Life Itself: before getting into the film itself, a note: I wasn’t much a Roger Ebert fan, as I always thought that his reviews were, for the most part, spoiler-heavy and opinion-light (to be fair, that is something that plagues the great majority of mainstream critics). Steve James’ film reinforces the notion that Ebert loved films, obviously (something I respect and relate to, in spite of); but it goes beyond that, and informs much about the subject, his relationship with cinema and with other people, without becoming a hagiography. In that sense, it certainly serves its purpose as a documentary; furthermore, it is also both funny and touching at times. Visually, it’s somewhat dull, but the content makes up for it.