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A Critic Responds to His Critics

By David Edelstein
Posted Friday, Dec. 29, 2000, at 3:02 PM ET

Someone called "Sprockets"--I hate pseudonyms on bulletin boards, especially when they're used by people attacking me directly (Why are you afraid to tell us your name?)--did us the service of compiling some Fray queries in relation this discussion. I will try to curb my temper and answer them, but don't expect diplomacy. Tony and Roger: You might be better at this sort of thing.

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1. Does it matter to you that people fundamentally go to the movies for enjoyment, and do you understand what various people find enjoyable or could find enjoyable? Why do critics only focus on what they've found enjoyable--or what they think would be good for us to see, whether it's enjoyable or not?

This is bull, plain and simple. I've never written a good review of a movie I didn't enjoy, but there are different kinds of enjoyment. Sometimes you have to invest a little more; sometimes you can just sit back and let a movie wash over you. I'm frankly tired of getting e-mail from people who mock all writing about film, proudly announcing that they "just wanna go and be entertained for two hours and not think." My response is: Great! Don't read me! Read Peter Travers' quote in the ads, see the movie, and forget about it. I feel sorry for people with such limited expectations, even from works of "popular entertainment": To me, it's great fun to see something you like and then hash it out with friends and savor it for as long as possible. But if that's not you're way: Bye.

2. Can you talk more specifically about your favorite movies this year and why you believe those of us reading you might like them (not just defending your picks to each other)? Why will we like Traffic? Good performances? Great story? Slam-bang action? If you all liked Shadow of the Vampire so much, why? Is Willem Dafoe good? (He usually isn't.) Is Malkovich overrated again? Eddie Izzard fun? Or is this movie as precious as Topsy Turvy, that other end of the year critical fave that was just a pain to sit through? If not, why not?

We're not here to reprint our reviews. You can find Tony's on the New York Times Web site, Roger's on the Sun-Times' site, J. Hoberman's at the Voice's site, and mine right here in the Slate archives. What we're doing here is something that we can't do the rest of the year.

3. The entire landscape of movie economics is changing: ownership of multimedia by huge conglomerates; the destruction of the traditional communal experience of moviegoing with the success of cable, VHS, and DVD; the breaking up of an audience for critics with the disappearance of national magazines of stature and the proliferation of online critics. Don't you need to address all this to explain the direction of movies today to today's audiences and the shift in the meaning of moviegoing from the 1970s to now?

Your question is just a catch-all, so I'll respond in a similarly scattered fashion.

I'm not aware of too many national magazines of stature disappearing. I believe that I write for one--and it wasn't here five years ago. Neither was Salon, Feed, and some others. The ones that were here are still here. The difference in regard to critics is that most of us are a lot more responsive to most of you. Good luck 10 years ago getting Vincent Canby to respond to an angry missive, but here's A.O. Scott, and he's all ears.

Moving along: The culture has, in the last half-century, become less and less public and more geared to the home experience. Fifty years ago, sitting in a darkened room responding to giant close-ups of beautiful people oblivious to your existence was viewed as a lonely, masturbatory pastime, but now it's often considered a public activity--which I guess it is if the only other option is sitting home alone and trancing out in front of the TV. I think that relates to the first question about someone wanting to go to the movies not to think. Traffic is hugely entertaining--"slam-bang action," great performances, etc. But anyone who walks out of it and doesn't feel a need to talk with friends about the issues that it raises has spent too much time alone. I started reading critics because I wanted to understand my own responses--I didn't just want to be a passive vessel for all kinds of bad (or good) ideas being put about by moviemakers.

Which brings me to this point: The multinational conglomerates of which you speak are drug peddlers, and just as McDonald's has addicted the world to high levels of fat and sugar, so studios would love for you to turn up at regular intervals for your jolt of action, your piece of beefcake or cheesecake, and your happy ending. If you want to shovel it all in, that's your choice, but don't mock those of us who think that there's something more important at stake.

4. Hasn't there always been this split between a mass audience (for commercial blockbusters like The Patriot and Gladiator, Sound of Music and Cleopatra) and a harder-to-reach audience for more original works of art? Why are you all so stumped by how to address these dual audiences today?

There has sometimes been a split but no, I'm not stumped in the least by how to address the "dual audience." I address the moviegoer like myself--whoever that is. I love a good horror picture, a good sex comedy like There's Something About Mary or even American Pie, a blockbuster like Jaws, a popular melodrama like Erin Brockavitch, a great Jackie Chan picture like Legend of Drunken Master. I didn't like Gladiator or Road Trip, but are you suggesting that a critic shouldn't discriminate among blockbusters? Why can't the audience that loves There's Something About Mary or South Park or The Sopranos also love You Can Count on Me or Before Night Falls or Hamlet? Are you implying that they don't have the capacity?

5. There used to be lots of female critics--Kael, Crist, Adler, Benson, Haskell. Does movie criticism suffer from too much male sensibility?

Sure, but do you want to hire some dumb women to right the balance? There aren't as many female movie critics but the ones we do have--our Sarah, Stephanie Zacharek, at least a half-dozen others--are plenty good. And they didn't like What Women Want any more than I did.

6. Is digital video production a blessing or a curse? Will we get out of it "boutique" neighborhood theaters equipped with digital projection technology augmented by individual subscriber access to smaller-market movies for downloading or streaming to the home--or will we just get ugly-looking movies nobody wants to see?

Roger has already gone into this. I don't like digital projection anymore than he does, but I'm convinced that the technology will get better and better, and I welcome the opportunity for filmmakers to tackle riskier subjects in a far less expensive medium. A smash digital video feature doesn't have to be a blockbuster, and it's the blockbuster mentality that's killing movies--not crummy projection.

In short--get down and dirty, folks, and open this thing up to new thoughts and territory and use the vocabulary of moviegoing experience that we can relate to.

Hmmm. Slate readers can't "relate" to critics enthusing, complaining, and talking shop? You don't give them much credit, do you?