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Life Itself
- A Memoir
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 14 hrs and 16 mins
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Publisher's summary
"I believe that if, at the end, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do. To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts. We must try to contribute joy to the world. That is true no matter what our problems, our health, our circumstances. We must try. I didn't always know this, and am happy I lived long enough to find it out."
—from Life Itself
Roger Ebert is the best-known film critic of our time. He has been reviewing films for the Chicago Sun-Times since 1967, and was the first film critic ever to win a Pulitzer Prize. He has appeared on television for four decades, including 23 years as cohost of Siskel & Ebert at the Movies.
In 2006, complications from thyroid cancer treatment resulted in the loss of his ability to eat, drink, or speak. But with the loss of his voice, Ebert has only become a more prolific and influential writer. And now, for the first time, he tells the full, dramatic story of his life and career.
Roger Ebert's journalism carried him on a path far from his nearly idyllic childhood in Urbana, Illinois. It is a journey that began as a reporter for his local daily, and took him to Chicago, where he was unexpectedly given the job of film critic for the Sun-Times, launching a lifetime's adventures.
In this candid, personal history, Ebert chronicles it all: his loves, losses, and obsessions; his struggle and recovery from alcoholism; his marriage; his politics; and his spiritual beliefs. He writes about his years at the Sun-Times, his colorful newspaper friends, and his life-changing collaboration with Gene Siskel. He remembers his friendships with Studs Terkel, Mike Royko, Oprah Winfrey, and Russ Meyer (for whom he wrote Beyond the Valley of the Dolls and an ill-fated Sex Pistols movie). He shares his insights into movie stars and directors like John Wayne, Werner Herzog, and Martin Scorsese.
This is a story that only Roger Ebert could tell. Filled with the same deep insight, dry wit, and sharp observations that his readers have long cherished, this is more than a memoir-it is a singular, warm-hearted, inspiring look at life itself.
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Great Dish, Sketchy Analysis
- By Dubi on 12-14-13
By: Peter Biskind
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Adventures in the Screen Trade
- By: William Goldman
- Narrated by: Kiff VandenHeuvel
- Length: 13 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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No one knows the writer's Hollywood more intimately than William Goldman. Two-time Academy Award-winning screenwriter and the best-selling author of Marathon Man, Tinsel, Boys and Girls Together, and other novels, Goldman now takes you into Hollywood's inner sanctums...on and behind the scenes for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, All the President's Men, and other films...into the plush offices of Hollywood producers...into the working lives of acting greats such as Redford, Olivier, Newman, and Hoffman...and more.
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Stone cold Hollywood classic with one of the better Narrations you’ll ever hear
- By Anonymous User on 10-14-22
By: William Goldman
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Best. Movie. Year. Ever.
- How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen
- By: Brian Raftery
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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From a veteran culture writer and modern movie expert, a celebration and analysis of the movies of 1999 - arguably the most groundbreaking year in American cinematic history.
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Like talking about movies with a friend
- By Shawn Inmon on 05-30-19
By: Brian Raftery
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Down and Dirty Pictures
- Miramax, Sundance and the Rise of Independent Film
- By: Peter Biskind
- Narrated by: Phil Gigante
- Length: 23 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Down and Dirty Pictures chronicles the rise of independent filmmakers and of the twin engines - the Sundance Film Festival and Miramax Films - that have powered them. Peter Biskind profiles the people who took the independent movement from obscurity to the Oscars, most notably Sundance founder Robert Redford and Harvey Weinstein, who with his brother, Bob, made Miramax an indie powerhouse.
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For the independent film lover!
- By natalie on 08-26-14
By: Peter Biskind
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Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli
- The Epic Story of the Making of The Godfather
- By: Mark Seal
- Narrated by: Phil Thron
- Length: 15 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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The story of how The Godfather was made is as dramatic, operatic, and entertaining as the film itself. Over the years, many versions of various aspects of the movie’s fiery creation have been told - sometimes conflicting, but always compelling. Mark Seal sifts through the evidence, has extensive new conversations with director Francis Ford Coppola and several heretofore silent sources, and complements them with colorful interviews with key players including actors Al Pacino, James Caan, Talia Shire, and others.
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A great book that draws from many, many sources
- By DARBY KERN on 04-11-22
By: Mark Seal
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All the Little Live Things
- By: Wallace Stegner
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 10 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Scarred by the senseless death of their son and baffled by the engulfing chaos of the 1960s, Joe Allston and his wife, Ruth, have left the coast for a California retreat. And although their new home looks like Eden, it also has its serpents: Jim Peck, a messianic exponent of drugs, yoga, and sex, and Marian Catlin, an attractive young woman whose otherwordly innocence is far more appealing—and far more dangerous.
