More About Medved:

Michael Medved strikes me as a political hack. As a writer he's strictly a mediocrity. He got his foot in the door by collaborating with Irving Wallace's son on a couple of lightweight books, one about the worst movies ever made, another about a class reunion. Everything Medved has put out since has been equally lightweight.

As a film critic he's not even up to Roger Ebert's level, who's a bit of a hack himself. Medved oozes febrile smarminess in just about everything he touches.

Of course, there's a meaner side to him, fueled by the desperation of having no talent. He got his foot in the door and wants to keep it there, so he grovels to the neo-conservative crowd. (He'd be as egregious if he were groveling to the New Yorker.)

Medved's hypocrisy can be gauged by the way this long-time campaigner against movie violence has applauded Gibson's well-made but disturbing film. Can one have it both ways? Either there's too much blood in cinema or there's not. (Those condemning "The Passion," who on the other hand raved about "Scarface," are equally hypocritical.)

Such things happen when you have a media and literary world whose criterion of entry is who you know and who you blow. Michael Medved seems to have covered both bases.

-King Wenclas