Critiques

Ralph Hammann has been a film and theater critic (and a member of the American Theatre Critics Association) ever since his first review was published in the college newspaper when he was a film student at NYU in 1972. Since then, he has written for five publications, most notably Albany, NY’s now defunct alternative newsweekly, Metroland (30 years), The Advocate (Williamstown, MA and also defunct) and The Berkshire Eagle.

He taught film and theatre courses at Pittsfield High School when it was an arts magnet school and was an adjunct at Berkshire Community College. For five years, he curated and lectured at a popular film series at the Berkshire Museum which drew the attention of David Lean and resulted in an afternoon visit to the renowned director’s home in London. He counts as his early film mentors David Lean, Akira Kurosawa, Stanley Kubrick, Federico Fellini, Carol Reed, Alfred Hitchcock, Terence Fisher, and Peter Cushing. More recently, he has been influenced by Ken Burns, Michael Moore, and Errol Morris.