Foundas Leaving Film Society of Lincoln Center to Write For Village Voice

Scott Foundas, who three years ago left the world of cinema criticism to join the programming team at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, is recrossing the border between critics and cultural arbiters. On Wednesday, Voice Media Group, which owns several alternative newspapers including The Village Voice and LA Weekly, said that Mr. Foundas had been hired as the principal film writer at The Voice, where his reviews and features will be appear in the print publications and online platforms owned by the company.

“I guess I could quote the old Joni Mitchell line, ‘You don't know what you've got till it's gone,'” Mr. Foundas said in a telephone interview. “I'd be lying if I didn't say that I had missed my writing a bit over the last three years.” Pointing to formidable film critics who have previously held this post at The Voice, including Andrew Sarris and J. Hoberman, Mr. Foundas said, “When this offer presented itself, it was too good to refuse, to paraphra se another famous line.”

Mr. Foundas was the film editor and chief film critic for LA Weekly when he was hired in November of 2009 as the Film Society's associate program director. In recent years he has worked with Richard Peña, the program director, to select movies and organize events including the New York Film Festival. Mr. Peña is departing at the end of the year, and is to be succeeded by Kent Jones, who will be director of programming for the festival, and Robert Koehler, who will be director of programming, year round.

The announcement comes at a time when The Voice and its parent company have come under increasing criticism for shedding brand-name contributors and diluting the unique sensibilities of individual publications amid consolidation in the alternative-newspaper marketplace. Last month, The Voice lost its most recent editor in chief, Tony Ortega.

Mr. Foundas, whose appointment at The Voice will be effective Dec. 3, said he was more op timistic about his position and these publications.

“People have been sounding the death knell for film criticism specifically, or print journalism in general, since I was first hired by the LA Weekly back in 2003,” Mr. Foundas said. “And I remember a critic friend of mine in L.A. saying to me, ‘You're going to be the one who turns out the lights,' meaning on film criticism. Here we are a decade later, and not only are The Weekly and The Voice still around, but I would say there's very strong evidence that quality film criticism is alive and well.”