I love to watch your reviews because of this kind of honesty. I respect someone who can admit this kind of thing (both the narcissism and the subjective opinion). However, I don't think I entirely agree with this.
I do agree with many of the points made here, not just yours, but the ones made against critics as a whole. I know that sounds like a strange contradiction. But the problem is that I don't think the criticisms are wrong: they're just not articulated well. When I see people talk about how critics are elite, I know that I share their opinion, but not their word choice. As you said, you should be elite, you should be well informed and educated about the art-form. But, while the issue is similar to elitism, your elitism isn't the real issue.
The disconnect I see between audience and critics is actually well formed by your own article and comes in two parts.
The first is that you state giving your opinion to the audience is tangential to your actual job. This is a pretty common among critics. But the problem is, without that audience, your job wouldn't exist. Holding the industry to a higher standard isn't what you're actually being employed to do. You're being employed to give an opinion to the audience. This is a minor problem because I do believe you're also meant to hold the industry to a higher standard. But if holding the industry accountable were the primary goal here... no one would be employing you. The reason why this matters is because it helps frame point #2.
At times, the need for critics to find something original trumps the need for them to find something -good-. If critics held themselves to the standard of helping the audience wade through the crap to find good movies (as someone who was employed to do that) then I don't think anyone rational would have an issue (there's always irrational people, but they're not the ones I'm talking about). However, sometimes the need for originality (as someone holding the industry accountable) overrides that need for something good. I'm not talking about dismissing a movie because of a lack of originality, those are obviously cheap cash-ins (Pirates, Hangover). Negativity towards bad movies that aren't original isn't the thing that bothers me, positivity towards bad movies that ARE original does.
Critics sometimes recommend very original movies...even if they're bad.
The Tree of Life is a good example. I haven't seen it yet, so I reserve my judgment. But what I do know is that I've heard at least two critics this week say that they COULD NOT recommend this movie as a "good" movie. But in the end they still think everyone should see it. They did not like the movie but they felt it was necessary that everyone watch it anyway. This is the disconnect that causes audiences to question whether the critics are being honest players in the forum of opinion. How can they possibly recommend something they did not actually like? Yes, it's universally called "pretty" but many "pretty" movies can be god awful (summer blockbusters with amazing special effects). So when they're recommending it, they're not recommending it because it's artful (I hear it is) or because it's good (they didn't think so) but because it's original. That's what happens when you hold industry accountability over audience.
To be fair, I think you're one of the few critics that don't do this on a regular basis. Your opinions have always been based in whether or not a movie was crap and you've been honest with people about why. Sometimes a boring movie is just a boring movie and you've always pointed that out. But since you are a critic, you're left to answer for the misdeeds of others in your profession and, when you really think about it, you can't escape the fact that some people recommend crap because it's very original crap.
I do agree with many of the points made here, not just yours, but the ones made against critics as a whole. I know that sounds like a strange contradiction. But the problem is that I don't think the criticisms are wrong: they're just not articulated well. When I see people talk about how critics are elite, I know that I share their opinion, but not their word choice. As you said, you should be elite, you should be well informed and educated about the art-form. But, while the issue is similar to elitism, your elitism isn't the real issue.
The disconnect I see between audience and critics is actually well formed by your own article and comes in two parts.
The first is that you state giving your opinion to the audience is tangential to your actual job. This is a pretty common among critics. But the problem is, without that audience, your job wouldn't exist. Holding the industry to a higher standard isn't what you're actually being employed to do. You're being employed to give an opinion to the audience. This is a minor problem because I do believe you're also meant to hold the industry to a higher standard. But if holding the industry accountable were the primary goal here... no one would be employing you. The reason why this matters is because it helps frame point #2.
At times, the need for critics to find something original trumps the need for them to find something -good-. If critics held themselves to the standard of helping the audience wade through the crap to find good movies (as someone who was employed to do that) then I don't think anyone rational would have an issue (there's always irrational people, but they're not the ones I'm talking about). However, sometimes the need for originality (as someone holding the industry accountable) overrides that need for something good. I'm not talking about dismissing a movie because of a lack of originality, those are obviously cheap cash-ins (Pirates, Hangover). Negativity towards bad movies that aren't original isn't the thing that bothers me, positivity towards bad movies that ARE original does.
Critics sometimes recommend very original movies...even if they're bad.
The Tree of Life is a good example. I haven't seen it yet, so I reserve my judgment. But what I do know is that I've heard at least two critics this week say that they COULD NOT recommend this movie as a "good" movie. But in the end they still think everyone should see it. They did not like the movie but they felt it was necessary that everyone watch it anyway. This is the disconnect that causes audiences to question whether the critics are being honest players in the forum of opinion. How can they possibly recommend something they did not actually like? Yes, it's universally called "pretty" but many "pretty" movies can be god awful (summer blockbusters with amazing special effects). So when they're recommending it, they're not recommending it because it's artful (I hear it is) or because it's good (they didn't think so) but because it's original. That's what happens when you hold industry accountability over audience.
To be fair, I think you're one of the few critics that don't do this on a regular basis. Your opinions have always been based in whether or not a movie was crap and you've been honest with people about why. Sometimes a boring movie is just a boring movie and you've always pointed that out. But since you are a critic, you're left to answer for the misdeeds of others in your profession and, when you really think about it, you can't escape the fact that some people recommend crap because it's very original crap.
