For anyone who might be interested, here’s an up-to-date bio:

Jonathan Rosenbaum was film critic for the Chicago Reader from 1987 to 2008. Born in Alabama in 1943, the son and grandson of movie exhibitors, he grew up in a house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. While living in Paris (1969-1974), he worked as an extra for Robert Bresson and as a script consultant for Jacques Tati, before working as assistant editor for Monthly Film Bulletin and staff writer for Sight and Sound in London (1974-1977).

His books include IN DREAMS BEGIN RESPONSIBILITIES: A JONATHAN ROSENBAUM READER (forthcoming in early 2024), CINEMATIC ENCOUNTERS 2: PORTRAITS AND POLEMICS (2019), CINEMATIC ENCOUNTERS: INTERVIEWS AND DIALOGUES (2018), GOODBYE CINEMA, HELLO CINEPHILIA: FILM CULTURE IN TRANSITION (2010), THE UNQUIET AMERICAN: TRANSGRESSIVE COMEDIES FROM THE U.S. (2009), DISCOVERING ORSON WELLES (2007), ESSENTIAL CINEMA: ON THE NECESSITY OF FILM CANONS (2004), MOVIE MUTATIONS: THE CHANGING FACE OF WORLD CINEPHILIA (coedited with Adrian Martin, 2003), ABBAS KIAROSTAMI (with Mehrnaz Saeed-Vafa, 2003, expanded second edition 2018), MOVIE WARS: HOW HOLLYWOOD AND THE MEDIA LIMIT WHAT FILMS WE CAN SEE (2000), DEAD MAN (2000), MOVIES AS POLITICS (1997), PLACING MOVIES: THE PRACTICE OF FILM CRITICISM (1995), THIS IS ORSON WELLES by Orson Welles and Peter Bogdanovich (edited, 1992), GREED (1991), MIDNIGHT MOVIES (with J. Hoberman, 1983), FILM: THE FRONT LINE 1983, and MOVING PLACES: A LIFE AT THE MOVIES (1980, expanded second edition 1995).

He has taught at State University of New York at Stony Brook, New York University, the School of Visual Arts (in New York), the University of California branches at Berkeley, San Diego, and Santa Barbara, the University of Chicago, the University of St. Andrews (in Scotland), the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, KinoKlub Split (in Croatia), and FilmFactory (in Sarajevo).

He maintains a web site archiving most of his work at jonathanrosenbaum.net that receives between 900 and 1500 International visitors daily.

According to my rough calculations, based partially on scrapbook entries, I’ve published over 9,000 items (including capsule reviews) since the late 60s. And according to my former technical adviser and helper Benjamin Coy back in May 2008, when jonathanrosenbaum.com was launched, over 5,500 of these appeared in the Chicago Reader. As of June 3,2023, 8,782 items have been posted on this site, now located at jonathanrosenbaum.net.

In some cases, if one looks up a particular film title, one may even find shorter and longer versions of the same capsule — a reflection of the Reader’s practice in recent years of trimming some of its longer capsules to conserve space. (J.R. Jones informed me that this trimming is no longer done; after I left in paper in early 2008 and Mara Shalhoup came in as editor, longer versions of the capsules appear on the Reader‘s website and shorter versions appear in print.)

In a few cases, due to some computer glitch(es), capsule reviews have been transported from the Reader web site in incomplete form. In those cases, I would advise going to the Reader’s own web site for the full version of the capsule, and would appreciate it if readers who encounter this problem could email me about it (at jonathanrosenbaum at earthlink dot net) so that I can restore the full version of the review on this site.

A caveat regarding the dates at the beginning and/or end of separate entries. Many of these are correct, but at least a tenth of them and possibly many more than that are not to be trusted. The reason for this is that computers compute and follow some orders but don’t think. Over 700 of my capsule reviews were never dated on the Reader’s database, and then had to be dated arbitrarily in order to be imported; and there are probably several others that were already dated incorrectly on the database for one reason or another. Non-Reader entries from monthly, bimonthly or quarterly publications also had to be assigned specific days as well as months and years, and there are most likely other glitches as well. I would welcome information from readers about ones that might be correctable, if they wish to email me (jonathanrosenbaum at earthlink.net), and I’ll correct these if I can.

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On the first day of jonathanrosenbaum.net, October 8, 2013, 924 people paid visits to this site;; 519 of these people came from the U.S., 93 from the U.K., 83 from Germany, 76 from Canada, 30 from Australia, 26 from Spain, 25 from Brazil, 15 from India, 14 from Argentina, 13 each from France and Peru, 11 each from Japan and Portugal, and 9 each from Indonesia and South Korea. On June 3, 2023, according to Goggle Analytics, there were 1,383 visits paid. 

Over the past four weeks, there were 20,350 visitors paying 31,950 visits, 18,608 of whom were new. 9,143 came from the U.S., 2,223 from China, 1,443 from the U.K., 645 from Canada, 585 from Australia, 417 from India, 411 from Germany, 362 from France, 348 from Spain, 317 from Italy, 248 from Japan, 247 from Brazil, 242 from South Korea, 226 from Argentina, 206 from the Netherlands, 192 from Mexico, 172 from Sweden, 156 from Portugal, 142 from Ireland, 121 from Finland,  94 from Romania, 93 from Turkey, 90 each from the Philippines and Russia, 87 from Greece, 86 from Poland, 84 from Vietnam, 78 from Belgium, 66 from New Zealand, 65 from Chile, 64 each from Austria and South Africa, 63 from Peru, 59 from Denmark, 57 each from Switzerland and Taiwan, 56 each from Norway and Singapore, 55 from Israel, 52 each from Hong Kong and Malaysia, 83 each from Colombia and Hong Kong, 49 each from Colombia and Hungary, 48 from Indonesia, 44 from Thailand, 42 from Croatia, 40 each from Bangladesh and Egypt, 33 from Saudi Arabia, and 31 from Iran. The remaining visitors came from 95 other countries. The average time spent by visitors was roughly 13 and a half minutes. The most common ages of the visitors, in descending order, were 18-24, 25-34, 35-44, 45-54, 55-64, and 65 and over. 2,769 were male and 1,620 were female.

For chronological indexes of items on this site, go here. For an index (with links!) to the first 25 years of this site, GO HERE. 

Site design by Rowan McNaught