Are negative reviews mostly by generally unhappy people these days?

It's only ridiculous when taken as an absolute.



However, there are a lot of things we select on the basis of the collective experience of others.



If you have ever used YELP or similar services you have put on your glasses, looked something up, and made a judgment based on the consensus testimony of average Joes.



If you have ever listened to a band because of popular buzz, you have taken a cue from society.



What I've learned about heroin, I have learned from other people. What I have learned from those who have used it has convinced me that I don't want to try it. I don't need to experience it for myself.



There are films that I have taken an interest in because they've generated public interest. When a film is popular enough to have lines going around the block, that is a promising sign that you will, at least, be entertained by it. It's no guarantee, but it is information which allows you to make a presumptive guess.



I am all for fitting into society, because it connects me with the life experience of millions of other souls. The average person may not be that smart, but in the aggregate, the "wisdom of the crowds" can empirically perform quite well as expert systems. There is a certain Aristotle who once said, "it is possible that the many, though not individually good men, yet when they come together may be better, not individually but collectively, than those who are so, just as public dinners to which many contribute are better than those supplied at one man's cost". The average Joe knows what it is like to to love, to lose, to live. I don't have to walk these roads alone, because I fit into a pattern of life which connects me with a great sea of experience which is a great comfort and a considerable aid.

Curious, now I have that feeling of déjà vu.

I've seen all the major ones at a relatively young age and was disappointed they weren't "harder". I'm not sure if I thought they'd be openly torturing Jews on camera but I guess I "hoped" that they would maybe at least directly call to murder them. But instead, they were just calling them rats, etc. This "disappointment" was due to my immaturity or simply wrong expectations. Anyway, I ended up liking a lot of these movies but for different reasons. For example, Olympia was a total masterpiece of cinematography and montage while Hitlerjunge Quex which was supposed to make a martyr of a Hitlerjugend member made me think of how easy it is to brainwash the youth.

The Führer Gives a City to the Jews was the one that disgusted me the most. During that time, Germans actually painted Theresienstadt as a great place to live for the Jews. There were international inspections of that place and of course, the Nazis knew when so they prepared the place and actually made all the people play their part, literally acting it out. The moment the inspection was over, it was all back to the good ole terrible. Of course, the director and all people in this film were transported to Auschwitz II-Birkenau and gassed after the movie was made. And yet, the film portrays Theresienstadt as that beautiful place with playgrounds for children and the city's orchestra playing lively tunes. I guess what's really disturbing is the real image of Theresienstadt we know from history books and the false image painted in this film.

When Germans transported Jews from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz II-Birkenau, they told them they were going to the East to work on farms. Even when Jews came to Auschwitz, they wouldn't want to believe that Nazis gas and cremate people there. Even if crematoria were like 200 meters away. People had a hard time believing the atrocities of the Nazis anyway. There was a guy, Goldman, who came to Israel and told his story of how he was imprisoned in the concentration camp and how he received the punishment of 80 blows - the worst penalty. People thought he'd made this story up. Goldman later claimed that the fact that he was taken for a liar was his 81st blow, which was the most painful of all. There actually is a film on Holocaust called The 81st Blow.

Another must-see is Shoah: Four Sisters, a great supplement to the original Shoah film. It's just interviews with four women who survived Holocaust. Lanzmann's disdain for all goys and attempt to portray Poles as greatly Antisemitic and Nazis' accomplices without giving any explanations to what the women are saying is problematic (he gives explanations in the last story about Hungary, so it's not like giving explanations and clarifications is beyond his filmmaking toolkit), but the accounts of the women are important. The first one is the most harrowing - forced by Mengele to give birth in Auschwitz. Mengele had the mother's breasts be tied really hard with bandages so that the baby had no access to them and therefore couldn't eat. The baby was slowly starving to death and Mengele would visit her every day saying that if the baby doesn't die soon they'll both be gassed. A nurse who decided to save the mother's life gave a syringe with morphine to the mother and asked her to kill the baby because otherwise, they'd be both gassed. The mother had to kill her own baby. Clearly, the baby was a goner anyway, but the sadistic nature of Mengele was pronounced really strongly in this one. He was charming and charismatic, according to the mother, but also incredibly cruel and full of hate for the Jews. This kinda fits the portrayal of a Nazi, and Nazis as a whole. They did unimaginably cruel things on a never-seen-before scale. But always did it systematically, making detailed records of everything (that's why we have so many pictures, records, know the number of victims, etc.). They appeared civilized, with good taste, clad in attractive uniforms. But it was just a mantle that hid their monstrosity.

I could go on and talk about other Holocaust and Nazi films, but it's offtopic anyway.

Italy was much "lighter" than Germany, and lighter than Japan, too. Japanese propaganda movies abound but Italians had their Telefoni Bianchi stuff and unless I'm ignorant, that's it. Even Nazis produced a lot of escapist stuff with no to little propaganda. It was the Soviets that could hardly make a film without any propaganda in it.

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Look, I'm not judging you - after all, I'm posting here myself, but maybe, just maybe, if you spent less time here and more time watching films, maybe, and I stress, maybe your taste would be of some value. Just a thought, ya know.

Ah, yes, conforming to society in order to be understood and accepted. As if that might not happen otherwise. Almost like this is what the ****ing problem with society is. People's pathetic need to feel like everyone else is like them and act disdainful those those who don't fall under the spell of the majority (almost like they can be seen how fragile that kind of approach to living is, how deeply sad it is)



Thank God there are actually people out there who understand how grotesque this is and appreciate, understand, challenge and tolerate differences. And who are also usually the ones who actually have interesting things to say about movies. Go figure how those two things go together. Almost like understanding how diversity in art is what makes us understand eachother, helps us live together, be enlightened by eachothers unique qualities.and have absolutely no need for a society if it is only on their terms we are accepted.


**** that nonsense right to death. As well as all the words about 'being servants to the betterment of others' in the most condescending manner possible. As if people talking about what music and movies they like is somehow maybe making them less a 'servant' to the good in the world.


So gross. Thank God I've got lots of good friends and family who accept me for exactly what I am, and I don't have to worry much if this is what the 'majority' is like just beneath the hood.


And thank God my taste in film is objectively better. That is always a nice balm on those days when I'm by myself and my friends are far away and everything is lonesome. Because I certainly am not going to curl up with the latest market tested, iron flattened piece of vanilla shit that people are lining up around the block to watch and immediately forget.

You seem too taken with Corax's weird theory. It really sounds like he made it up and then projects it onto MoFos to foolproof-test it. Clearly not a good theory, but let the man have his little Socratic method.

Corax would have been one of the guys booing Stravinsky back in the day.

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Captain's Log
My Collection

That's what it used to be, twenty years ago. He used to manage to generate fair contrarianism which would push conversations forward. But now it has a very specific purpose which he consistently uses to trojan horse his weird politics into threads. I know because I've seen what he does in forums with less moderation. He does it over and over and he never changes. And, it also needs to be said, he has frequently made disgusting personal jabs, which by this point are by now unforgivable.


Of course, this means there is no reason to respond to him. And I shouldn't. And I'd be happy not to if I wasn't seeing evidence of him still pulling this nonsense. I'd be happy to block him out of existence because I'm done with him. But even when he's blocked, whenever someone quotes him, there he is. Saying the same shit. And while I've been good recently about ignoring that until the last day or two, he said some things I saw quoted that I don't have nearly enough restraint to let slide. Because I know where he's going with them, and my intentions are to derail that.



And so now here we are again. And I don't like it anymore than anyone else. The last two or three years of talking to him have been an absolute waste of time and I'm happy to be done with it. But he has a real talent at getting people to quote him. And so he keeps popping up. And if I'm not in the mood for it, I'm responding.

He'd be one of the ones rioting, but only after looking around and making sure everyone else was rioting too.

To me, part of what's interesting about the movie business is the business. Everybody talks about Art, but, at the bottom line, somebody puts up a bunch of money and expects a profit, whether it's cheap and arty, or a summer popcorn movie. Thanks to the fortunes of life, in this corrupt, mercenary world, sometimes "little", pretentious movies are awful and big ones ARE great. I don't know who gets to put the number on quality judgement, but, if you put up the money, quality means profit. Critics often seem like they are bought and sold too.

Oscar speeches extol the Art part of the movie, but we all know that's half truth. I also know that I've seen lots of really bad "little" movies. It just seems to be part of our world that it works like that.

Wait, you've known him for more than 20 years? Or is this just hyperbolic?

Maybe, maybe not. Probability dictates that one is more likely to be closer to average than not on most attributes. This is why medical school always harps on "Horses not Zebras!" when it comes to diagnostics.



Of course, the most average thing in the world is to imagine that one is NOT average. Most people estimate that they are above average in terms of intelligence and good looks. Americans tend to think that they're temporarily inconvenienced millionaires. Most people imagine that if they'd been born in Germany in the early 20th century, that they'd have been fighting the Nazis the whole way, neglecting evidence from Milgram's experiments showing that the average person is compliant to authority.



