What do you make of Rotten Tomatoes reviews?
When I read an interesting review in the Times or elsewhere, I make note of the movie and subsequently check it on Rotten Tomatoes (Flixter). If both critics and audience give it very low marks, I take it off my list. If both give it very high marks, I'll usually Netflix it. If there's a large discrepancy, I read the comments/reviews in greater depth and make my own decision. This "system" doesn't always work for me, but I haven't found a more practical one.
If I see on Rotten Tomatoes that crirics didn't like a movie but viewers did, (and as long as scores are fairly positive), I'm more likely to see it than not. I think because a critics are paid to "criticize", they over-analyze a lot of movies that I end up liking.
Like Unicorn33's system, it isn't perfect. But I've seen a lot of movies I liked that I might not have seen based on critics ratings.
I usually look for low marks from major critics (major newspapers and websites, not the myriad of smaller ones and fanboy sites that they also seem to be included under "critics") and then read as to why they didn't favorably review - usually that provides enough insight for me to choose to spend $$$ to see it in theaters or wait until I can get it for "free" via TV. For instance, for Southpaw, the LA Times reviewer's review shows up as "rotten" - the review itself doesn't entirely pan the film; the main problem for the reviewer is what he perceives to be a "contrived" plot. Coming from Kurt Sutter and as a Sons of Anarchy watcher, I'm ok with that.
In further looking at Rotten Toms for Southpaw - and BTW, I'd hardly say 57% means that critics "hate" it - many of the major and "top" critics give it a favorable review. It'll probably be over-the-top and silly at times (like Sons of Anarchy) but I'm sure it'll be fun throughout the journey.
FYI, I'm not a fan of NYT's AO Scott - he usually just does a synopsis of the entire film and parks a couple of metaphorical and cliched sentences in the beginning and end as to whether or not he liked it.
my kids like Rotten Tomatoes. I really like Stephen Whitty in the Ledger.
hankzona said:
my kids like Rotten Tomatoes. I really like Stephen Whitty in the Ledger.
Agreed, Whitty is excellent, greatly underappreciated nationally. I tend to agree with critics more than the public when there is a split. I also use www.metacritic.com on my computer, which has good metrics and links to all the full reviews.
Jasmo said:
hankzona said:Agreed, Whitty is excellent, greatly underappreciated nationally.
my kids like Rotten Tomatoes. I really like Stephen Whitty in the Ledger.
I believe he lives in Millburn too. I use the subject of movie reviewers often when people ask me about where to buy wine. I tell people you find someone who makes suggestions that your palate ends up agreeing with, but to beware of the guy who tells you every wine is a must have blockbuster. Its like Joel Siegel who used to say every movie was a must see blockbuster. Its just not the case, and ultimately, what you like is about your own personal taste. I like Whitty because his movie palate tends to line up well with mine.
lanky said:
Coming from Kurt Sutter and as a Sons of Anarchy watcher, I'm ok with that.
I was in the Boy Scouts with Kurt Sutter
Well, I guess I have to swim against the current here, because I find that more often than not I am at odds with Whitty. He's frequently given great reviews to movies I've disliked and zinged movies I've thoroughly enjoyed. I still read his reviews, but use them only as a jumping off point. I find myself more in agreement with the Times reviews.
kthnry said:
I miss Roger Ebert.
yup. he was the guy that was closest to my taste in movies. I don't have anyone now that I think has similar sensibility
Generally I've found I'm more inclined to agree with the audience consensus.
However, specifically when an audience viewer writes about what is supposed to be a thoughtful film and writes "Too slow, no action" I know that they have probably been playing too many video games.
And when a professional critic writes about what is supposed to simply be a fun film and talks about how it "Missed being great" or I read the word "juxtaposition" I know they are too jaded.
Meanwhile, I've gotten pretty good at knowing what I want to see just from watching the trailers although have occasionally been fooled and disappointed.
On a side note: Reactions to some films are much different when seen alone at home versus in a theater with all the audience reactions around you, -Such as "The Hangover" which I thought was wildly hysterical when I saw it is a crowded theater with a friend yet not half as funny when I watched again sometime later at home by myself, -not because I'd already seen it but because there wasn't the fun atmosphere of a whole room of other people laughing.
Thanks all. Will have to check out the Ledger reviewer.
I miss Ebert as well. I enjoyed Life Itself, both the book and the movie. Very interesting life.
Yes, Roger Ebert was the best. Once in a blue moon I didn't think quite as highly of a movie as he did, but I never found myself liking a movie that he didn't.
