“It Would Be Much Better if…” | On Bad Film Criticism
Five years ago, Belated Media made a video, which went viral and garnered over 3.5 million views. The video was called “WHAT IF “STAR WARS: EPISODE I” WAS GOOD?” The goal of the video was essentially to rewrite the entirety of the script of The Phantom Menace, in order for it to conform to traditional screenwriting conventions, regarding character arcs, narratives and what Star Wars fans think would be really cool. This video is fun, and I think that this was how it was intended to be. A friendly, agreeable pitch of what this particular person would have loved to have seen from the first Star Wars prequel. However, this video does not constitute valid criticism, and should not be taken as such. It only serves to confirm the preconceived notion among fans that there is a better version of The Phantom Menace somewhere, it just wasn’t the version that was released. And this notion is wrong.
I am not saying their opinion is wrong. Anyone is entitled to their opinion. I could say that I would have enjoyed it more if Darth Maul had more lines in The Phantom Menace and that would be my opinion. It might be completely arbitrary considering I don’t know whether Darth Maul having more lines would have actually improved the movie, or made it worse. In my opinion, the biggest problem with Belated Media’s video is that he tells his viewers how the audience would feel given his changes, when he doesn’t know how the audience would feel. I don’t only say this because I know people who love the prequels as they are, but because I feel that once a piece of art has been created (yes, I consider the Star Wars prequels art, even though I don’t like them) it is done. That is to say that what is there can be criticised, but it cannot be remade.
This is perhaps the reason that, when Chris Stuckmann, a movie reviewer on YouTube, rewrote a scene from Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) he was met with ridicule and death threats. I am no way trying to justifying this irrational reaction, however, I do think the reason people had such a negative response was because it came across as self-righteous to believe that he could write a better version of a film, than someone who did it professionally. His reasoning was sound — he didn’t believe that Bruce Wayne’s character had enough depth, however he thought that he was the person who could give the character depth was misguided.
That is the starting point to this argument: There is no better version of any film — there is only the version that exists. I want to talk about what criticism means to me and what I believe constitutes ‘correct criticism’. What I believe critics are doing when reviewing a film is trying to figure out what the film was aiming to achieve, and judge it based on whether it achieved that goal effectively, through the writing, the visuals, and the sound. A film is ‘well made’ if the aforementioned qualities make it clear what the message of the film was and whether that message is argued in a convincing way.
However, this then is confronted by the issue of the critic’s own bias. Context matters. When audiences saw Birth of a Nation (1915) when it was originally released, people thought it was a cinematic masterpiece and some people appreciate the cinematic qualities, despite its butchering of historical events. If that film were released today, it would have a terrible reception for its deeply racist narrative. Equally if Birth of a Nation (2016) came out back then, audiences would have rioted at the thought of African Americans being the heroes of the story. For this reason, critics need to be up front about their political beliefs and worldview when writing. You must contextualise yourselves as a biased entity within a politicised society at a given point in history, because if you have an opposing political view to the one that the film is trying to argue, then it will be harder for you to enjoy.
Furthermore to the point of context, the way you watch a film is important too. For example, I saw La La Land (2016) while on a date with my partner, and I really enjoyed it. It was a nice film to watch before sitting down for a meal out, and we had a lot of fun singing along to the songs on the drive home. If I had watched it on my own, in the middle of the day, on a laptop, it probably would not have had the same effect, considering I didn’t think the film was particularly impactful outside of the overall enjoyment I got from that date. How does one avoid the bias of one’s own mood? It’s hard to say. Personally I find it easy to detach my opinion of a film from my enjoyment of it. I enjoyed Suicide Squad (2016) for the same reason as La La Land, but can acknowledge its large number of shortcomings.
Another thing which played into my perception of these films were my preconceptions about them. La La Land was nominated for an Oscar at the time I saw it, and so I was expecting to see a film, which I not only enjoyed, but could consider to be of a higher quality than most films I had seen that year. I remember saying to a lot of people that I really enjoyed it, but wasn’t sure if it was really “Oscar material”. On the other hand, Suicide Squad had already been critically panned by the time I saw it, despite going to its opening midnight screening at my local cinema — it was unavoidable hearing about the poor reception it had. Thus when I saw it I was surprised to find a reasonably competently shot film, which I actually enjoyed and so when writing about it, I had to mention that it wasn’t as bad as many critics had said.
The worst criticism, however, not only ignores everything I have just laid out but also the fundamentals of film criticism. YouTube channels such as I Hate Everything don’t actually review films, but merely list everything that happens in a derisive tone in order to appease an audience of people who merely want to have their own anger reflected back for them to nod and believe that their opinion is correct. In fairness to I Hate Everything, it seems that his approach is more tongue-in-cheek, given the language he uses, however it seems that other people have started channels using a similar style completely unironically and now deem themselves film critics. To clarify, repeating a line from a film and saying “Yeah, they actually said that” does not prove to someone that the line was bad. These reviews have no analysis, no evaluation, and no context. They simply slate a film for the views, which as a critic, I find to be utterly offensive.
With thanks to Ana Bonitch
