efilmcritic Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Cinematical Seven: Pieces of Advice for Critics to Come
Filed under: Cinematical Seven », Columns »
"I believe that children are our future
(Thank you)
Teach them well and let them lead the way..."
-Randy Watson (Eddie Murphy), Coming to America
It might be presumptuous for someone as young as I am to offer up words of wisdom to any fledgling film critics out there, but in an age where print critics are only dwindling in number and online reviewers are subjected to constantly shifting standards of the industry, the prospect of constructive advice is my effort to provide something that wasn't necessarily there when I started in the field. Just because anyone can start their own review site doesn't mean that they should, but hopefully, some of the following tips will help encourage those of you still determined to give this a go to hold yourself and your work to a higher standard.
eFilmCritic's Critic Quote Whores of 2007
Filed under: Critical Thought », Lists »
Our own Scott Weinberg recently told you about the canning of quote whore Pete Hammond from the pages of Maxim Magazine, and brought you many of Hammond's incredible quotes, culled all year long by the indefatigable Erik Childress at efilmcritic.com. Now Childress has announced his annual Criticwatch "Whores of the Year" list, saving his "2007 Michael Medved Bag of Douche Memorial Award" for Hammond. Jeffrey Lyons and Earl Dittman made the top ten this year, along with young E! Online critic Ben Lyons -- son of Jeffrey -- for calling I Am Legend "one of the greatest films ever made." Says Childress: "If he were 12 and had only seen 50 movies in his lifetime it would STILL be one of the dumbest god damn statements ever made by a human being named Lyons." Apparently Childress has taken on the superhuman effort of combing through every blurb on every movie ad for the entire year and cataloging them in such a way as to reveal their hidden hypocrisies. How many films in 2007 were called "masterpiece"? At least 20, and that's including Dittman's assessment of Halloween. Even more films were called "spellbinding" and "a must-see!" I personally escaped this year, but several of my critic friends did not. Even Cinematical's James Rocchi is mentioned, for having used the phrase "raw sexuality and fever-pitched emotion" in his review of Red Road. A big thanks to Erik for keeping score.
The SXSW Filmmakers: Getting to Know You, Getting to Know All About You
Filed under: Comedy », Documentary », Drama », Foreign Language », Gay & Lesbian », Horror », Independent », SXSW », Festival Reports », Cinematical Indie »
eFilmCritic is getting a jump on SXSW -- the writers there, including our own Scott Weinberg, are already busy doing their annual SXSW Filmmaker Interviews. You can get a big jump on SXSW, which runs March 9-17 in Austin, Texas, by checking out the slew of stellar interviews they've already posted, including Elvis and Annabelle director Will Geiger, Audience of One director Michael Jacobs, Who Loves the Sun director Matthew Bissonnette, and Trigger Man director Ti West.Each filmmaker gets emailed the same 22 questions -- queries like, "Describe your movie using the smallest number of words possible," and "What films and filmmakers have acted as your inspirations, be they a lifelong love or a very specific scene composition?" And then there's my personal fave, "Who's an actor you'd kill a small dog to work with? (Don't worry; nobody would know.)"
Also, be sure to check out the full SXSW schedule, and let us know which films you're most interested in seeing us review and which filmmakers you most want us to get up-close-and-personal with. We're going to have a crew of three -- Scott Weinberg, James Rocchi, and Jette Kernion -- covering SXSW for you from top-to-bottom, so speak and you shall be heard.
[ via Matt Dentler's Blog ]
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