But there was a local critic in my abode of St. Louis that I followed more religiously than I later followed Ebert, but for a different reason. This critic (whose name I am blanking out on) wrote for the long-gone Globe-Democrat, whose conservative editorial stance I also happened to detest. If this critic liked a movie, I knew I shouldn't bother with it. If he missed the whole point of a movie, I knew it was an unalloyed masterpiece that I should step over my dead mother to run and catch.
A little thread drift, but can anyone explain the following to me? I recently saw "Ted 2," which I personally found somewhat amusing. I do know that critical opinion was all over the place. One local critic had also generally found it amusing, once he "got past all the fart jokes." That line almost put me off of seeing the movie, but I went anyway. And then I found, if I remember correctly, that there were no fart jokes in the movie. What there was, was lots of the word "f***," which fit the character and the movie perfectly. Is this a new thing, to use the phrase "fart-joke" as a euphemism for "f***?" I normally admire this particular reviewer's writing, but maybe this guy is turning into the Globe-Democrat guy. Or maybe he is channeling the British reviewer who once described Hitchcock's "Vertigo" as taking place in Los Angeles, thereby missing half the meaning of the movie. For anyone not familiar with "Vertigo," the San Francisco Bay Area where the movie is set is just as important a character in the movie as those played by Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak. By the way, at least one important ranking of movies not long ago shoved aside "Citizen Kane" as the best movie ever made in favor of "Vertigo" for #1.
Follow Stephen Whitty, Millburn resident and excellent critic, on Twitter
https://twitter.com/stephenwhitty
and see his reviews on nj.com. He is unfortunately no longer a reviewer for The Ledger.
http://www.nj.com/entertainment/movies/
I miss Pauline Kael. And I think the reader comments on Times reviews are generally pretty smart.
chopin said:
But there was a local critic in my abode of St. Louis that I followed more religiously than I later followed Ebert, but for a different reason. This critic (whose name I am blanking out on) wrote for the long-gone Globe-Democrat, whose conservative editorial stance I also happened to detest. If this critic liked a movie, I knew I shouldn't bother with it. If he missed the whole point of a movie, I knew it was an unalloyed masterpiece that I should step over my dead mother to run and catch.
Not the critic you were thinking of, but sad news:
http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/post-dispatch-movie-critic-joe-williams-killed-in-crash-in/article_93d3f349-2929-5261-8565-2111b4040e8f.html
OMG, Williams was the critic I referred to in connection with "Ted 2." Except for that one instance, I always respected and enjoyed his reviews. So sad.
"Fart-jokes" is usually a critical euphemism for base or easy humor. You could substitute it for "toilet humor" or "dick-jokes" even though there may be no mention of farting, toilets or dicks.
chopin said:
Or maybe he is channeling the British reviewer who once described Hitchcock's "Vertigo" as taking place in Los Angeles, thereby missing half the meaning of the movie. For anyone not familiar with "Vertigo," the San Francisco Bay Area where the movie is set is just as important a character in the movie as those played by Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak.
I once tried to convince a movie critic that her reference to the destruction of monuments in Washington by aliens in "The Day the Earth Stood Still" was a mistake (perhaps conflating it with "Earth vs. the Flying Saucers") and that it kind of missed the movie's major themes: Peace, and the vulnerability of the Northeast corridor's power grid. I didn't get very far.
You have to remember that the percent they give is not how good the movie is but of how many critics thought the film was. After enough critics have reviewed it, Rotten Tomatoes will write up a one to two sentence synopsis of the common likes and dislikes of the critics. I use that synopsis and the trailer to decide on if I should see the movie and I always leave a film liking it exactly as much as I was expecting. A lot of the time the critical consensus for a "rotten" film will be, "it was good but did not fulfill its potential" or "it fit in its genre too much". Critics seem to hate it when genre films stay within their genre.
Southpaw's synopsis is "Jake Gyllenhaal delivers an impressively committed performance, but Southpaw beats it down with a dispiriting drama that pummels viewers with genre clichés". Based on that, if you liked the trailer then you will probably like Southpaw.
Featured Events
-
Stephen Whitty Presents - Hometown Movie Stars: The Celebrated Actors Of CHS
May 6, 2024 at 7:00pm
Critics hate Southpaw (57%); Moviegoers love it (97%). Are there particular reviewers that you trust? I've seen a couple movies that were middle of the road where reviews were concerned and I absolutely hated the movie (the latest Woody Allen for example).
I'll see things that seem interesting to me regardless of reviews. But these discrepancies are interesting.
Eta: the consensus on Irrational Man has dropped considerably since I saw it.