Someone please put Pauline Kael out of her misery

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kappoka
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#51 Post by kappoka » Fri Mar 18, 2005 7:40 pm

I am glad that you finally admit that you enjoy reading people that you disagree with. But how can you be taken serious or taken as an individual with an ounce of common film sense when you attack her writing skills and her thinking?

I am offering you a challenge. You review for me and the rest of us here on this post the following films and supercede Kael's reviews and I will bow to you and declare you the ultimate sage Critic numero Uno. (I will also burn all my copies of Kael's writings I own)

Remember now, you must best Kael's criticism of: The Godfather I and II, Nashville, 2001, Mean Streets.

Reviews you present should be honestly your own. My email address is kappoka@hotmail.com.

This is your big chance to put Kael out of her misery!
Good luck
=D>

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Michael
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#52 Post by Michael » Fri Mar 18, 2005 8:01 pm

Remember now, you must best Kael's criticism of: The Godfather I and II, Nashville, 2001, Mean Streets.
Are they available anywhere on the internet? Or do I have to wait for her books that I reserved recently from the library?

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Mr Sausage
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#53 Post by Mr Sausage » Sat Mar 19, 2005 11:35 am

kappoka wrote:I am glad that you finally admit that you enjoy reading people that you disagree with. But how can you be taken serious or taken as an individual with an ounce of common film sense when you attack her writing skills and her thinking?

I am offering you a challenge. You review for me and the rest of us here on this post the following films and supercede Kael's reviews and I will bow to you and declare you the ultimate sage Critic numero Uno. (I will also burn all my copies of Kael's writings I own)

Remember now, you must best Kael's criticism of: The Godfather I and II, Nashville, 2001, Mean Streets.
That kind of reminds me of something I heard Kael said once (paraphrase likely): "I don't have to be able to lay eggs to know whether or not I like them."

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dvdane
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#54 Post by dvdane » Sat Mar 19, 2005 12:38 pm

Remember now, you must best Kael's criticism of: The Godfather I and II, Nashville, 2001, Mean Streets.
While I would love to take the challenge, why not do something harder: Write a worse book about Citizen Kane than she did. I bet even people who think Citizen Kane is a garden tool could do better. Kael is honestly not that bad. She may have had one or two (or several) bad days, but she also had some great ones. There are numerous other reviewers who should be "put out of their misery", before Kael even should be adressed, my first pick would be Mike d'Angelo, but then again, he is no critic.

I havn't read that much of her, and most of what I read about her some 15 years ago, I've forgotten. Hell, I hardly remember reviews I read last year. So what exactly is the problem with Kael and why does some of you have too much time of your hands to sit and read all her work?

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#55 Post by javelin » Sat Mar 19, 2005 1:59 pm

There are numerous other reviewers who should be "put out of their misery", before Kael even should be adressed, my first pick would be Mike d'Angelo, but then again, he is no critic.
You're kidding me, right? One of the freshest, most entertaining, and well-written voices to pop up in the last 10 years, and you wanna eradicate him?

People I'm jealous of who, therefore, should be eliminated:

Rosenbaum
Ebert
Dargis
Carney (ok - maybe he should actually be dealt with)
Hoberman
Richie

I don't get it. (With regards to Kael, I get that she's overrated. Her knee-jerking shouldn't always be considered criticism, or even good, but the woman had a (borderline dogmatic) passion for film that showed in her writing. Her review of Gimme Shelter (the, um, you know, impetus for this thread) is bullshit, but some other things she wrote are entirely valid.) It's difficult to read critical lambasting (especially when their personal traits are attacked) and think anything but "jealousy."

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Dylan
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#56 Post by Dylan » Sat Mar 19, 2005 3:05 pm

Lets face it, every reviewer is going to have at least one review somebody will disagree with, or one that just doesn't make any sense to a particular reader.

For Kael, well, there are plenty (her review of L' Eclisse, every Fellini review, her bashing of Morricone in her 1900 review, Orson Welles comments, etc.), but she wasn't a bad reviewer by a long shot.
Last edited by Dylan on Sat Aug 11, 2007 2:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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ben d banana
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#57 Post by ben d banana » Sat Mar 19, 2005 3:18 pm

I, on the other hand, believe we should hate freely and without remorse.

