Gene Siskel's 10 Best Bad Movie Reviews

Before the age of Rotten Tomatoes metrics and Twitter dunking, there was Gene Siskel—razor-sharp, deeply informed, and unafraid to fillet a film on live television. As half of the legendary Siskel & Ebert duo, his dynamic with Roger Ebert became the blueprint for modern cultural criticism: competitive, hyper-verbal, and obsessed with movies as both art and artifact. But Siskel was always the colder blade. Where Ebert occasionally let sentiment sneak in, Siskel kept his emotional range tight—more Chicago Tribune than emotional barometer. His criticism was clinical, often surgical, and at times delivered with the unnerving energy of a man who knew he was right before you finished your sentence. Whether he was defending Fargo or decimating Friday the 13th Part 2, Siskel brought a journalist’s instinct for truth and a theatergoer’s intolerance for bulls**t.