, esp keeping the younger Lumet in line, as she had some interesting things to say, but was extremely self-involved and needed to be reined in a bit. Her father was so proud of her, tho, which was touching, that he even kvelled when she insisted the moderator show the bean-farting scene from “Blazing Saddles”, when we could have been treated to a longer discussion of “Twelve Angry Men” or “Dog Day Afternoon”.

One thing Rachel also should have mentioned is that Tony Walton , the set/production designer on “Murder on the Orient Express” was in the audience to give insight and anecdotal banter with the panelists. Visiting from San Francisco, for me, it felt like an only-in-New-York moment which was thrilling

But I do agree, to refer to Candace Bergen simply as “Candy” with no explanation or introduction, or “Pauline” with out two seconds of background was a bit name-dropp-y and it would have been fabulous to have been clued in…or not to have to whisper to my seatmates whom he was talking about…

Overall, tho, the nuggets that were there were well worth the two hours, tho it is right on to point out where it could have been stronger, without John (above) getting all snippy.
Panel Nerds

Thanks for commenting, Andrea. We just wanted to first clarify that it wasn’t Rachel who saw and reviewed this panel, it was us. I think the piece was mis-bylined for a bit, but it’s fixed now.

We agree that it would have been great for the clips to all be from Lumet films. The difference between the audience’s roaring ovation for “Twelve Angry Men” and timid claps for some of the other film clips really struck us, as I am sure it did you.

We should have mentioned Tony Walton’s presence, but even that seemed disjointed to us. How great would it have been to divide the night up into 8 (or so) sections focusing on different directorial considerations that the typical audience doesn’t consider? If one of those sections would have been design, and they used Walton in that context… that would have been great.

We’re glad you enjoyed it, but it left us wishing we got a lot more out of it.
allenbarra

I was at the panel event at Lincoln Center with Joe Morgenstern, and I was guided to this site by a friend who told me, “You won’t believe the level of ignorance displayed here.” He was right – I can’t believe it.

First of all, the audience seemed to be very well versed in what the two idiots who wrote this column were not: namely that it was not a traditional type interview but a discussion of Lumet’s and Morgenstern’s favorite films, some of them quite obscure, others famous, and why they love them so much.

Second, the discussion of Pauline Kael touched on an important area of modern movie history. If the panel nerds had to go to Google to find out who Pauline Kael was, they had no business even attending this event, let alone writing about it.

I guess it’s true. All you need to set yourself up as an internet pundits all you need is $15.00 and a computer.

Allen Barra
Panel Nerds

Hey Allen,

Thanks for writing.

The point of our column, and why we gave the panel a bad review, was about the role of the moderator in guiding a panel and in translating it to the audience. Mr. Morgenstern did neither well.

Our panel reflected the audience in our section who seemed exceedingly bored with the panel, and we surmised that cause- that the discussion jumped around so much with little context. We agree that it would have been great to listen to a “discussion of Lumet’s and Morgenstern’s favorite films, some of them quite obscure, others famous, and why they love them so much.” But they only gave a perfunctory nod to the latter part, often just saying “I love that clip. It’s so funny/ meaningful/ deep.” I can’t imagine what an audience member could gain from that.

As far as Pauline Kael- at a panel, the moderator’s role is to make things as clear as possible. That’s not to suggest he has to start by explaining how cameras capture images. He is allowed to assume a certain basic level of knowledge, of course. However, when one word (or name, in this case-”Kael”) could have clarified that, and one sentence of background could have filled in some basic details, there is no reason for the moderator not to supply it. It does not ruin the panel for people who commonly refer to Pauline Kael simply as “Pauline,” and it makes the panel infinitely more accessible to those who normally refer to her with two names.

Contrast that with another Wall Street journal event, “planet hip hop,” where moderator Christopher Farley supplied the name and album for the tracks that he played. Did most of the audience know the music anyway? Sure. But offering short explanations takes nothing away from audience enjoyment and makes the discussion open to everyone, even those who only have $15 and a computer.