Fan Rant: Richard Corliss Wants to Know If Film Critics Matter
Filed under: Awards, Oscar Watch, Fan Rant
As the end of yet another movie cycle draws to a close and all our attentions are focused on which flicks are "Oscar-worthy," we get an article from Time Magazine's Richard Corliss that ponders the question: What are film critics thinking? The piece, entitled (flatteringly enough) "Do Film Critics Know Anything?", wonders if there's an actual point to all this year-end glad-handing in which all the film critics and award-giving bodies fall all over each other to tell you how this arthouse film (that made $156,349) is better than this Lithuanian documentary about the wicker industry.Here's a good section: "You will be forgiven if, like my friends at TIME, you are scratching your head and feigning interest, hoping I'll get quickly to the sexy stuff, like best non-fiction feature (the Iraq docs No End in Sight and Body of War and Michael Moore's Sicko) and distinguished achievement in production design (Jack Fisk, There Will Be Blood, L.A.) . Gee, you're wondering, did The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, the French story of a man totally immobilized by a stroke, beat out the German spy drama The Lives of Others? (Three out of five critics groups say yes.) If you're getting restless, movie lovers, too bad. You'll be hearing the same obscure names at the Golden Globes and on Oscar night." (Full article here.)
After reading through the article twice (and with all due respect to Mr. Corliss, an accomplished film critic if ever there was one), my response is this: Must everything be whittled down to the lowest common denominator? Have even the words "best" and "finest" been annexed by the committee that decides which DVDs get the biggest Walmart shelf? Obviously, "film critic" is a pretty excellent job, all things considered. But let the professional movie-watchers have their brief moment to spout off, praise some obscurities, and make their lists. If we're asked to muddle through eleven months of remakes, sequels, video game flicks, comic book movies, mindless action explosions, crotch-centric teen comedies ... why wouldn't you want a month in which OTHER movies earn the spotlight?
So if Sally Secretary has never heard of Persepolis or No Country for Old Men or The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, and the critics' year-end group-stroke for quality filmmaking actually turns her on to something more challenging than, say, Hairspray -- then what's the problem? Corliss closes his piece thusly: "...critics fighting over which hardly seen movie they want to call the best of the year." Hmph. Perhaps Mr. Corliss would like the Academy to institute something called Oscars 2, and everyone can vote in on how Night at the Museum is so much better than Meet the Fockers. (I call copyright on that idea!) I have no idea how "hardly seen" my favorite film of the year will be; it doesn't come out for a few weeks. Unfortunately for my reputation as a useful film critic, the film happens to be in Spanish. Darn.
So to offer just one lowly film critic's response to the query posed in the article's title: Yeah, film critics know a lot. Like how if Hollywood concentrated on making better movies, you'd see a lot more "popular" fare on a lot more nomination lists.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
12-12-2007 @ 1:55PM
ahkaufman said...
Is movie watching now like wine tasting? The awards go to the obscure, refined, "insider" labels (movies) which you only hear about if you read magazines (or ask your sommelier), but anyone can and usually goes down to the local liquor store for some crowd pleasing two buck chuck and then wonder why it's not voted best of the year. I guess that would make cinephiles, film geeks, and film critics the equivalents to the wine snob. So who cares if you chose to wax poetic as you smell the bouquet of your favorite art-house fair? I'll either read about it or I won't. The funny and perhaps hurtful thing is that the Academy Awards was always the most prestigious critics award anyway, until it became the Super Bowl or the All Star game of movies.
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12-12-2007 @ 2:24PM
David Earl said...
Christ, this is the worst kind of parochialism - "I haven't heard of this film, so it must be rubbish. Even worse, it's in a foreign language!" I'm actually kind of horrified at the films that a writer for Time is calling obscure. I'm in the UK, and we had adverts for The Lives of Others all over public transport earlier this year. Why belittle a film just because its US distributors couldn't get it to play in Idaho? Should the Oscars go to Pirates of the Caribbean because that opened on 4000 screens and everybody knows who Jack Sparrow is?
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12-13-2007 @ 12:44PM
Joe Mac said...
Awards are an irrelevance at best, and no measure of quality, regardless of whats being judged, or by whom.
But I also think its time for a wake-up call. If you remove Western critics from the audience of that movie about teenage abortions in back street Tangier, or the struggles of a Kazakstani goat wrangler with TB, then you'd be left with the director's mum and his personal glee club applauding. These movies thrive on elitism, not actual artistic value, (which, in any case, is no greater than an episode of The Sopranos or The Shield, and far less entertaining).
The difficulty with movies as "art" is the astonishing self indulgence involved in spending relatively vast sums on a director's "vision", which is wilfully exclusive of mainstream audiences. (Mostly pretentious and tedious output, lets be honest).
At least an easel, palette and a selection of oil paints is affordable, even for a struggling painter - and more uniquely the product of one sensibility, not a crew's.
And yes, there ARE too many mindless sequels and product movies out there, which audiences suffer through just like reviewers. but if critics cant connect - or aren't prepared to connect - with their readers, then who are they actually writing for?
At least, thats what we audience members are wondering more and more.
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12-13-2007 @ 9:51PM
Gary said...
So i was just about to come on here and say that in my humble opinion Richard Corliss is talking crap. But then I read Joe mac's comments and one line struck me "...if critics cant connect - or aren't prepared to connect - with their readers, then who are they actually writing for?"
I guess that needs some thought as at first glance he is 100% correct, I guess that in some way critics should be reviewing for their readers/listeners. But we need to decide what should be the end result of a film review, Take Mr average-hollywood-cool-aid-drinker who loves Michael Bay films and whatever has the most explosions and girls bottoms at the time. If he picks up his media of choice for a movie review and because his reviewer is one his side is only told that the latest hollywood sequel is right up his street he will go and watch it. Michael Bay will get richer, the lazy Hollywood studio will get richer and they will then go an make another 2 movies with the same plot, actions sequences and girls bottom. How does that help anyone?
What a movie critic should be saying to this guy is "sure there is "Mean Cops on Cocaine part 7" if you really want to see it, but hey get your arse down to the cinema and check out "No Country For Old Men" it's got guns in it. Surely that should be the first role of a movie critic?
By Definition a movie critic must be a film fan, like most if not all people who actually read this blog (why else would we be here?). As film fans we want people like the Coen Brothers making more money for their movies, we want them to make more movies and raise the cash easier. We want a new generation of filmmakers to grow up wanting to make great films and knowing that their is a market for them. The critics have a big role to play in this and yes Richard Corliss is talking crap, "No Country" or "There Will be Blood" has to win the major Oscars because they represent the best of this years movies. (okay of course i have not seen There will be Blood yet so going out on a limb here and trusting the opinions of the people who have) And if the best movies do not win the prizes then the Oscars are even more worthless than they are now.
When should the popular vote count for anything? People go and see the movies they are told to watch by the studios. Spend $30 million on marketing and the general public would pay to watch a film of me taking a dump. It's sad, maybe condescending but is true. The Oscars would just turn into a competition to see who has the best marketing budget and strategy.
Besides to cap of a long post i do have some bad news for Richard Corliss and his peers. Most of what i have written is academic anyway, most people do not read movie reviews. The people that do tend to be film fans anyway and the majority go and watch "Mean Cops on Cocaine 7" without reading a single review anyway. They watch it because it is splattered over every wall/bus/commercial/website etc.. not because there was an article in Time Magazine. Your opinions are nowhere near as important as you seem to think they are.
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