Why Film Critics Are Necessary For Film Makers

Lately I've been doing heavy amounts of drinking and movie watching with a few film journalists from Austin, Dallas and Los Angeles. Call them reviewers, critics, or bloggers (because print journalism is just ignored now. Even the Austin Chronicle -yikes). I also follow them on twitter because they are absolutely the most fun people to talk about film with. I personally declined an offer to write for a film blog, because although you can certainly be both (like Robert Cargill. Great writer IMO) I felt like establishing myself as a film blogger would hurt my plans on being a commercial science fiction film director. Although there are so many times when I wish I could write about film, but again I feel like it's not my place as a film maker. Let the people who blog about film do that.

Yesterday, quite a few of them were tweeting about Film maker, Kevin Smith's slam against film critics. There's one dude I follow named @ScottEWeinberg who I swear is like some kind of mystery dude. We have mutual friends and I've apparently gone to multiple parties and screenings that he's been at but never met him. Or at least didn't know it (which would make me a socially awkward jerk). This guy, Scott wrote a great article defending his profession and craft from Smith's SDCC statement. You can read it here.

It was a great article but I really felt like it was missing a lot of points on why critics are so necessary to film makers.

So I wanted to throw in my point of view. First of all some background if you don't know me. I made a no budget feature length slasher film when I was 21. Looking at it now, I'm embarrassed at thinking I was ready to make it, however it was almost a full 4 years of film school itself (I dropped out even though Cliff Robertson told me not to. Bad idea. Should've listened to Uncle Ben). By making that film and taking it to festivals and horror cons, I met a lot of people who are currently my friends and future collaborators. But regardless, it's a shitty film. But hey, we all have to get our first film out of the way. We can't all make "The Duel".

Here are a couple of bad reviews on it. I did have some good reviews but I refuse to post them because that's not the point. (but just know that some people liked it and I'm way better now). This first review was on Dreadcentral. I consider this a poorly written bad review. I learned nothing from it and the reader doesn't know why my film was boring. The second review from KillerFilm was a great critique that actually said why my film was shit.

With that said film reviews can be incredibly insightful to learn and grow and know what your weakness are as a film maker. I'd be fucking lying if I said they weren't stressful to read, but grow the fuck up. One of my friends who's a film maker once came across his film on the iTunes Store and was amused at the negative customer reviews on it. He sincerely laughed and I'm jealous of him.

I also really enjoy the reviews made by Red Letter Media. They are most known for making Star Wars prequel reviews that are over an hour long. When I watch these reviews I feel like I learn more about what works and what doesn't work in the language of film as well as understand and reevaluating the basics of character and story structure that I feel is lost and forgotten very often. You can learn a lot from watching, reading or listening to other great reviews.

Truthfully criticism is necessary for any professional or artist of any craft or medium to learn, grow and improve. The best people for this job are indeed film journalists because they are fucking journalists. They are able to analyze and write what they feel doesn't work and articulate it better than anybody else.

The audience isn't stupid. If they don't like a particular reviewer, they won't pay attention to them. If they find a reviewer their taste is inline with, they'll frequent this reviewer. Because enjoying film isn't about good/bad or right/wrong. It's about fucking liking the movie. I lost some absolutely bad films because they're fun.

Since 2005ish, it seems like people have replaced the life and arts section of their local paper with blogs. This is a result of more journalists having a much larger medium to establish themselves than just one or two local newspapers. As a guy interested in movies, I had the choice to read certain reviewers on the internet and not the reviewers of the Austin American Statesman or the Austin Chronicle. Because I had a choice. And after I watch a film, I definitely want to know what someone else thought. And sometimes I'm quiet and antisocial.

If films aren't criticized or the criticism is ignored, the entire film industry will continue to get worse and worse and only be determined by how much shit it can sell. And that is only an indicator on how well a movie is marketable; not an indicator about how enjoyable the movie is. And we all want a return to artistically driven films. So let's respect our critics.