The big "event" of last week was the death of Andrew Sarris, one of the most important film critics in the United States. Over at her IndieWire column, Anne Thompson has been compiling a list of the various tributes to Sarris. My thoughts are rather complicated, but i'll say this: the popularizing of the politique des auteurs was a considerable achievement. There's a lot more to say, but i spent the last week finishing an article (which will be published in a new online journal) where i've tried to think about various issues in terms of film criticism and scholarship. One thing i'll say is that the problem is the politique des auteurs has caused the coarsening of critical ideology into a preference of directors, so that whether or not one likes a certain director becomes a paramount critical issue, and other critical perspectives have been neglected. That's all i can say at the moment, as i try to think about the current situation of criticism.