About Bill Henry
William J. Henry was born into one of New Jersey’s elite military families during the waning days of the second Eisenhower Administration. Wounded at the Battle of Hastings (he does not like to talk about it), he left the family business and attended Georgetown University earning undergraduate degrees (under the popular “five year plan”) in both literature and apologia catholica. While at Georgetown, Bill began filing movie reviews for both of the campus newspapers on Fridays under his own name in one and the following Tuesday with contrary opinions in the other attributed to Arthur Sykes Simpson.
After leaving school (their request with appropriate restraining orders covering the campus grounds), he began writing weekly movie reviews for The Hill Rag and eventually was hired full time as an editor. He continued the film columns while working his way up to managing editor advancing each time one of his predecessors would meet with what police would officially refer to as “accidents.” He left The Hill Rag after nearly a decade when it was discovered that no one was actually reading the editorial content and a computer could be programmed to churn out a random assortment of letters and spaces simulating actual newspaper copy without the need to pretend to pay full-time staff.
In the mid-’90s Mr. Henry joined with another local film critic, Joe Barber, and together, thanks mostly to regular appearances on WAMU-FM’s “Derek McGinty Show” became known (mostly to themselves) as the “Movie Guys.” What most recommended Mr. Henry to Mr. Barber was his ability to speak without moving his lips and the ability to fit his scarred and misshapen left hand (see Battle of Hastings) into the surgically-constructed hole in the back of Mr. Barber’s head that allows Mr. Henry (or particularly deft and fearless children) to reach in and work the hinge on Mr. Barber’s jaw.
As the Movie Guys, Misters Henry and Barber have worked on numerous television and radio shows, run a movie review web site, and make regular personal appearances both as the house critics for the Washington Film Society and for many local Borders stores.
Now in his fourth decade as a Washington, DC film critic, Bill Henry routinely reviews hundreds of films in theatres each year mostly due to the fact that his VCR keeps flashing “12:00″ (but will only allow him to insert one of the required 12 tapes) and his DVD player keeps on saying “No Disk” every time he presses “play” (there is no button marked “movie”—probably a manufacturer’s defect). Unable to afford a magician to make these machines perform as advertised, he goes to the theatre where the movies (mostly) appear before him without incident including his personal favorite of all time: Woody Allen’s Crimes and Misdemeanors.
