Why do the critics rage?

In today's New York Times, the movie critic A. O. Scott takes a surprisingly touching look at "the discrepancy between what critics think and how the public behaves". What can it possibly mean to say that a film like Pirates of the Caribbean 2 is a "bad" movie (as most professional movie critics do) when it just had the biggest opening weekend ever? Isn't the box office the only proper place to judge the quality of popular entertainment? What are critics for, exactly? He writes:

The obvious answer is that art, or at least the kind of pleasure, wonder and surprise we associate with art, often pops out of commerce, and we want to be around to celebrate when it does and to complain when it doesn’t. But the deeper answer is that our love of movies is sometimes expressed as a mistrust of the people who make and sell them, and even of the people who see them. We take entertainment very seriously, which is to say that we don’t go to the movies for fun. Or for money. We do it for you.

Does that ring a bell? Do you remember the first time you went home after you started working in advertising and your aunt said, "You're in advertising! Did you do that nice ad where the girl finds her kitten and then has a hot bowl of soup?" You couldn't help thinking, "Thank god, no", but then couldn't shake the feeling that if your aunt liked it and remembered it, who were you to say it was crap? Scott stops just short of answering this question for me. I would have added one more paragraph:

There is an unavoidably elitist quality to being a critic that comes from having seen thousands of movies. That's a lot more than most people. So when I talk about a "good" movie, I mean one that stands above most of the many others I've seen rather than one that will be only an enjoyable way to spend a Friday evening . I'm all for enjoying Friday evening, but I'm really thinking about what I believe you will find interesting, worth thinking about after you leave the theater and maybe, hopefully, even years from now. 

Comments

[Carol]

Heavens, does anyone decide what film to go to based on what the New York Times says these days? Hollywood Reporter and Variety are more valuable resources.

I chose based on the artists involved, what I know of the story, a bit of buzz picked up on the internet and, this is sad, what the screen and sound will be like. There aren't that many good cinemas in London.

Mass market audiences are a noisy, annoying lot, I've nigh on given up going to opening weekends in Leicester Square these days.

[Jeffre Jackson]

I saw Spiderman 2 in Leicester Square. It wasn't really like watching a movie. The audience was so vocal, it was more like watching television in a really big living room. But it was air-conditioned.

In general, I pick movies based on story and subject, though I do also look at reviews. Although now that I think of it, I hardly ever look at current reviews because I hardly ever go to current movies anymore. I usually find things in books or on genre websites or just wandering around imdb, which means that almost all of my movie watching is on DVD.

[josh]

It also begs the question of why people go to movies in the first place. Or better, the many reasons why they go. If you reduce the act of movie criticism to a simple device, they exist to tell us whether a movie is good or bad. But when we go to the movies, concern about whether the film is good or bad is very far down our list of criteria (almost at the very tip of the purchase funnel). I think we're more concerned with how we feel (am I in the mood for a comedy? drama?), what we might want to experience and learn (a documentary about penguins? a poignant foreign piece?), whether we're participating in popular culture (i feel compelled to see the big blockbuster so I can be part of the experience), etc etc. That's why many critics can seem so disconnected and effete...they only touch upon a small reason why we care about the movies.

[Jeffre Jackson]

I think most critics would agree that a simple bad/good assessment isn't useful, and so they say contextual things like "This is a good movie for a summer afternoon" or "If you're in the mood to think hard about the Middle East situation".

But they're also there to act as a filter. You can pick whichever filter works best for you, but that filter has to be consistent or it's of no use. So while we're free to say, "Well, this is good for me right now because I'm in the mood for something about penguins", a critic isn't. Maybe they're kind of doomed to be seen as effete by at least some people some of the time.

[Paul Wilson]

Isn't cinema going also a social experience? Not only is there a huge amount of negotiation involved in selecting a film to see but the audience reaction is part of the excitement and the entertainment.

Sharing people's emotions is part of the experience that makes going to the cinema different that just watching a film at home on TV. Sometimes a well hone citical mind misses these more basic pleasures.

[jeffre]

It certainly is. And I think most critics know that, but see their job as something other than reflecting all aspects of the popular cinema going experience.

[Nicholai]

somewhat late to the party here... but still:

I think your point about the 'elitist' difference in standards of reference - here, number of movies seen - is quite important.

Having done literary criticism, I've found that what sometimes comes off as rather unpleasant snobbishness - "you might like this, but I know a lot more than you about it and must manifest that difference by telling you what you should think" - often comes from a rather naive and genuine love for one's field.
In the extremely commercial novel, I recognize certain elements that I find disgustingly manipulative, and I feel strangely compelled to warn people about it. Even though I know it's in vain and they'll think less of me for doing so...

Don't you find this to be true in advertising? When you see a really cheap trick being used - and people buying into it - don't you feel that sort of professional pride, a need somehow to stick it to crappy/lazy copywriters - to tell people how they're being had?

[Jeffre Jackson]

Yes, exactly. That's what I think Scott means when he writes that his love of the movies is what drives his criticism, especially in those cases where his judgement seems most perversely out of step with the market.

[Jeffre Jackson]

Here's another commentary on Scott's article from a video gamer's point of view:
http://www.gamegirladvance.com/archives/2006/07/20/the_role_of_the_critic.html

I agree with some of the comments that she misunderstands what Scott is saying, but it's interesting to see how the object of criticism (games vs movies) affects interpretation of the critic's role.

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