Critics

——— IN THE NEWS ——-

"Read All About It"

During a crisis in foreign film distribution, a book like this is poignant and valuable.

———— Roger Ebert, Chicago Film Critic

“Ordinarily, it might be rather difficult to associate such qualities as courage, imagination, compassion, and artistic wisdom with the owner-operator of a movie theatre in America. But all those attributes and several more mark the character of James N. Selvidge.”

———– Lou Guzzo, Drama Editor, The Seattle Times

“In the age of Netflix, when just about any film made anywhere can be summoned painlessly to your mailbox, we do well to remember that once upon a time there were only a handful of independently operated movie theaters in the United States dedicated to showing foreign-language cinema. Prints were few, sane distributors fewer, and even as the beleaguered exhibitors struggled to build an audience for “movies to read,” often as not they had to fight off local censor boards, right wing xenophobes, and self-appointed arbiters of morality and decency. Jim Selvidge was one of these cultural heroes (if you can feature a hero in horn-rimmed glasses heavy enough to tilt the Titanic). Single handedly at times he championed Bergman, Godard, Bunuel, Kurosawa, et al., put the Seattle Censor Board out of business, founded the Seattle Film Society and enticed his community to take the first steps toward acquiring a reputation as one of the savviest movie towns in the country. It’s an important story.”

————- Richard T. Jameson, Manager Edgemont Theatre (1967-70)

Editor Movietone News (1971-81 and Film Comment (1990-2000)

I was there the night they were going to put Selvidge in jail for showing Brigitte Bardot in the French film “The Truth”. Night was like day – all three networks were there with their floodlights blazing. There was a line-u[ about two blocks long. Don’t know if they were waiting for the movie, or to see Selvidge hauled away.”

————- Les McWatters, old friend

“I did indeed get your book, for which I thank you. It’s an important book and I’m both gratified to relive through it my own immersion in these landmark films, and to feel above all a measure of relief that you are playing no small role in keeping them alive. At the time, we took their timelessness for granted, but now we know better, and with this in mind, my hat goes off to you!”

————- Jay P. Carr, National Society of Film Critics

“The name Jim Selvidge has largely been forgotten in local move circles, but he was Seattle’s pioneering exhibitor of foreign-language films in the 1950′s and 1960′s and the spiritual godfather of the vibrant specialty film scene the city now enjoys.

Over those two decades, Selvidge successfully ran several Northwest movie venues, including the Ridgemont, the first Seattle cinema to book foreign films as a regular policy and – - from 1956 to 1971 – - one of the most influential ar houses in the country.

The book is full fo reflection on Seattle’s odyssey from provincial backwater to cultural mecca, observations about the role of the exhibitor in the ever-changing film business and entertaining anecdotes about a host of long-vanished West Coast movie characters.”

———— William Arnold, Movie Critic, Seattle-Post Intelligencer