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Bosley Crowther | |
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 Crowther in 1949 | |
| Born | Francis Bosley Crowther Jr. (1905-07-13)July 13, 1905 Lutherville, Maryland, U.S. |
| Died | March 7, 1981(1981-03-07) (aged 75) Mount Kisco, New York, U.S. |
| Alma mater | Princeton University |
| Occupation(s) | Journalist, author, film critic |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 3 (includingJohn M.) |
| Relatives | Welles Crowther (grandson) |
Francis Bosley Crowther Jr. (July 13, 1905 – March 7, 1981) was an American journalist, writer, and film critic forThe New York Times for 27 years. His work helped shape the careers of many actors, directors and screenwriters, though some of his reviews of popular films have been seen as unnecessarily harsh. Crowther was an advocate of foreign-language films in the 1950s and 1960s, particularly those ofRoberto Rossellini,Vittorio De Sica,Ingmar Bergman, andFederico Fellini.
Crowther was born Francis Bosley Crowther Jr. inLutherville, Maryland, the son of Eliza Hay (née Leisenring, 1877–1960) and Francis Bosley Crowther (1874–1950).[1] As a child, Crowther moved toWinston-Salem, North Carolina, where he published a neighborhood newspaper,The Evening Star. His family moved to Washington, D.C., and Crowther graduated fromWestern High School in 1922. After two years of prep school atWoodberry Forest School, he enteredPrinceton University, where he majored in history and was editor ofThe Daily Princetonian. During his final year in 1928, he wonThe New York Times's Intercollegiate Current Events Contest and won a trip to Europe. Following his return, Crowther was offered a job as a cub reporter forThe New York Times at a salary of $30 per week. He declined the offer, made to him by the publisherAdolph S. Ochs, hoping to find employment on a small Southern newspaper. When the salary offered by those papers was not half of theTimes offer, he went to New York and took the job. He was the first nightclub reporter for theTimes, and in 1932 was asked byBrooks Atkinson to join the drama department as assistant drama editor. He spent five years covering the theater scene in New York, and even dabbled in writing for it.[2]
While at theTimes in those early years, Crowther met Florence Marks, a fellow employee; the couple married on January 20, 1933.[3] They had three sons, Bosley Crowther III, an attorney;John M. Crowther, a writer and artist; and Jefferson, a banker and the father ofWelles Remy Crowther, who died in theSeptember 11 attacks in 2001.
In 1937 he became assistant screen editor and in 1940 replacedFrank Nugent as film critic forThe New York Times as well as screen editor.[2] He was film critic for theTimes until he semi-retired in 1967 and became critic emeritus.[1] In 1954, he received theDirectors Guild of America's first film criticism award.[4]
After he semi-retired from theTimes, he also started to work forColumbia Pictures helping them identify stories and films to buy. One of the stories he suggested was S. J. Wilson'sTo Find a Man.[5][4]
In addition to his film criticism, Crowther wroteThe Lion's Share: The Story of an Entertainment Empire (1957), the first book documenting the history ofMetro-Goldwyn-Mayer,Hollywood Rajah: The Life and Times of Louis B. Mayer (1960), a biography of the head of the MGM studio,The Great Films: 50 Golden Years of the Motion Picture Industry (1967), andTreasury of the Talking Picture.[1][4]
Perhaps conscious of the power of his reviews, Crowther adopted a tone thatNew York Times obituaristRobert D. McFadden considered to be "scholarly rather than breezy".[1] Frank Beaver wrote inBosley Crowther: Social Critic of the Film, 1940–1967 that Crowther opposed displays ofpatriotism in films and believed that a movie producer "should balance his political attitudes even in the uncertain times of the 1940s and 1950s, during theHouse Un-American Activities Committee".[2] Crowther's commentary on the wartime dramaMission to Moscow (1943), made during the period when the Soviet Union was one of theAllied Powers with the United States, chided the film by saying it should show "less ecstasy", and wrote:"It is just as ridiculous to pretend that Russia has been a paradise of purity as it is to say the same thing of ourselves".[2][6]
In the 1950s, Crowther was an opponent of SenatorJoseph R. McCarthy, whoseanti-communist crusade targeted the State Department, the administration ofHarry S. Truman, theU.S. Army, and individual government employees. However, he also criticised the left-wing filmKnock on Any Door for blaming law-abiding society for a juvenile delinquent's descent into murder: "Rubbish! The only shortcoming of society which this film proves is that it casually tolerates the pouring of such fraudulence onto the public mind."[7]
Crowther opposedcensorship of movies, and advocated greater social responsibility in the making of them. He approved of movies with social content, such asGone with the Wind (1939),The Grapes of Wrath (1940),Citizen Kane (1941),The Lost Weekend (1945),All the King's Men (1949), andHigh Noon (1952).
