zlacker

Putting experience and expertise about a matter of taste on a pedestal is nonsense.

I don't share many values with movie critics. Here's an spicy example that will mark me as a philistine forever.

I think Princess Mononoke was an awful film with a navel gazing director who gets treated far too kindly because of a childish desire for "whimsy". Everytime I see a Ghibli pusher here, I laugh.

No movie critic will engage with such a perspective (because it is "wrong", the movie is "powerful", the art is "beautiful" and the characters are "strong" — every one of which is literally a matter of interpretation). Depending on critics is depending on people who have to satisfy their local equivalent of the Reddit front page. Why would you trust them except to know the current rightthink?

It's not the same as a scientist describing climate change or an engineer explaining the loads on a bridge.

>>jbm+(OP)
Critics underrate movies too.

Freddy Got Fingered, the movie I personally found funniest, is currently at 11% on Rotten Tomatoes. It's full of creative and quotable scenes, and never resorts to tired cliches (despite its genre there is no toilet humor). Penalizing a gross-out comedy for being "gross" is a clear failure of criticism. Even Roger Ebert, who usually judged movies by the standards of the genre, made this mistake.

Batman v Superman, the superhero movie I personally found most engaging, is at 29%. It's one of the few movies in the genre that feels like it has any ambition to be serious art. It takes the characters seriously, without the constant jokes the Marvel movies use to reassure the audience that they're not really comic book nerds. Critics considered this a reason to rate it poorly.

>>jbm+(OP)
What were your issues with Princess Mononoke?

>>mrob+xn
I saw a recent reappraisal of Freddy Got Fingered by Red Letter Media* that was very interesting; apparently it was also meant as a cash grab by studio execs, and Tom Green decided to make the weirdest movie he could possibly make.

While I don't personally like the "gross-out" style of movie, the the discussion of the movie exposed a lot of nuance behind the movie that I didn't know. The difference between the conversation and the original "professional reviews" really was telling; I much prefer the former to the later.

*: I am aware of the contradiction; in my defense, I mostly care about their comments about movie structure.

>>jbm+(OP)
Princess Mononoke just has a slow gradual buildup. It builds the world and plays with plot tension and progression in interesting ways. Then saves the climax for the end of the film, with an after scene that gives a sense of finality.

It's easily one of my favourite films for these reasons.