David Edelstein

As he introduced a review of the movie Margin Call about a group of corrupt characters on Wall Street, regular CBS movie reviewer David Edelstein held up a "Thanks" sign directed at Occupy Wall Street protesters as he declared that "I'm not here as a political pundit, so I can't speak to them directly," and then suggested that the protesters "deserve some R & R" and so should see the film.

Edelstein began:

 On CBS's Sunday Morning program, as he reviewed the film Bad Teacher, starring Cameron Diaz, film critic David Edelstein applauded the raunchy film for having "no redeeming social value" as he derided "all the hypocritical moralists out there."

The film critic - who also contributes to New York magazine and NPR - recounted that Diaz’s character is "a conniving, druggy, drunken middle school instructor who’ll do anything for money to buy herself bigger boobs so she can marry rich and not have to do the job at which she’s, yes, bad," and then described himself as being "in awe" of the movie.

He then continued: "The beauty part of Bad Teacher is it has no redeeming social value. Let me clarify: With all the hypocritical moralists out there, a movie honest about having no redeeming social value has redeeming social value."

On CBS's Sunday Morning, movie reviewer David Edelstein heaped praised upon The Ghost Writer, the latest film by director, and indicted child rapist, Roman Polanski: "Whatever you say about this man, a victim and a victimizer, he's an artist to the end. He can conjure up on screen his inner world. However, malignant."     

Edelstein began the review by proclaiming that Polanski's new film: "shows its maker at the height of his powers." That despite the admission that the director is "likely en route to the slammer for a rape he committed in the '70s." Edelstein later gushed: "Polanski's The Ghost Writer is alive and gripping from its first frame....There's an icky erotic undertone. With Polanski, sex and death are sibling close."

Interestingly, on NPR's Morning Edition radio program on Friday, movie reviewer Kenneth Turan had almost identical praise for the controversial director: "Roman Polanski is back, his new film, The Ghost Writer, is a dark pearl of a movie, made with the flare and precision of a director suddenly returned to the height of his powers." Turan later hoped: "With any kind of luck, The Ghost Writer will help Roman Polanski catch fire one last time."

In an October 1, 2009 column entitled "Hollywood's Favorite Rapist," NewsBusters publisher and Media Research Center President Brent Bozell detailed how those in the entertainment industry and the news media have defended Polanski in the wake of the director's recent arrest and indictment for the rape of a 13-year-old girl in 1977.

National Public Radio's arts-and-culture show "Fresh Air" recently displayed how its leftist ideology trumps artistic judgment, especially when it comes to movies designed to get America out of Iraq before our crazed soldiers senselessly kill more civilians. Film critic David Edelstein lauded Brian De Palma's new movie "Redacted" as a "laudable artistic response to an unpopular war," even as he conceded the movie is terrible as a work of art.

Edelstein knew some people hated the exploitative display of Iraqi corpses at the film's end, noting that De Palma thinks rubbing Americans' faces with the collateral damage will get us out of Iraq: "I think most Americans are immune to those techniques, but I respect his impulse. 'Redacted' is a crude piece of work but it's the kind of outright agitprop that rarely makes it to the big screen."

Edelstein also claims the movie centered around savage rape and murder by American troops isn't anti-troops: "But it's an act of sympathy to suggest that soldiers on their third tours of duty in a place where they have no knowledge of the culture, where they can't tell who's on their side and who wants to blow them up, stand a good chance of losing both their moral compass and their minds." Here's the transcript from the November 16 review: