About the author
Jonathan Crocker
Who am I?
I’m Jonathan Crocker, author of ‘How to write a good film review’.
What qualifies me to write this guide?
Mostly, that I’ve made every mistake this guide tells you not to make. And then some. But additionally, I worked as a UK film journalist — both staff and freelance — for more than a decade.
My main jobs in film journalism have been:
- News Editor of Total Film magazine
- Film Editor of i-D magazine
- Editor of Little White Lies magazine, which I also helped to launch
- Co-creator and editor of delve, a weekly digital newsletter about film and life
- Co-creator of Cult Movie Cards with illustrator Paul Willoughby
- I’ve also written about film for places like Time Out, ShortList, Esquire, the Guardian, the Independent, GQ, MSN, IGN, SFX and other acronyms
Why did I write this guide?
I’ll never forget what it felt like when I was trying to break into film journalism. Like there was a pane of glass between me and my dream job. I could see exactly where I wanted to be. But getting there seemed massively unlikely.
No one got bored of reminding me of that, either. Fair enough. There should have been no way on earth that I managed to get a job in the industry. I had no contacts, no money and did not live in London.
But I knew that if I could write great film reviews, and someone saw them, I had a chance. I was desperate to learn this specific skill. So it was frustrating to discover I would struggle to find any resources that could help me.
And that’s why this guide exists. I wanted to write something I would have loved to read back then. It’s a guide I hope will be useful to anyone who is where I was.
Cheers,
JC
ps. If you don’t want to be a film critic, I also wrote a thing called Hopefully, the 10 most useful writing tips you’ll ever read. I hope they are!
pps. You can find me on Twitter @JonathanCrocker
