Everything about Mark Kermode totally explained
Mark Kermode (born
Mark Fairey,
2 July 1963) is an
English film critic who regularly writes for
Sight and Sound magazine and
The Observer newspaper. He reviews films on
Simon Mayo's
BBC Radio Five Live show on Friday afternoons, and is also the resident movie critic for
The Culture Show. He is also a critic on other branches of the arts for the
BBC Two programme
Newsnight Review, and appears regularly on
BBC News.
In The Screen Directory's chart of best ever film critics, Kermode appears at number 10.
Career
Print media
Kermode began his film career as a print journalist, writing for Manchester's
City Life, and then
Time Out and the
NME in London. He has also written for
The Independent,
The Guardian,
Vox,
Empire,
Flicks,
Fangoria and
Neon. Until September 2005, Kermode reviewed films each week for the
New Statesman. He regularly writes for the
British Film Institute's
Sight and Sound magazine and
The Observer newspaper.
Radio
Kermode began working at
BBC Radio 1 on a slot called
Cult Film Corner most Thursday nights on
Mark Radcliffe's
Graveyard Shift session. He then moved to Simon Mayo's BBC Radio 1 morning show. Between February 1992 and October 1993, he was the resident film reviewer on
BBC Radio 5's
Morning Edition with
Danny Baker.
He currently reviews and debates new film releases each Friday afternoon with
Simon Mayo on Mayo's
BBC Radio Five Live show, which is also available as a podcast and a vodcast.
Television
Kermode is currently a regular presenter on
BBC Two's
The Culture Show. On 19 May 2007 he was featured on the show playing with his
skiffle band,
The Dodge Brothers, in which he plays the
double bass. He also appears regularly on
Newsnight Review and
Film 24 on
BBC News.
Kermode is also a resident film critic and presenter for
Film Four and
Channel 4 television, presenting the weekly
Extreme Cinema strand. He also writes, researches and presents documentaries for Channel 4..
As of April 2008, Kermode has started a
video blog hosted on the BBC website, where he posts clips of himself talking about movies and telling anecdotes. In May 2008 he was sending back clips from the France where he attended
Cannes Film Festival.
Other work
Kermode has recorded DVD
audio commentaries for
Tommy,
The Ninth Configuration,
The Wicker Man and (with
Peter O'Toole)
Becket.
Film reviews
Horror specialisation
Kermode is a visiting fellow at the
University of Southampton, having gained a
PhD at the
University of Manchester in modern English and American
horror fiction. This, together with his former contributions to
Fangoria, makes him something of a
horror film expert, in particular on his favourite film
The Exorcist. He is considered one of the world's leading authorities on that film, having written two editions of
BFI Modern Classics: The Exorcist and contributed to many other publications and documentaries about it.
Other
cult films in his 2002 Top Ten list include
Brazil,
The Devils and
Don't Look Now.
Opinions
Kermode's appreciation of genre cinema isn't always in line with popular taste: he's a personal dislike for all three
Pirates of the Caribbean films and the
Star Wars films. Kermode's emphasis on genre cinema has also meant he often expresses a liking for films panned by other critics, such as
Basic Instinct 2 or
Lassie because they follow genre expectations. Kermode is critical of documentary makers
Nick Broomfield and
Michael Moore.
Kermode rarely watches television, calling it "trivial" and stating that "I have been doing my best to avoid [TV] for the last 20 years." On being challenged by
The Observer to watch TV, he admitted "if there's one thing I've learned from agreeing to take up the Observer's TV challenge this summer, it's that an awareness of what's going on in television is probably helpful to an understanding of movies. Worse, it may even be essential". He obtained a
PhD in
English at
Manchester University, writing a thesis on Horror Fiction.
Kermode has stated that "I was a revolutionary communist affiliate in the 80s", but that "none of us had any respect for Stalin". He occasionally refers to this in his Radio 5 reviews. He now describes his politics as
liberal.
He is married to
Linda Ruth Williams, a professor who lectures on film at the
University of Southampton and has written the book
The Erotic Thriller in Contemporary Cinema. In
October-
November 2004 they curated a History of the Horror Film season and exhibition at the
National Film Theatre in
London together.
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