Zachary Levi is causing a stir once again with his comments about Hollywood. The Shazam! star was at a fan event where he called out the film industry for the “garbage” content they out…
A) Your average movie goer isn’t capable of telling from a trailer if a movie is going to be garbage or not. Heck, your average movie goer can’t tell from watching THE MOVIE if it’s garbage or not.
B) Levi’s last flick, while not exactly a hot mess, wasn’t exactly great either. The Skittles product placement was 110% un-necessary and backpedaling to go “no, no, it’s a family movie, see?” lowers the bar for family movies.
Just looking at this year, Cocaine Bear and The Machine probably didn’t need to happen.
I feel like you can’t really watch trailers anymore nowadays, they tend to give away a lot of the story already. For example, I watched the trailer for the Meg 2 and it already gave away most of the twists and who would die. I know that they have to try and hype you up but it sucks when they basically spoil the movie.
I actually enjoyed cocaine bear. That one felt like a breath of fresh air to the usual garbo. Was genuinely a fun film to watch where it felt like you were also watching people have fun making it.
Self awareness can be fun, that doesn’t make it a good movie.
I laughed so hard at Betty White, swearing like a sailor, feeding people to a giant New England crocodile in Lake Placid, but I’d never dream of calling it a good movie.
Wanted has Morgan Freeman delivering the classic line “Will somebody, please, shoot this motherfucker?” Again, does not make it a good movie.
Your average movie goer isn’t capable of telling from a trailer if a movie is going to be garbage or not.
Of course not. A trailer is just an ad. That’s like expecting to be able to tell if a smartwatch is good after watching an ad.
So a possible solution could be professional/expert reviews. We need to be able to trust them though (no bought reviews etc.) and they shouldn’t be snobbish against pure entertainment movies. Unfortunately this will only work if people actively seek out those reviews (at least I can’t think of a way to actively push the reviews to the consumers), which does not work as long as movies are consumed in order to not think. Which they will be as long as they are as shitty and brainless as many are right now.
We used to have that back in the day with Siskel and Ebert. Two, classically trained film reviewers, who had a show that aired the week before the films they were reviewing were due to come out.
Of the two, Ebert would go easier on pure entertainment movies than Siskel would. They didn’t always agree, but when they did, you could be assured it was either really good or really bad.
We don’t really have an equivalent in this day and age with review embargoes and such.
I give props to Ebert for putting his money where his mouth is and actually writing a movie. While not a great movie, he was still willing to go through the process of writing a screenplay and getting the movie made.
I would argue your second statement in A) assumes that a movie can objectively be rated good or bad. Plus it also seems to claim to know exactly what people want to see from a movie. Never s fan when someone seems to say, “I know better than you do what you like.”
I’ll agree a trailer doesn’t always do a good job. But to claim a person can’t tell if what they watched is good is hardly a statement a same person would make. Possibly a narcissist would say it. Or someone else full of themselves.
There is obviously technique that can be graded, but that doesn’t make a movie.
Movies can absolutely be objectively rated good or bad, all the component pieces can be good or bad, writing, acting, directing, pacing, hell, even lighting, editing and special effects.
The problem is your average movie goer can’t tell the difference. Sure, if something is ESPECIALLY bad like the visual effects in the Flash, they’ll pick up on that.
Quite more often something can be entirely awful and the reaction is “Well, I had fun…” That doesn’t make it “good”.
You can have a good movie with poor elements and a poor movie with great elements. I’d even argue you can have a good movie with bad acting. Plus, it’s all about the intent of the movie, as with any piece of art. Cocaine Bear had an intent. It fulfilled that intent. Claiming that art can objectively be rated is naive.
I don’t know what you expect to accomplish with this. If you want to make an argument by example, be prepared to make it exhaustive, otherwise it’s simply anecdotal. Anecdotes does not an argument make.
My point is that this is a very subjective realm. You can know all you want about technique and still make a bad movie. And someone who knows nothing can still make a good movie. The odds don’t work in their favor, sure, but it’s possible. Technique just helps, but it’s neither a requirement nor a guarantee. And part of determining whether a film is done well is knowing the film’s purpose and theme. Cult classics exist for a reason. They aren’t “bad.” They’re just not popular with folks who didn’t get it. You will always be colored by your biases. You can not like a film but that doesn’t mean it was unnecessary. You aren’t an authority as much as you want to pretend to the throne.
He’s not wrong, but there a couple of problems:
A) Your average movie goer isn’t capable of telling from a trailer if a movie is going to be garbage or not. Heck, your average movie goer can’t tell from watching THE MOVIE if it’s garbage or not.
