DALLAS — Dallas’ Texas Theatre rolled out the red carpet on Thursday for “The Last Critic.”

The documentary follows Robert Christgau, the self-proclaimed “Dean of American Rock Critics,” that has been writing about music since the late 1960s for Esquire and The Village Voice. Christgau, who is in early 80s, is still writing today.

“The Last Critic” premiered earlier this spring at Austin’s South by Southwest Film & TV Festival, where it picked up the special jury prize for documentary feature. The film then played a little closer to home at the Oak Cliff Film Festival in July and won Best Documentary Feature.

A few weeks ago, the Dallas Film Commission selected the documentary for its Screen Dallas program, which awards the film with a week-long theatrical release that qualifies it for Academy Award consideration.

The program also includes a free red carpet screening, which was held on Thursday evening.

“I mean, it was unthinkable,” “Last Critic” director Matty Wishnow told the Star-Telegram on the carpet. “If you talked to me a month ago, this was not on my bingo card.”

‘The Last Critic’ screens in Dallas

Wishnow was joined at the screening by his “Last Critic” producers Ben Wu, Paul Lovelace and Joe Levy.

The crew walked the red carpet and spoke with several media members about the film, which will screen multiple times a day from Sept. 11-17 at Studio Movie Grill Spring Valley.

Making the film made Wishnow rethink what the function of a critic is, especially in how Christgau describes what the two core totems of criticism are.

“[Christgau] says, ‘You have to know what you like, and you have to be able to explain why you like it, no matter how deplorable that rationale is,’” Wishnow said. “I wouldn’t say that I rethought the role of art, but I definitely wrestled with and got a much deeper understanding about what it means to be a critic and what the value of a music critic is.”

The Screen Dallas committee chose “The Last Critic” because they thought it had the best chance to be shortlisted for an Academy Award, Dallas film commissioner Katie Schuck said.

Furthermore, Schuck said Christgau is a fascinating subject, and the film is well-shot and well-edited. Plus, every documentary that screens at a Dallas-area film festival is automatically considered for the Screen Dallas grand prize.

“This just makes sense for everybody,” Schuck said.

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“The Last Critic” screens Sept. 11-17 at Studio Movie Grill Spring Valley.

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