Now I'm just gonna throw my two cents in here...
No offense to anyone here because you know I love you all but.....granted critics are often times good judges in the film department hence the fact that they are critics...
But they aren't always right....and sometimes the best films get little critical appraise...so go see the film and judge for yourselves! You never know what your missin unless you actually see it...and if you don't like it then that is great - thats your opinion and I respect that....but you can't necessarily judge a film by its critical success....JMO
Ok so there it is....
On the role of the press and our film criticism profession... In our film critics prof. association, and it's one of the big ones with year-end voting and awards reported nationally, there's much discussion about this topic and my thought is as follows. The role of the film critic is to objectively look at the film and ask these questions:
1. What did the director try to achieve?
2. How well did he achieve this end?
Whether or not it was worth doing is a moot point.
That is all there is, folks. And though we'd like to think that subjectivity has a great deal to do with it, it really shouldn't be any criteria for a legitimate film critic when evaluating whether or not a film "works." One of the best barometers you can employ is to separate personal taste from whether or not a work of art succeeds on its own terms. Many times, whether or not we "like" something has little to do with how "good" it is.
When you can say, "I understand that this film is very good and qualifies as a success. However I personally didn't like it because...," then you know you're there in terms of your ability to remove yourself from your evaluation and talk objectively about the merit of the work. If you are worth your weight as a critic, you have to get outside yourself when it comes to subjects, genres, likes and dislikes.
In the world of critics--mainly men who spend days together in a small room in the dark, talking of nothing much more than celluloid, and rarely about the outside world--there are those who begin with different perspectives as the credits roll for each film. Perspective number one is the critic who is embittered and begins with a slightly negative stance the film must then overcome, as if it's to win him over. Perspective number two is the critic who genuinely loves film and begins with a glass half full take. And within the group there are TV journalists, entertainment "reporters," print, online, daily, weekly, cable, network, etc. So there are many different evaluations happening and to different ends.
Although, subjectively I wanted to love this one because anything that incites Christians to wave signs in the air and hold special services to debunk is A-OK in my book.... LOL
rt
