"Philip Kaufman's Twisted walks like a thriller and talks like a thriller, but it squawks like a turkey. But back to deus ex machina. This is a phrase you will want to study and master, not merely to amaze friends during long bus journeys but because it so perfectly describes what otherwise might take you thousands of words. Imagine a play on a stage. The hero is in a fix. The dragon is breathing fire, his sword is broken, his leg is broken, his spirit is broken, and the playwright's imagination is broken. Suddenly there is the offstage noise of the grinding of gears, and invisible machinery lowers a god onto the stage, who slays the dragon, heals the hero, and fires the playwright. He is the "god from the machine.""
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Pulitzer Prize winnersMemoirists from the United StatesHumanistsScreenwriters from the United StatesFilm critics from the United States
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Review of Twisted (27 February 2004)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Roger_Ebert
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert (18 June 1942 β 4 April 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, essayist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. He was the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.
249 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Roger Ebert β
Related Quotes
"Downey's Holmes is at once more dissolute and more fit than previous incarnations. Holmes' canonical devotion to cocaβ¦"
"It is human nature to look away from illness. We don't enjoy a reminder of our own fragile mortality. That's why writβ¦"
"Art is the closest we can come to understanding how a stranger really feels."
"One of the remarkable things about Russ Meyer's films is that they continue to live and play, long after the other woβ¦"
"When I think about the kinds of movies that make me cry, that make tears come to my eyes, I usually don't think aboutβ¦"
"Of what use is freedom of speech to those who fear to offend?"
"I had a colonoscopy once, and they let me watch it on TV. It was more entertaining than The Brown Bunny."
"Well, what is a political film? A film about politicians? Or a film about issues β sexism, racism, the environment, nβ¦"
"Doing research on the Web is like using a library assembled piecemeal by pack rats and vandalized nightly."
"Pixar is the first studio that is a movie star."