Slouching casually against a wall, renowned New Yorker film critic Anthony Lane read from his latest book, Nobody's Perfect, to a small audience at the Penn Bookstore on Thursday evening.
Nobody's Perfect is a compilation of Lane's articles from past years, split roughly in half between his biting film reviews and his equally-biting multi-page dissertation on anything from the horror of cookbooks to the nature of film.
He read the latter at the bookstore, an article called "Let's Get Out of These Wet Things," where he surveyed the progress of movies from the beginning of the 20th century until the present day, and how, despite being in his opinion predictably unoriginal and almost invariably disappointing, they still captivate audiences.
Some of the article was obscured by Lane's clipped British accent, but this did not veil his scathing cynicism.
"Have you ever noticed that in any movie filmed in any Asian city or any city where there is a China town, all chase scenes happen to occur at Chinese New Year right through a parade?" Lane said regarding movie cliches.
Reading about Roger Moore's long, 12-year stint as James Bond, he did several near-perfect impersonations.
Afterwards, Lane opened up the floor for an informal question-and-answer session.
"What would you say about movie culture as opposed to film culture?" asked audience member Jennifer Yuan, 37, a University employee.
"Never the twain shall meet, really," Lane replied. "The movies [I review] are hot... they're not books that are hot -- they're cool to the point of chill. It's a kind of a calmative... the pleasure of returning [to books] is like a beautiful slightly lukewarm bath on a hot day."
After the question-and-answer session, Lane stayed to autograph copies of his voluminous book and chat with audience members.
"Might as well sign all of them," he said. "A signed copy is a sold copy."
"He's very funny," said audience member Marilyn Tseng, 34. "He's very witty and very scathing."
"It was great -- he was brilliant," Yuan said. "I'm a long-time fan. His is one of the first parts of the New Yorker that I read."
She added, "He does great impersonations. I never would have guessed."
Lane's charismatic personality, blade-sharp tongue and quick wit left the audience not only in awe but also in stitches.
"It was excellent. He was very witty," said Leighanne Scarborough, 23, an employee of the University's Chemistry Department. "I loved how he was doing the impressions."
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