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I just took my wife to see The Housemaid this weekend. On one hand, the plot was kind of forced and it had to do a lot of voice overs to explain what was going on. On the other hand it had Sydney Sweeney’s tits in it. 5 stars.
Fuck Sydney Sweeney. There are billions of sets of tits, find some that don’t belong to a MAGA eugenicist, please.
Gourmet vs Gourmand
Life’s better when you can enjoy complex things for their complexity and simple things for their simplicity =)
Bingo. I always try to think “What is it trying to be and can I take enjoyment from that?”
I’ll even enjoy a “bad” movie if it seems like everyone involved was having a blast making it. I just shift my perspective to “What if this were my friends from highschool showing me a movie they made?” and I end up being a lot less judgy.
Life’s too short to be too picky to be entertained.
All the positive reviews have a suspiciously similar, gushing writing style.
Hmm.
I mean, not a single other current movie/show on their front page has 99% audience score.
Even if Melanoma was secretly good and “the critics were trying to bury it” they would be suspicious.
It’ll be a shit load of bots, and then the same reactionary people that make everything politically partisan and mass review bomb anything “woke”
People that didn’t see it and don’t care about “how well it does” won’t review it at all, so there’s no counter votes because… Literally no one seeing it.
Russian and Israeli bots
It depends entirely on the movie.
Like one of my all time favourite movies is Pacific Rim, because it’s goal is simply to be a bad ass and fun movie where robots fight giant monsters and it succeeds at that incredible.
It doesn’t pretend there’s some big important ehtic dilemma or it’s characters are particularly deep or go through big arcs, but it doesn’t ignore any of that either, it gives just another character to make the film work and be good without distracting from the robots.
But then on the other hand a film like good will hunting has no giant monsters but has a great character arc that is the driving force of the movie and is also good.
As I said of Pacific Rim in another comment:
A giant robot hits a giant monster with a boat, it doesn’t get better than that!
But then another personal favorite of mine is 12 Angry Men. Black & white, most of the movie takes place in a single room, but still fantastic
Incorporating both is the better perspective. Don’t let examining media critically stop you from liking what you like.
The same goes the other way around: don’t let your enjoyment of something stop you from examining it critically, or, worse, (try to) stop others from doing so - which happens quite often, unfortunately.
Had a friend say this exact thing recently, completely baffled me. I didn’t like the movie we watched and was pointing things out, he was agreeing with most of it until he said something like: “yeah but overall I enjoyed the movie so I shouldn’t complain about it.”
I used to be a huge turd for years thinking “these plebians liking will Farrell movies are so dumb, it’s a horrible movie with no plot”.
Turns out you can enjoy two different things completely fine in life. I was just being an arrogant fuckwit
This is valid but I still hate watching Elf
One is not a cinephile, and the other is a fantastic exaggeration of what a cinephile is.
“This comment lacked perspective and nuance. A dreadful affair, 0/10.”
vs
“Hehe true.”
I’m going to be honest, the number one way to get a good rating from me is to put a giant monster in your movie and have it fight other giant monsters OR a giant robot.
My number one complaint about movies with kaiju and/or mecha, which can prevent them from getting five stars, is that there are usually too many scenes with people talking and advancing the plot, and not enough scenes of wanton destruction where the kaiju/mecha are brawling.
That’s why Pacific Rim ranks so high in my book
A giant robot hits a giant monster with a boat, it doesn’t get better than that!
If you want high star rating from me, make a science fiction movie and make space silent and soundless, as it should be. Bonus points if the people in the spaceship don’t magically stick to the floor.
Even more points if it doesn’t just follow the “Aliens” formula with some stupid variations on the theme.
I used to have a higher bar, but shit has gotten so bad I can’t even. I don’t even know where to begin. I just want ONE good thing, is that too much to hope for???
How many stars does 2001: Space Odyssey get from you?
Yes.
i think a film’s quality is multidimensional and shouldn’t be reduced to a single number.
so i literally don’t rate films unless all aspects of it are consistently good or bad.
Neither perspective is good if they are to be applied generalized. There are flawed movies I enjoy, there are supposedly perfect movies I don’t enjoy. There are movies I enjoy because they challenge me and movies I don’t enjoy because they don’t. There are a lot of movies that I’ve already seen even on a first watch (looking at you, Marvel after Phase III) and dislike because of that and there are movies I watch because I’ve seen them before.
Often (not always, remember we try not to generalize) it comes down to what is expected, what is delivered and when there is something delivered you didn’t expect, how well was the twist executed.
Having craftsmanship be a factor in one’s rating of a movie is equally valid as how much you enjoyed it, as may be individual factors like historical plausibility, scientific accuracy or fidelity to the source material, if those things apply.
That’s why I prefer to talk about movies instead of assign numerical ratings.
I totally share that perspective. My controversial example is always fury road because it fits those criteria so well. It delivers exactly what it says on the tin. If you come expecting something else you’re gonna have a lousy time. But if you come excited about what it has to deliver, you’ll start noticing that it is engineered to near perfection with that one objective in mind.
Both of them are rating Sophie’s Choice btw.
I think people should rate things consistently, and both of those criteria in the post are fairly subjective. Like, they could both vary based on your mood.
Here’s my 3-star rating system, which is less subjective:
*** I would happily watch this movie again, or I have already enjoyed it multiple times.
** It wasn’t bad, but I don’t see myself watching it again.
* I would refuse to watch this again, or I turned it off because I couldn’t watch it once.
Of course, it’s not perfect. Movies like Dear Zachary would be forced to be 2 stars. But for the most part, since star reviews are to help people decide what to watch, if the criteria is whether or not people would want to watch it a lot, I think the intentions line up with the implementation better.
Good system. I really like the practical call to action.
- must watch
- watch
- don’t watch
You could even extend it with half stars to a 6 star system equivalent.
Lots of rating systems gain an inflation of the hightest grades.
I’m a fan of:
** - Watch
-
- Dont watch
-
Neither? If you’re going to rate every movie 5/5 then there’s no point in rating movies. Just watch them and enjoy them.
Sometimes a movie is neither fun, nor has anything valuable to say
How dare you call out Pixels like that.
Right has the far better perspective. Thats the one I try to take into all movies sight unseen.
Movies made for Left tend to make themselves known within the first 15 minutes or so, and then he can come out and offer literary critique
And you’d be wrong.
Neither has the better perspective, they’re both part of the experience.
Some movies are just fun watches, some movies are incredibly insightful, some combine both.
Right has the far better perspective.
You can have a world where both The English Patient and Paddington 2 are considered good movies
Seriously how did they make a movie about a talking bear so goddamn good?
If you’ve got standards, sure.
But “Paddington 2 is just as good as Tron 3” leaves me questioning your rubric.
Two compelling critiques of the latest Zootopia film.
Why the fuck would I want to be challenged as a viewer?
Life is already challenging enough.
Film is a great way to show you an experience that may expand your perspective. The viewer is usually challenged by this as they have to empathise with a person outside of their comfort zone.
A good example is when a character first comes off as bad and you have to really feel his situation and empathise with him to understand why he made the choices he did and two people might walk away thinking different things about if he was right or wrong. This is a lot more involved than non challenging films where the intentions are out in the open.
Theyre fun if you’re in the mood but theres nothing wrong with chucking on something mindless, entertaining and enjoying.
I always rate entertainment based on how much I was entertained.
I’m not a cinematographer, it’s not my job to look for fault, I’m watching stuff to be entertained. So if a stupid movie entertains me it gets high marks.
Same. Also, if it’s longer than a tiktok I can’t be bothered. The trailer is usually enough anyway…
