Harold Meyerson on growing up in Movieland:
The moment of my irreversible conversion to whatever it is I subsequently became — pop-culture critical historian, cineaste, Turner Classic Movies addict — took place not in a theater but in some Upper West Side bookstore as I thumbed through a new book by Andrew Sarris: The American Cinema: Directors And Directions 1929-1968. What stopped me dead in my tracks was its presumption. Sarris ranked the directors of American movies (and directors, or more properly, good directors, were the auteurs of movies, he argued in the argot of the Cahiers du Cinema crowd). He then ranked the movies, year by year. My immediate reaction was disbelief. Anyone’s immediate reaction had to be disbelief. Sarris could distinguish between the 33rd and 34th best films of 1952? Really?