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who is bobby dylan
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#58 Post by who is bobby dylan » Mon Mar 21, 2005 1:06 pm

What part of Kael's review of Gimme Shelter is bullshit? What makes her information in the review skeptical at best?

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#59 Post by kschell » Mon Apr 04, 2005 3:25 pm

I disagreed then and disagree now with many of the things Kael wrote. However, that doesn't mean her criticism is worthless. She trashed Kubrick's Clockwork Orange for example for its misogyny. While I find plenty in the filmn to admire, I have to admit she was half-right about this... it *was* a misogynistic film. She always trashed Woody Allen's films which at the time I loved; in hindsight she may have been mostly right: his films were overrated in the 70s. She often praised mediocre directors (Brian DePalma for example). She was way wrong about Orson Welles. And yet and yet and yet... I continue to return to her reviews. Even when one disagrees, Kael has the ability to make you see the film in a different way, to re-examine a film form a different ange. Her essays really ARE "re"-views.... Re-seeing the film in a different way.

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justeleblanc
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#60 Post by justeleblanc » Mon Apr 04, 2005 3:46 pm

Her hatred of Clockwork as a piece of misogeny, I still find it inconsistant with De Palma, who for the most part is one of the most misogenistic directors out there.

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#61 Post by alexismyname » Mon Apr 04, 2005 3:47 pm

This is taken from the begining of Rosenbaum's article on Spanglish:

One reason I can't regard Pauline Kael as a great film critic is her unshakable belief that she needed to see a movie only once -- that she could immediately form an opinion and never have to revise it. She was thought of as an industry gadfly, but her blind faith in first impressions often fit industry calculations perfectly, helping to validate things like test-marketing and seeing movies as disposable.

I readily admit that changing one's mind about movies days or years later can also be a problem. But we outgrow some films and mature enough to value the challenges of others.

Seven years ago I gave four stars to James L. Brooks's feature As Good as It Gets, calling it his best film. What was I thinking? Rereading my review made me wonder if I'd been overly invested in the material -- or in defending Brooks in general. Whatever my reasons, some colleagues and film buffs were horrified, insisting that the movie was completely phony. Many members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences must have agreed with me, however, because the two leads, Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt, won Oscars.

I recently saw Spanglish, Brooks's latest feature, and came away thinking it was gripping despite its plausibility gaps. I knew I had to go back to As Good as It Gets. This time when I watched it I saw an intricate interweaving of truth and falsity that often made it almost impossible to distinguish between the two -- the same thing I'd found in Terms of Endearment (1983), Broadcast News (1987), I'll Do Anything (1994), and Spanglish. I'm now inclined to think that all of Brooks's films are adept cons -- which makes him both fascinating and infuriating.

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Andre Jurieu
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#62 Post by Andre Jurieu » Mon Apr 04, 2005 4:00 pm

One reason I can't regard Jonathan Rosenbaum as a great film critic is that he actually considered Spanglish among the best films released last year.

Kidding, of course. I usually find Rosenbaum to be pretty consistent and intelligent, and lately very humble. That's refreshing when it comes to film criticism. Rex Reed anyone?

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chaddoli
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#63 Post by chaddoli » Mon Apr 04, 2005 4:27 pm

Is there anywhere online where one can read Kael's criticisms? Or are they only available in books?

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Jun-Dai
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#64 Post by Jun-Dai » Mon Apr 04, 2005 4:28 pm

But we outgrow some films and mature enough to value the challenges of others.
This is true, though people can certainly outgrow films in different directions. It is not a linear path. One person might find that they've outgrown Citizen Kane and delight in the simplicity and earnestness of My Neighbor Totoro that seemed to childish to them when they were a film student. I've certainly had friends tell me about films that they've really come to like that I feel I've outgrown, and in the same interchange I can mention a film that I've come to like that they feel they've left behind them.

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#65 Post by MattXFLexicon » Wed Oct 10, 2007 8:11 pm

You know, it's probably a disservice to bring up this thread again. But I felt I had to chime in. While I agree that Pauline Kael isn't an idiot, I disagreed with 96% of everything she wrote.

While I agree she was very intelligent and a wonderful technical writer, I felt she was vastly overrated as a critic. Her death hasn't changed my opinion of her work and I had no desire to sanctify her. Especially considering her talent as a writer, tragically, I felt she squandered her talents by never attempting to write fiction or write and sell her own screenplay.