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Another winner from Stegner
- By B.J. on 10-22-12
By: Wallace Stegner
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Martin Scorsese
- A Journey
- By: Mary Pat Kelly, Leonardo DiCaprio, Steven Spielberg
- Narrated by: Nancy Linari, P.J. Ochlan
- Length: 13 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Few filmmakers, if any, make the kind of impact that Martin Scorsese has made on American cinema. The winner of every prestigious film award, including the Oscar, Scorsese is a living legend. Bestselling author and award-winning filmmaker Mary Pat Kelly’s groundbreaking biography reveals how this working-class boy from Manhattan’s Little Italy became one of our most acclaimed, celebrated, and influential filmmakers. Martin Scorsese: A Journey maps Scorsese’s personal and artistic evolution.
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Good behind the scenes of early Scorsese films
- By Boxing Fan on 12-04-23
By: Mary Pat Kelly, and others
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Pictures at a Revolution
- Five Movies and the Birth of the New Hollywood
- By: Mark Harris
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 17 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Here is the epic human drama behind the making of the five movies nominated for Best Picture in 1967 - Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, The Graduate, In the Heat of the Night, Doctor Dolittle, and Bonnie and Clyde - and through them, the larger story of the cultural revolution that transformed Hollywood and America forever.
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Would It Be Too Much To Ask?
- By Casey Keller on 12-31-08
By: Mark Harris
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A Life in Movies
- Stories from 50 Years in Hollywood
- By: Irwin Winkler
- Narrated by: Michael Butler Murray
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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This is an engrossing and candid book, a beguiling exploration of what it means to be a producer, including purchasing rights, developing scripts, casting actors, managing directors, editing film, and winning awards. Filled with tales of legendary and beloved films, as well as some not-so-legendary and forgotten ones, A Life in Movies takes listeners behind the scenes and into the history of Hollywood.
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ONLY ONE WAY THIS BOOK COULD HAVE BEEN BETTER
- By David from Vermont on 09-22-19
By: Irwin Winkler
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The Devil’s Candy
- The Anatomy of a Hollywood Fiasco
- By: Julie Salamon
- Narrated by: Julie Salamon
- Length: 18 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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When Brian De Palma agreed to allow Julie Salamon unlimited access to the film production of Tom Wolfe's best-selling book The Bonfire of the Vanities, both director and journalist must have felt like they were on to something big. How could it lose? But instead Salamon got a front-row seat at the Hollywood disaster of the decade.
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WHAT A GEM!!!
- By Momofour on 07-04-21
By: Julie Salamon
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The Big Goodbye
- Chinatown and the Last Years of Hollywood
- By: Sam Wasson
- Narrated by: Sam Wasson
- Length: 11 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Chinatown is the Holy Grail of 1970s cinema. Its twist ending is the most notorious in American film and its closing line of dialogue the most haunting. Here for the first time is the incredible true story of its making. In Sam Wasson's telling, it becomes the defining story of the most colorful characters in the most colorful period of Hollywood history. Here is Jack Nicholson at the height of his powers, as compelling a movie star as there has ever been, embarking on his great, doomed love affair with Anjelica Huston.
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This book is cursed
- By Dobbs on 04-13-20
By: Sam Wasson
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The Kid Stays in the Picture
- By: Robert Evans
- Narrated by: Robert Evans
- Length: 6 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Robert Evans' The Kid Stays in the Picture is universally recognized as the greatest, most outrageous, and most unforgettable show business memoir ever written. The basis of an award-winning documentary film, it remains the gold standard of Hollywood storytelling. An extraordinary raconteur, Evans spares no one, least of all himself. The Kid Stays in the Picture is sharp, witty, self-aggrandizing, and self-lacerating in equal measure.
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Not even close to unabridged
- By Shaun Bossio on 09-08-16
By: Robert Evans
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Hollywood: The Oral History
- By: Jeanine Basinger, Sam Wasson
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon, Marni Penning
- Length: 28 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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From the archives of the American Film Institute comes a unique picture of what it was like to work in Hollywood from its beginnings to its present day. Gleaned from nearly three thousand interviews, involving four hundred voices from the industry, Hollywood: The Oral History, lets a listener “listen in” on candid remarks from the biggest names in front of the camera—Bette Davis, Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, Harold Lloyd—to the biggest behind it—Frank Capra, Steven Spielberg, Alfred Hitchcock, Jordan Peele, as well as the lesser known individuals that shaped what was heard and seen on screen.
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Picky, Picky!
- By Patrick on 12-22-22
By: Jeanine Basinger, and others
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Villages
- By: John Updike
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 9 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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John Updike's 21st novel, a bildungsroman, follows its hero, Owen Mackenzie, from his birth in the semi-rural Pennsylvania town of Willow to his retirement in the rather geriatric community of Haskells Crossing, Massachusetts. In between these two settlements comes Middle Falls, Connecticut, where Owen, an early computer programmer, founds with a partner, Ed Mervine, the successful firm of E-O Data, which is housed in an old gun factory on the Chunkaunkabaug River.
