I just wanted to comment briefly on something Chris Stangl wrote:
I know I was just arguing for the power of diary form film blogging, but how many blogs would be vastly improved if the writer would just put some intellectual distance between their heart and their keyboard? A: I have no idea, but I can think of a few. Those few are rare because they're writers with interesting ideas lost in a swamp of personal-life mush.
Now, I'm definitely in favor of clarity in writing (even if my own writing doesn't always meet the standard), so, yes, I think it's a bad thing if your best ideas are getting lost...
However (and this is me riffing on Chris's comment, rather than reading into it or arguing with it), if we're doing criticism, "personal-life mush" is going to play a part. To the extent that movies are aesthetic, emotional, and, even erotic experiences, we can't help that our responses are going to be personal. One of the strengths of blogs, IMHO, is that, as opposed to newspaper/magazine film criticism or academic film criticism, writers can deal with how this "personal-life mush" affects their response to and interpretation and appreciation of a given movie in an up-front and straightforward manner.
This 2Blowhards post from last year brings up some related issues.
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