While I frequently disagree with Ebert, at least I give him a little more credit for writing a script, even if it was a bad, campy, B movie. At least Peter Bogdanovich, who started off as a film scholar and critic, became a filmmaker and left himself open for public view, to criticize the result of his work.

Since this thread initally was asking for examples to back up why people had problems with Kael, let me do just that.

I didn't agree with her over-top dismissal of The Sound Of Music, being that the filmmakers had no intent to produce an 'artistic statement', it was simply a big budget genre picture.

I didn't agree with her savage attack over Look Who's Coming To Dinner. I can understand the criticism if the point of such criticism was directed at the lack of a Black writer or Director at the helm of such a project. Yet, when that film was released in 1967, the subject of interracial relationships wasn't being considered much in mainstream culture, other than in private. I feel that filmmakers can use the medium to address social issues, even as she claimed, it was 'ham-fisted'. I also took issue with Kael's review because it reeked to me of opportunism.

Her review of Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, calling it the 'ultimate amateur film' with a sidmissive tone, seemed too over the top. Her attacks on Kubrick's Clockwork Orange, calling it misogynist, seem to miss the point, as it read it, that Kubrick was pointing out the inherent misogyny that still existed at that time. I never read the film as celebrating misogynistic attitudes, yet quite the opposite.

I've also an an interesting experience with my play writing partner this year, she saw Clockwork Orange for research purposes and loved it, she didn't some away with any overt offense about the film. Being that the film is presenting a moral fable in a sense.

I also have taken huge issue with Kael's attacks over Don Seigel's Dirty Harry as fascist. Why in god's name must we be more concerned with the rights of the criminal, than the rights of the victim or the right of the victim to get justice. By the way, I am not advocating excessive abuse of criminals either, but when bureauracy allows itself to become so politically correct as to become impotent, then I agree with the point of that film based on the context of that time period, 1971. I'm sorry, but if faced with killing an unrepentant sociopath for self defense, I'd probably do the same.

I also have issues with the way she championed Speilberg and Lucas' early work, then by 77'/ 78' dismissing them for producing more commercial fare, just seems wildly inconsistent to me.

Anyway, please feel free to fire away. There's a number of examples over why I felt she was off base more often than not.

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Cold Bishop
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#66 Post by Cold Bishop » Wed Oct 10, 2007 9:00 pm

MattXFLexicon wrote:I didn't agree with her over-top dismissal of The Sound Of Music, being that the filmmakers had no intent to produce an 'artistic statement', it was simply a big budget genre picture.

I didn't agree with her savage attack over Look Who's Coming To Dinner.

I also have taken huge issue with Kael's attacks over Don Seigel's Dirty Harry as fascist.

I also have issues with the way she championed Speilberg and Lucas' early work, then by 77'/ 78' dismissing them for producing more commercial fare, just seems wildly inconsistent to me.
A few points I want to make personally, not so much involving Kael (never really followed her writings and reviews).

1. Beyond the Valley of the Dolls is a wonderful, underrated film. Bad? definitely not. It is much more entertaining that lot of films being made at the time. And is there a better fiction film about sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll? (Okay, there's maybe a couple, but its still up there on the list) Campy? Only intentionally and fitting with Meyer's eccentric style. Any film that's starts off about a female pop group, and eventually works it way towards a violent murder (to the sound of the 20th Century Fox theme no less) is worth viewing, and I respect Ebert for his work on the script much more than anything he's done as a critic.

2. Maybe she was over-the-top, but I will always stand by my opinion that Sound of Music is a lousy film, and whether or not they were trying to make art doesn't make that fact any less important. Same goes for West Side Story.

3. Same goes for Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?. Social issue or not, it doesn't excuse it being ham-fisted. I'm not familiar with her review or what she said, but does anybody actually like this film for anything other than the acting.

4. It's one thing for a film to create a situation in which a violent situation presents itself and a character has to act, it's one thing to make a film which explores the question of self-defense. It's another thing to make a movie where the audience is suppose to cheer the "good guy" when he blasts away the "bad guys", just because they're criminals, therefore we have moral superiority over them; that's not self-defense. Even if the movie creates a situation where the "bad guy" is shooting at the "good guy", and he has to shoot back (which films often do to work around the question); the situation may be self-defense, but the movie still clearly gives moral superiority the "good guy" to be able to shoot "baddies". And a victim's right to justice is a question worth exploring, but a movie saying that outright that "Yes, a victim can kill a criminal in the name of justice" just screams of blood lust.
I actually never got around to seeing Dirty Harry, so I don't know how it applies to it (I've seen plenty of films labeled "fascist" by critics which I found far from being so) but I've seen plenty of the other "fascist" cop and action films, and while some are enjoyable on a certain level, I never lose sight of the fascistic edge to them.