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Updike at the height of his powers
- By M. Consol on 07-09-05
By: John Updike
What listeners say about Life Itself
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- dj
- 06-14-13
An Owner's Manual for Living a Fulfilled Life
Roger Ebert might just have been the happiest man alive – I know that’s not true, but it may be close. He’s either the greatest liar or luckiest man who ever lived; I believe the later.
He shares with us his life – though he doesn’t pat himself on the back for doing some of it right or wallow in misery for the things he did wrong (particularly alcoholism) – he really does celebrate all of it in these pages. I sincerely thank him for that.
This is a book that clearly demonstrates that it’s the little things in a life that make it grand – he spends more time telling us about his inability to rid himself of a single one of the books he’s owned in his life than he does aggrandizing the life of the most celebrated movie critic ever.
He shares the love he had for the people in his life – the newspaper friends, his parents, and his beloved wife. He shares the joy he felt in revisiting the little places he had found and loved in cities around the world. He shares the wonder found in books, movies, and life in general.
This really is a book that makes me want to be a better person – and one that shows me the way to go about it. I can’t recommend it more enthusiastically. Listen to it twice.
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- Jojobean
- 05-18-20
Not what I had in mind..
This is a memoir of his life that takes you back into the 60's, which is difficult for me to relate with. I was looking for more movie review related stories but this was not that sort of book.. my bad.
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- danny lawrence
- 12-08-12
One and a half thumbs up
This wasnt an incredibly in depth memoir but some of the Hollywood Elite stories made this a mostly fun and entertaining listen. John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, and others kept it interesting. Edward Herrman did a fantastic job with the narration. A light take on the life and career of one of the most famous movie critics in american media history.
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- Bob
- 11-17-12
this book demonstrates the key role of the reader
Would you consider the audio edition of Life Itself to be better than the print version?
Absolutely. I am sure if I had read the book,the long lists of names and places would have been cumbersome. What brought this book to live esd Edward Herrmann's pitch-perfect reading.
What did you like best about this story?
I enjoyed the stories and reference to movies and Ebert's positive attitude, but was carried me away into the story was Edward Herrmann. It was both calm and restrained and yet full of warmth and emotion.
What does Edward Herrmann bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
Uh, everything. Intelligence, feeling, drama - this dude is one of the great readers
Any additional comments?
did I mention how impressive Edward Herrmann was?
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7 people found this helpful
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- MG
- 02-04-12
Enjoyable autobiography
What did you love best about Life Itself?
Some people earn the right to tell their story, and Roger Ebert certainly has. He does not brag or name drop; he remains in awe of his circumstance. He tells intersting and funny stories about the movie industry and theh people he grew close to.
What did you like best about this story?
Roger is down to earth. He reveals himself in an honest way.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Don
- 12-25-12
Surprisingly good read
What did you love best about Life Itself?
I found the book really brought me into his world and the times he grew up in. It was really great to listen to all the stories behind the movies, actors, and directors. If you are a movie buff, you'll like this aspect of the book.I also liked that he never pulled any punches. He tells it, warts and all.
What does Edward Herrmann bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
I found the narrator was just about perfect. His tone and cadence were bang on, and did not distract in any way.
Any additional comments?
It gave me a better understanding of the life of one of my favorite tv personalities. I also appreciate that even without the ability to speak, he is still connecting with his fan base in a great way.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Bill at Torg Stories
- 04-25-13
The Newspaper Business in Chicago
I mentally noted chapter 13 for when I began to get really interested in this book. Once I got past childhood and into Roger getting his first job, this really picked up for me. Given Roger's lifetime of watching movies, it was interesting to hear his opinions on film and about all the experiences he's had talking with filmmakers and actors. Lots of excellent travel stories related to film festivals.
Oh yeah! Getting started in TV was also a great story. Roger's wife Chaz is an inspiration. What an amazing woman.
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2 people found this helpful
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- K
- 12-06-14
My favorite audio book of all time!
What did you love best about Life Itself?
Edward Herrman's narration.
Who was your favorite character and why?
Roger Ebert's stories are charming.
Any additional comments?
Since the stories are non-linear, I am never bored by this book. I find the narration and story cadence to be soothing, I have listed to this three times already!
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- Pohokano
- 06-30-19
A wonderful memoir beautifully told
A lovely telling of Ebert's life well lived. He made the most of his time, even after cancer took its toll. I knew of him only as the nerdy guy on the movie–review shows (Siskel was much more interesting) but now appreciate all that was behind the figure on the screen. I wish I could have known him.
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- SLW
- 10-27-11
Absorbing memoir, wonderful narration
Roger Ebert has astonishing recall, memorably evoking his childhood, his career, the people he has met, his alcoholism, his marriage to the spectacular Chaz, and his current doings. This is a warm and humorous (yes, I laughed out loud) story that has its serious side. It also boasts an excellent performance by Edward Herrmann, who often sounds a lot like the people whose conversations with Ebert he is portraying. I really enjoyed this.
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10 people found this helpful