Crowther barely concealed his disdain forJoan Crawford when reviewing her films, saying that her acting style inFemale on the Beach (1955) was characterized by "artificiality" and "pretentiousness,"[8] and also chided Crawford for her physical bearing. In his review of theNicholas Ray filmJohnny Guitar (1954), Crowther complained that "no more femininity comes from (Crawford) than from rugged Mr.Heflin inShane (1953). For the lady, as usual, is as sexless as the lions on the public library steps and as sharp and romantically forbidding as a package of unwrapped razor blades".[9]
Though his preferences in popular movies were not always predictable, Crowther in general detested action and war films that depicted violence and gunplay. He defended epics such asBen-Hur (1959) andCleopatra (1963), but gave theWorld War II filmThe Great Escape (also 1963) a highly unfavorable review,[10] and pannedDavid Lean's later works. He calledLawrence of Arabia (1962) a "thundering camel-opera that tends to run down rather badly as it rolls on into its third hour and gets involved with sullen disillusion and political deceit."[11]
Crowther often admired foreign-language films, especially the works ofRoberto Rossellini,Vittorio De Sica,Ingmar Bergman, andFederico Fellini.[1] However he was critical of some iconic releases as well. He foundAkira Kurosawa's classicThrone of Blood (1957, but not released in the U.S. until 1961), derived fromMacbeth, ludicrous, particularly its ending;[12] and calledGodzilla (1954) "an incredibly awful film".[13] Crowther dismissedAlfred Hitchcock'sPsycho (1960) as "a blot on an otherwise honorable career".[14] After other reviewers praised the film, Crowther recanted his criticism and named it one of the top ten movies of the year, writing thatPsycho was a "bold psychological mystery picture.... [I]t represented expert and sophisticated command of emotional development with cinematic techniques."[15] He commented that whileSatyajit Ray'sPather Panchali (1955; U.S., 1958) took on "a slim poetic form," the structure and tempo of it "would barely pass as a 'rough cut' with editors in Hollywood".[16] Writing aboutL'Avventura (1960; U.S., 1961), Crowther said that watching the film was "like trying to follow a showing of a picture at which several reels have got lost."[17]
The career of Bosley Crowther is discussed at length inFor the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism, including his support for foreign-language cinema and his public repudiation ofMcCarthyism and theBlacklist. In this 2009 documentary film, contemporary critics who appreciate his work, such asA. O. Scott, appear, but also those who found his work too moralistic, such asRichard Schickel,Molly Haskell, andAndrew Sarris.[citation needed]
The end of Crowther's career was marked by his disdain for the 1967 filmBonnie and Clyde. He was critical of what he saw as the film's sensationalized violence. His review was negative:
It is a cheap piece of bald-faced slapstick comedy that treats the hideous depredations of that sleazy, moronic pair as though they were as full of fun and frolic as the jazz-age cut-ups inThoroughly Modern Millie... [S]uch ridiculous, camp-tinctured travesties of the kind of people these desperadoes were and of the way people lived in the dustySouthwest back in those barren years might be passed off as candidly commercial movie comedy, nothing more, if the film weren't reddened with blotches of violence of the most grisly sort... This blending of farce with brutal killings is as pointless as it is lacking in taste, since it makes no valid commentary upon the already travestied truth. And it leaves an astonished critic wondering just what purposeMr. Penn andMr. Beatty think they serve with this strangely antique, sentimental claptrap.[18]
Other critics besides Crowther panned the movie.John Simon, the critic ofNew York magazine, while praising its technical execution, declared "Slop is slop, even served with a silver ladle." Its distributor pulled the film from circulation. However, the critical consensus onBonnie and Clyde reversed, exemplified by two high-profile reassessments byTime andNewsweek. The latter'sJoe Morgenstern wrote two reviews in consecutive issues, the second retracting and apologizing for the first.[citation needed]Time hiredStefan Kanfer as its new film critic in late 1967; his first assignment was an ostentatious rebuttal of his magazine's original negative review.[citation needed] A rave inThe New Yorker byPauline Kael was also influential.
Even in the wake of this critical reversal, however, Crowther remained one of the film's most dogged critics. He eventually wrote three negative reviews and periodically blasted the movie in reviews of other films and in a letters column response to unhappyTimes readers.The New York Times replaced Crowther as its primary film critic in early 1968, and some observers speculated that his persistent attacks onBonnie and Clyde had shown him to be out of touch with current cinema and weighed heavily in his removal.[19] Crowther worked as an executive consultant atColumbia Pictures after leaving theTimes.[20]
Crowther died of heart failure on March 7, 1981, atNorthern Westchester Hospital inMount Kisco, New York.[1] He was survived by his wife Florence, who died in 1984;[21] a sister, Nancy Crowther Kappes; three sons, F. Bosley,John, and Jefferson; and four grandchildren.[1]
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| Preceded by | Chief film critic ofThe New York Times 1940-1968 | Succeeded by |