B) Levi’s last flick, while not exactly a hot mess, wasn’t exactly great either. The Skittles product placement was 110% un-necessary and backpedaling to go “no, no, it’s a family movie, see?” lowers the bar for family movies.
Just looking at this year, Cocaine Bear and The Machine probably didn’t need to happen.
I feel like you can’t really watch trailers anymore nowadays, they tend to give away a lot of the story already. For example, I watched the trailer for the Meg 2 and it already gave away most of the twists and who would die. I know that they have to try and hype you up but it sucks when they basically spoil the movie.
I actually enjoyed cocaine bear. That one felt like a breath of fresh air to the usual garbo. Was genuinely a fun film to watch where it felt like you were also watching people have fun making it.
A)
Ouch! You’re more snob than I am! 🏆
!moviesnob@lemmy.film
You getting snobby about Cocaine Bear?
Some movies are good because they are completely aware of how ridiculous they are.
Self awareness can be fun, that doesn’t make it a good movie.
I laughed so hard at Betty White, swearing like a sailor, feeding people to a giant New England crocodile in Lake Placid, but I’d never dream of calling it a good movie.
Wanted has Morgan Freeman delivering the classic line “Will somebody, please, shoot this motherfucker?” Again, does not make it a good movie.
Good thing I did not say that being self aware automatically made a movie good.
Lake Placid is an excellent horror comedy beyond Betty’s character. You just have bad taste and try to pass it off as objective criticism.
Of course not. A trailer is just an ad. That’s like expecting to be able to tell if a smartwatch is good after watching an ad.
So a possible solution could be professional/expert reviews. We need to be able to trust them though (no bought reviews etc.) and they shouldn’t be snobbish against pure entertainment movies. Unfortunately this will only work if people actively seek out those reviews (at least I can’t think of a way to actively push the reviews to the consumers), which does not work as long as movies are consumed in order to not think. Which they will be as long as they are as shitty and brainless as many are right now.
We used to have that back in the day with Siskel and Ebert. Two, classically trained film reviewers, who had a show that aired the week before the films they were reviewing were due to come out.
Of the two, Ebert would go easier on pure entertainment movies than Siskel would. They didn’t always agree, but when they did, you could be assured it was either really good or really bad.
We don’t really have an equivalent in this day and age with review embargoes and such.
I give props to Ebert for putting his money where his mouth is and actually writing a movie. While not a great movie, he was still willing to go through the process of writing a screenplay and getting the movie made.
I would argue your second statement in A) assumes that a movie can objectively be rated good or bad. Plus it also seems to claim to know exactly what people want to see from a movie. Never s fan when someone seems to say, “I know better than you do what you like.”
I’ll agree a trailer doesn’t always do a good job. But to claim a person can’t tell if what they watched is good is hardly a statement a same person would make. Possibly a narcissist would say it. Or someone else full of themselves.
There is obviously technique that can be graded, but that doesn’t make a movie.
Movies can absolutely be objectively rated good or bad, all the component pieces can be good or bad, writing, acting, directing, pacing, hell, even lighting, editing and special effects.
The problem is your average movie goer can’t tell the difference. Sure, if something is ESPECIALLY bad like the visual effects in the Flash, they’ll pick up on that.
Quite more often something can be entirely awful and the reaction is “Well, I had fun…” That doesn’t make it “good”.
You can have a good movie with poor elements and a poor movie with great elements. I’d even argue you can have a good movie with bad acting. Plus, it’s all about the intent of the movie, as with any piece of art. Cocaine Bear had an intent. It fulfilled that intent. Claiming that art can objectively be rated is naive.
Plan 9 From Outer Space is a terrible movie.
Ed Wood is amazing.
I’m sure you can tell the difference.
I don’t know what you expect to accomplish with this. If you want to make an argument by example, be prepared to make it exhaustive, otherwise it’s simply anecdotal. Anecdotes does not an argument make.
My point is that this is a very subjective realm. You can know all you want about technique and still make a bad movie. And someone who knows nothing can still make a good movie. The odds don’t work in their favor, sure, but it’s possible. Technique just helps, but it’s neither a requirement nor a guarantee. And part of determining whether a film is done well is knowing the film’s purpose and theme. Cult classics exist for a reason. They aren’t “bad.” They’re just not popular with folks who didn’t get it. You will always be colored by your biases. You can not like a film but that doesn’t mean it was unnecessary. You aren’t an authority as much as you want to pretend to the throne.
It’s not at all subjective and, again, if you doubt that, sit down and watch Plan 9 and Ed Wood back to back.
One is generally accepted to be the worst film ever made, the other won two Academy Awards.
If you legit can’t tell why which film falls into which category, you’re precisely the problem I outlined in A)
it’s entirely subjective after you clear some very basic benchmarks.