RIP Ann Hornaday, a Newspaper Film Critic Survivor — SkimNews
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- Ann Hornaday died Monday at age 66 from brain cancer after a 23-year run as the Washington Post's film critic, a tenure that made her a 2008 Pulitzer Prize finalist for her reviews and essays.
- Her career arc traced the decline of the daily-newspaper film beat: she was the Austin American-Statesman's critic from 1995 to 1997, then moved to the Baltimore Sun, before joining the Post in 2002; she took a buyout in 2025, after which many of her peers had already shifted to Substacks or freelance work.
- Before her journalism career, Hornaday spent two years as personal assistant to Gloria Steinem at Ms. Magazine in New York, and she graduated from Smith College in 1982 with a government degree.
- She published "Talking Pictures: How to Watch Movies" in 2017, a readable collection of conversations with filmmakers including Kenneth Lonergan, Robert Altman, Jack Lemmon, and Spike Lee.
- Shortly before her death, Hornaday completed a behind-the-scenes book on the making of Alan J. Pakula's 1976 "All the President's Men," which she called a "masterpiece" — the book is tentatively scheduled for release in 2028.
- She is survived by her husband of 26 years Lawrence Greenia, their daughter Victoria Greenia, stepdaughter Leila Greenia, and brother William Hornaday III.
Why it matters: Hornaday's exit by buyout, followed by her death just months later, crystallizes a generational shift in American cultural criticism: the full-time newspaper film beat that once anchored awards-season conversation is being replaced by freelance Substack writers, leaving readers with fewer institutional voices shaping how major films are received. Her posthumous 2028 book on 'All the President's Men' will arrive without its author to tour it.
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