5. And I don't see the problem with that. THX-118 was easily his best film and American Graffiti is still definitely better than any of the Star Wars films. Same could be said for Spielberg's films and his output that decade. They're move towards bigger films definitely coincides with a drop in quality in there films, despite what fanboys may say about it.

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#67 Post by gubbelsj » Wed Oct 10, 2007 9:40 pm

The thing to keep in mind when reading criticisms of Dirty Harry is that the film was released during a period of both massive social upheavals in American society and a trend towards vigilante-type action movies. With white flight from urban areas rising, race riots and war protests causing headlines, and black nationalism and gay rights making their presence felt in society, lots of people thought the country was "out of control," and quite a few of them believed that a few straight-laced types with guns might be able to solve some of those problems. Setting a film in San Francisco, then and now one of the most liberal and permissive cities in the country, and turning a rogue cop loose to settle scores was really a signal to a certain type of moviegoer and citizen that some people just needed to be taken out. To many reviewers, such an argument was repugnant, and a clear repudiation of democratic values. That's where the fascism charge comes in.

I really don't think the point of Dirty Harry was that people should be allowed to kill in self-defense, as MatXFlexicon seems to be suggesting. The greater point was that society needed vigilante action to keep America clean, pure, normal. Watch Dirty Harry back to back with the original Walking Tall (if you can stand watching Joe Don Baker) and the first Death Wish film, all released in the early 1970s. The tag line for Death Wish was "Vigilante, City Style - Judge, Jury and Executioner". Put those films into the context of their time - white people scared to walk through the city! - and they take on a very sinister edge. Picture a film made today in which the hero is a Blackwater USA employee working in Iraq who starts mowing down civilians / potential terrorists in the streets because the military is too concerned that taking them into custody might infringe upon their rights, and you'll get some idea of what the vigilante films were up to. Final disclosure: I'm a Kael fan, and have been for years, even though I disagree strongly with many of her positions and opinions. But she was far from the lone critical voice assailing Dirty Harry.

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#68 Post by MattXFLexicon » Wed Oct 10, 2007 11:29 pm

First off, my apologies over remarks about Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, I have nothing against the film, the point was a generalization of past mixed reviews I've seen about that film. It was a flip remark.

Gubbelsj has made the point I was about to make. It's all about context, Dirty Harry was released at the height in California of the Zodiac killer. Many in San Francisco felt under seige during that period. I can't fault the citizen's of the bay area feeling frustrated over lack of progress of by police officals. Dirty Harry was reflecting the climate of that period.
I don't have Kael's review off hand, yet, from what I remember, Kael fails to point out in context that such a case, as the Zodiac case, was very much in the public's mind. Being that that case was nationally well known, Ms. Kael had to have been aware of it even in New York, therefore, her lack of context in her review is a major failing, and not grounded in the reality of what was socially going on during that period.

Lastly, Seigel's film does touch on the Consitutional delemia's of Harry actions, it's not so cut and dried. Again, it was simply a genre police thriller.

Yes, I agree, Guess Who's Coming To Dinner isn't an especially great film. Yet, Sidney Poitier always has struck me as an honest enough man to where I have doubt's he'd attach himself to a film if he really felt it was detrimental. Historically due to Guess Who's, we saw a market develop for Black cinema, and yes, Hollywood was guilty of allowing that market to be mostly in the exploitation genre in the early 70s. Yet every step has an awkward beginning as far as filmmakers with of a certain ethnic origin getting opportunities to authentically share their experiences in film. Yes, underground filmmakers of the mid sixties were probably doing a better job in exploring race relations, than how it was being handled in Hollywood

Again, what I found disturbing in Kael's Guess Who's Coming To Dinner review. There seemed to be, based on my recollection of that review, an implication that Hollywood shouldn't tackle race relations unless helmed by African American writers / directors. There's a real flaw in that assertion once you see a context that can't be overlooked.