And so we have Captain Terror quip that I would have booed Stravinsky, implying that he would've been more evolved, more sensitive, ahead of the crowd. It's comforting thought. Alas, people always tend to think they're slightly extraordinary.

Were I the knitting sort, this would already be well on its way to immortality, as a sofa pillow.


If I may, to the larger point under discussion...? (*turns and faces crowd; clears throat nervously*)


I think what's (possibly) being lost here, in all the lobbing and volleying, is that not all films can be objectively weighted by same standards and measures, really.


I mean, a bolus such as, say, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania only exists in the first place AS a bland, pre-fab sort of mass market communal experience; it isn't really "about" anything deeper or more meaningful than that simple(-minded) light show being promised by its accompanying TV ads and poster. Judging it by the same standards any sane, educated adult might otherwise apply to a Red Sorghum, or Rome, Open City seems (to me, at any rate) both pointless and futile -- as if, when appraising a pork chop at the supermarket, my most pressing concern was not "How might this taste?", but rather "How many miles does it get in the city?"


This should by no means be taken as some sort of inherent defense against the rigors of criticism as criticism, as applied to the next Disney live-action remake or rote Blumhouse horror flick, he added hastily. Even two different types of candy bar may be profitably compared to one another, after all. My point, I suppose -- assuming I'm even expressing it adequately or coherently, at this juncture -- is that questions of "Yes, yes, but what does it all mean, really?" only rightly apply to movies (or books, or paintings, or what-have-you) consciously intended as artistic expression(s) in the first place.


Certainly, Michael Bay and Wim Wenders are both making movies, so far as that goes. Similarly, Guy de Maupassant and the guy currently cranking out the next installment of the "Moan for Bigfoot" porno series (I saw it on Amazon; it really exists ) both get called novelists, as well... and I can scarcely imagine any exercise less potentially fruitful, ultimately, than attempting to judge the latter by the same measures I'd automatically apply to the former. Is this something on which we might all agree...?


In closing, I'd just like to say: "Not the face! NOT THE FACE -- !"

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"If it was priggish for an older generation of reviewers to be ashamed of what they enjoyed and to feel they had to be contemptuous of popular entertainment, it's even more priggish for a new movie generation to be so proud of what they enjoy that they use their education to try to place trash within the acceptable academic tradition." -- Pauline Kael

It's probably about 15

Claiming that negative reviews come from people who are unhappy makes about as much sense as most positive reviews only coming from people who are happy.
If I am having a bad day, seeing a good movie might make me feel a bit better. If the movie sucks, oh well, my day was pretty shit already anyway. The mood I'm in has absolutely no bearing on whether I'll go into a film with a certain set of expectations or not. If the movie looks solid I might enjoy it, if it doesn't I am much less likely to check it out anyway unless it's part of a film series.

My biggest problem with the thread perpetuating this narrative is that it comes from a place of "I like all these movies, therefore everyone trashing them are just being negative!". It has more to do with audience members growing tired of the influx of similar types of movies getting pumped out over and over again. I'll give a superhero flick credit if it's wellmade, but for the love of God do we need so many at once? I often find myself disappointed whenever I give a new franchise film a shot, simply because it feels like the people involved didn't care, and I only gave it a chance out of sheer nostalgia or simply because the earlier ones were good.

As for people going out to see every new Marvel/DC film and ending up disliking nearly all of them, I can imagine it's like a TV show that started sucking but you can't let go of it. You fell in love with these characters, so you desperately want to see them used well, but end up feeling deflated once you realize this episode is the same as the last one.

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Sounds like a long, bumpy relationship! But let's hope love conquers all!

There is a sort of "hater" review culture out there. Not so much made by people who are happy as a matter of necessity, but for people who are unhappy and want to see "that brand" fail. There is the phenomenon of "hate viewing," which is odd (e.g., people watching new Star Wars products with the expectation of being enraged and counting cinema sins to feed confirmation bias. We have a rather unhappy culture at the moment.

We cannot make guesses about bad reviews there are some people who are genuine as well.

If this had been the first reply in the thread, we might've been saved a lot of typing.

So all of this over why people give a movie they don't care for a negative review?? LOL!! You need to seek some therapy kid because this ramble of yours seems to have 0 to do with the topic at hand and more to do with some axe you have to grind??

Um, the culture is only unhappy to you it seems?? You can't speak for everyone else you know?? You should consider logging off once in awhile and getting some fresh air if you feel this way??