It’s a sad day for film buffs as legendary critic, Roger Ebert, has passed away at the age of 70. Only yesterday Ebert had announced that his cancer had returned and he would be taking time off to treat it. Ebert leaves behind a legacy that includes being touted as the “most powerful pundit in America”, not to mention his popular film criticism television series, Siskel & Ebert.
Ebert was born and raised in Urbana, Illinois, where his interest in film and in journalism merged at an early age. He attended the University of Chicago and in 1967 started professionally reviewing films for the Chicago Sun-Times. In 1975, he and Chicago Tribune film critic Gene Siskel started a local weekly film review show called Sneak Previews that would later become the nationally syndicated Siskel & Ebert:
