God forbid people don’t like your movie Taika.
For some movies, there is a pretty significant difference between critic and audience scores. This is one of them it seems.
From my experience many critics can be pretty far off the mark. And it seems to almost always be whether the movie was like they expected it to be, not whether it’s a good movie.
A lot of John Carpenter’s work was panned by critics. John Carpenter. For fucks sake. They live, big trouble etc. Undisputed classics now. Even if they aren’t for everyone.
I’ve always found highly rated films by critics less enjoyable. Often the lower they rated it the better I liked it. It was rare when our opinions aligned.
Yup. The NYT review for They Live:
“Since Mr. Carpenter seems to be trying to make a real point here, the flatness of They Live is doubly disappointing. So is its crazy inconsistency, since the film stops trying to abide even by its own game plan after a while.”
flat? bitch, this movie has the most brutal fist fight ever filmed as a side show, doubly disappointing? what fucking movie did you see?
Is the movie like a NYT bestseller with positive critical reviews all over it, or is it something people will actually enjoy?
To an extent, for sure. A lot of it comes down to the fact that they are looking for art as they define it in their field. Not strictly entertainment. Judging things on a vastly different criteria than that of your average movie watcher.
But I wouldn’t doubt that there was some bias or completely gamed nature. Like the New York Times bestseller’s list. That shit is gamed to hell and back. Utterly meaningless at this point.
A lot of it comes down to the fact that they are looking for art as they define it in their field.
Yeah this seems to be what a lot of critics do. And it’s just not really helpful to determine whether you might like a movie.
Critics are always going to hate the Fast and Furious franchise. And objectively they’re not “good” movies by metrics like industry awards and social commentary. But sometimes you just wanna watch some cars go fast, explosions, and family. And reviews need to take that into account, which a lot of critics seem to ignore. In the immortal words of Seth from Superbad, “Well I’m sorry Evan, that the Coen Brothers don’t direct the porn that I watch.”
Ok I did enjoy “They Live” but let’s not act like it’s above criticism. The first half is great, the fight scene is amazing. It makes a great point about propaganda.
But the second half of it is a different, not as good, movie. The ending is pretty forgettable.
I still recommend it to people, but it’s certainly got flaws.
This also happens when a director has a following which is hyper focused on loving everything they do no matter what.
Yes. All review aggregators are less than useless. Listen to individual voices you trust to get meaningful perspectives.
Review aggregation is for the intellectually lazy that only want to like what the majority already likes. They don’t want to be challenged in any way.
Critics tend to place more weight on technical things, like shot composition, than audiences do. With splits like this the movie is usually enjoyable, but also have some bafflingly terrible decisions in there that will take one of your friends totally out of the movie that your other friends won’t even notice.
Now show the Rotten Tomatoes page for Rise of Skywalker.
It sounds like people thought it was ok but critics didn’t
and another thing: im not mad. please dont put in the newspaper that i got mad.
Taika would like you to not criticize him. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Ah, the relationship between an artist and a critic…
Dear Mr Trussington Howell-Foxforthy,
Thank you for returning my manuscript and your enclosed nasty niminy-piminy little note. I am afraid your letter is most unsuitable for me at the present time as I’ve just spent the entire weekend writing the novel that you have summarily rejected. I can only assume that it is company policy to reject all manuscripts not submitted in 10-ft high Braille. And yes, I am aware, that it is traditionally bad form to respond to any kind of criticism or rejection. But in this, as with all else, I am an innovator. Therefore I may freely address you as pissmidget.
Still, there is time for you to change your views, and I think you will when we meet. And meet we most assuredly will, when I suck out your eyes and use them as stoppers for my ears to muffle the screams you’ll make as I headbutt you into a fine paste. I do hope you will not be disheartened by your sudden, violent death.
Yours Faithfully, Bernard Black
Everyone… Everyone agreed he was right to kill the publisher. And to do it with a flugelhorn was a stroke of genius. “Bernard!” they said. No, Brendan, Brendan, “Brendan” they said. “Congratulations! Here, have this basket of stuff and come and stay for the weekend!”
Any ratings system for art is stupid, from simple star ratings to book-length reviews from professional critics. I use CSS tweaks in Stylus and uBlock Origin to hide ratings and reviews for everything on IMDb and Steam (and many other places), and after watching a film or playing a game and then going to the ratings, I’m almost always shocked at how low they are compared to my own experiences with them. It’s a very rare occasion when I’m like “well, I wasted 90 minutes watching that piece of shit”. Going into a film with poor ratings ringing in your ears is only going to ensure you dislike it, because you’re gonna completely switch off your own benefit-of-the-doubt and want to have your views line up with the consensus and to edit your experience in real-time. This is robbing you of everything a film offers.
I’ve been doing the CSS thing for years and have never looked back. It’s improved my movie and game experiences tenfold and made me a marginally happier person in general. Try it, you lose literally nothing but gain so, so much.
How do you choose what to watch then? There’s literal thousands of movies released every year, to me it’s already hard to choose as is. I usually just check the ratings curve to make sure the movie wasn’t review bombed (or the opposite).
Not the commenter but…recommendations is the way.
I’m more of a music guy nowadays and follow several people with overlapping tastes who post what they like. Beats an algo any day
I like the cut of your jib, me hearty.
Dude always looks and sounds like he’s been on a binge of drugs I can’t afford.
I will be calling all of my critics this from now on