Other than African American Actor's, there were almost no significant Black Directors / writers / producers working in Hollywood even by the mid sixties, Which doesn't reflect well on Hollywood. There might be isolated cases I am unaware of, but how were the such issues, such as race relations to be addressed. Unless actor's like Poitier took such opportunities to address them in films that did so, however flawed.

Yes, I agree that THX1138 and American Graffiti are Lucas' best films. But to argue there's been no quality within the output of Spielberg's mid-nineties work, nor growth?

There's a lot that Pauline Kael should be credited for, as far as her advocacy for certain foreign filmmakers and young directors, I just found her base more often than not for my tastes and not a balanced critic.
There simply have been times I have questioned her sincerity, weather or not she was catering to a certain readership demographic, subjectively speaking. That's really all I have to add. No offense intended otherwise.

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Cold Bishop
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#69 Post by Cold Bishop » Wed Oct 10, 2007 11:53 pm

MattXFLexicon wrote:Yes, I agree that THX1138 and American Graffiti are Lucas' best films. But to argue there's been no quality within the output of Spielberg's mid-nineties work, nor growth?
I wouldn't say there wasn't, but I could see why someone following Spielberg's career from the start could be dissapointed when he started make E.T. and Indiana Jones. Hell, I'm not a fan, but my favorite of his films have been from the last few years. I prefer AI, Minority Report (even with Tom Cruise), Catch Me If You Can?, and Munich to anything in his career prior. Yet, the whole period from the late 70s to late 90s is not something I find very good.

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#70 Post by domino harvey » Thu Oct 11, 2007 1:40 am

Cold Bishop wrote:I could see why someone following Spielberg's career from the start could be dissapointed when he started make E.T. and Indiana Jones. Hell, I'm not a fan, but my favorite of his films have been from the last few years. I prefer AI, Minority Report (even with Tom Cruise), Catch Me If You Can?, and Munich to anything in his career prior. Yet, the whole period from the late 70s to late 90s is not something I find very good.
I'll go one further: I think he's made exactly one good film, War of the Worlds.

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Cold Bishop
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#71 Post by Cold Bishop » Thu Oct 11, 2007 1:44 am

domino harvey wrote:I'll go one further: I think he's made exactly one good film, War of the Worlds.
Well, at risk of turning this into something that belongs in a Spielberg thread, I completely skipped out on that after the word-of-mouth I heard. Should I reconsider?

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#72 Post by domino harvey » Thu Oct 11, 2007 2:08 am

Cold Bishop wrote:
domino harvey wrote:I'll go one further: I think he's made exactly one good film, War of the Worlds.
Well, at risk of turning this into something that belongs in a Spielberg thread, I completely skipped out on that after the word-of-mouth I heard. Should I reconsider?
I don't know, my appraisal of the film is highly idiosyncratic, so while I don't want to turn this into a defend/defame Spielberg thread either, I do think the film's quite brilliant.

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Dylan
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#73 Post by Dylan » Thu Oct 11, 2007 2:22 am

Move this to the Spielberg thread, I sense an entirely off-topic discussion coming in.

Meanwhile, Pauline Kael was an early fan of Spielberg: she enjoyed Jaws and Sugerland Express and seemed very moved by Close Encounters and E.T. It's what Spielberg ultimately became from the late eighties on that she really began to hate, and by Saving Private Ryan (read her book Afterglow) she thought he was absolutely dreadful.

As for Lucas, she hated Star Wars, sorta kinda liked Empire, then absolutely despised Return of the Jedi.

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#74 Post by Andre Jurieu » Thu Oct 11, 2007 10:45 am

Cold Bishop wrote:
domino harvey wrote:I'll go one further: I think he's made exactly one good film, War of the Worlds.
Well, at risk of turning this into something that belongs in a Spielberg thread, I completely skipped out on that after the word-of-mouth I heard. Should I reconsider?
Well, it appears you and I share an appreciation for Spielberg's more recent films (though The Terminal might be his worst film), rather than his early stuff, so I would whole-heartedly endorse War of the Worlds. The entire terrorism/invasion/occupation angel is kind of muddled, but it's still fascinating and the film is well worth watching at least once. Just remember to treat Dakota Fanning's endless shrieking as if it was part of the alien audio, otherwise she's really tough to take.

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ltfontaine
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#75 Post by ltfontaine » Fri Oct 12, 2007 12:08 pm

Insight into the pesky question of the queen bee and her drones may be gleaned from this interview with David Edelstein.

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