The Glistening Texture of Jerry Lewis on a Snowfield

Today's Jerry Lewis reference in the New York Times comes from a surprising source: Stephen Holden. NOT Manohla Dargis! "Surprising" because Stephen Holden's kind of thing is usually "a jubilee of the most rarified sort" (!) involving "the abrupt interruption of a sedate passage with an explosive percussive burst that has the glistening texture of sunlight on a snowfield" (!!) or being very troubled about why a fancy person such as William Hurt would like to portray a character from - gasp - Kentucky. He enjoys a particular kind of rarified jubilee of fanciness is what I am saying - the very fanciness that Jerry Lewis has spent his life trying to demolish! So Jerry Lewis and Stephen Holden would seem the unlikeliest of allies! Yet Mr. Holden reviews a whole Uma Thurman movie and then at the end there's the typographical equivalent of a pause and a sniff of disdain before he concludes with the kicker: "I'll take Jerry Lewis." BOOM! Me too, Stephen Holden! Nothing against Uma Thurman! Quentin Tarantino likes them both.