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Gary Ross

Reviews

Ocean's 8 (2018)
Free State of Jones (2016)
Seabiscuit (2003)
Pleasantville (1998)

Blog Posts

Ebert Club

#326 April 17, 2018

Matt writes: The 20th anniversary of Ebertfest will kick off tomorrow, April 18th, and run through Sunday, April 22nd, at the Virginia Theatre in Champaign, Illinois. Andrew Davis' classic edge-of-your-seat thriller, "The Fugitive," will open the festival, which features other beloved titles including "American Splendor" and "The Big Lebowski," as well as such trailblazing filmmakers as Ava DuVernay, Julie Dash, Amma Asante, Martha Coolidge and many more.

Ebert Club

#318 December 26, 2017

Matt writes: For our final newsletter of 2017, we are providing a round-up of the RogerEbert.com lists ranking the best films of the year. The cumulative top 10 list from the writers at our site placed Greta Gerwig's sharply insightful directorial debut, "Lady Bird," at the top of the heap, while each of our writers provided their individual lists separately. Our publisher, Chaz Ebert, revealed her picks for the year's best films in an extensive list that was headed by a four-way tie: Jordan Peele's "Get Out," Guillermo del Toro's "The Shape of Water," Luca Guadagnino's "Call Me by Your Name" and Ruben Östlund's "The Square." She also presented her favorite documentaries of 2017, spotlighting such essential titles as Amanda Lipitz's "Step," Agnès Varda's "Faces Places," Ben Lear's "They Call Us Monsters" and Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis' "Whose Streets?"

Ebert Club

#301 May 2, 2017

Matt writes: Last month's 19th installment of Ebertfest in Champaign, Illinois, was a tremendous joy from beginning to end. Our special guests included Norman Lear ("All in the Family"), Isabelle Huppert ("Elle"), Charles Burnett ("Killer of Sheep"), Gary Ross ("Pleasantville"), cinematographer Caleb Deschanel ("Being There"), first assistant director Michael Hausman ("Hair") and Oscar-winning producer Irwin Winkler ("Rocky"). We have compiled our site's complete coverage of the festival into a table of contents, accompanied by several excellent articles from Champaign's newspaper, The News-Gazette. Our special edition of Thumbnails features additional coverage of the festival published at Variety, the Chicago Sun-Times, The Daily Illini, Smile Politely and more. So grab some popcorn and join us in reliving the highlights of Ebertfest 2017.

Features

The Political Idealism of Gary Ross

A look at the politics and idealism of director Gary Ross, as reflected over the course of his career in films like "Pleasantville," "The Hunger Games" and "Free State of Jones."

Far Flungers

The Garden of Pleasantville

How do things work in a perfect world? The book of Genesis tells us this much: every living thing lives in harmony, food is plentiful, there is no such thing as pain, and nobody knows the difference between good and evil.

That's the loophole the serpent uses to convince Eve to eat the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. "God said not to because I'll die," she protests. "You won't die," the serpent says. "You'll just be wiser, like God, and see things the way he does." So Eve eats the fruit because she can't conceive of anything that isn't perfect, and if God is wise, then wisdom is perfect too. As for Adam, the Bible never really attributes any motive to his deed. He just seems to take the fruit from Eve without question.

May contain spoilers

Ebert Club

#96 January 4, 2012

Marie Haws: Remember the Old Vic Tunnels?  I did some more sniffing around and you'll never guess where it led me. That's right - into the sewer system!  But not just any old sewer, oh no... it's the home of a famous forgotten river flowing beneath Fleet Street; the former home of English journalism.So grab a flashlight and some rubber boots as we go underground to explore "mile after mile of ornate brickwork" and a labyrinthine of tunnels which reveal the beauty of London's hidden River Fleet. (click images to enlarge.)

Ebert Club

#89 November 16, 2011

Marie writes: I was browsing the 2010 National Geographic Photography Contest Galleries and came upon this amazing shot - click to enlarge!

The Birth Of Earth: Photo by Terje Sorgjerd"Getting close or getting too close? Photo taken of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano eruption that would grind most of europe air traffic. This is the scariest moment in my life, and also the most beautiful and frightening display of raw force I have ever seen." - Terje Sorgjerd

Festivals & Awards

Some sure bets and wild cards for awards

Shortly after 7:30 a.m. (CST) Tuesday, Motion Picture Academy President Frank Pierson and actress Sigourney Weaver will walk onstage at the Kodak Theater on Hollywood Boulevard and announce the nominations for the 76th Academy Awards, and this article will instantly become obsolete. But until that moment, we can guess and speculate and predict about this year's nominees, and here goes.