LAUREN BACALL - BACALL PUCKERS UP AND BLOWS AT CURRENT MOVIE FARE

BACALL PUCKERS UP AND BLOWS AT CURRENT MOVIE FARE

Lauren Bacall, who made her starring debut in the film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's To Have or Have Not 63 years ago, said Tuesday that movies have fallen victim to "mediocrity" over those years, "and I think it's too bad that's happened." Appearing at a news conference at the Berlin Film Festival, where her latest film, Paul Schrader's The Walker, is being screened out of competition, Bacall, 82, blamed television for the decline of quality filmmaking. "I think there are still good people who want to do good work and think that's all that matters," she said, "and I think unfortunately in television sometimes they want to do good work, but a lot of the time they're doing terrible work and I think that has affected movie making badly. ... It's all about ratings now and everything. It should be about the work, and it's not." As for herself, she said, "what [appearing in films] means to me mostly is staying alive. I have too much energy to stop working. I don't believe in retirement. I love working."

14/02/2007