Comments on: Smart People

By: Sal

Sal — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 08:43:04 +0000

Daniel, I WAS impressed with the script. Felt like a character-rich novel, not your typical Hollywood fare. It meandered a little, like life does, and the characters were all so well developed and defined and original. Each of them surprised me. Oscar-worthy script. Mark my words. – Sal

By: Luke Harrington

Luke Harrington — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:59:16 +0000

Hey Banker, thanks for your thoughts. As I’ve stated here and elsewhere, though, I’m really not interested in the usual critic “games” like assembling a personal “top 100″ or arguing over which film is better than which. You can add star ratings to that list as well.

To me, star ratings are something of a necessary evil, and nothing more. To assume that the worth of a film can be summed up in a simple quantity of stars is didactic at worst, and simply arrogant at best. The real value of a star rating, as far as I’m concerned is to get people to read the review. In that respect, mine seem to be working pretty well.

I don’t think it’s my job to “grade” the film, or — worse — to try to ascertain its place in some sort of mythical pantheon of cinema; to attempt either is to place myself on a pedestal that I’m not comfortable mounting, and even less eager to claim.

With that said, I would much rather use the stars to reflect my experience of the film; in other words, I tend to give five stars to films I both love and admire, four stars to films I admire but don’t love (or vice-versa), three stars to films I merely enjoy, two stars to films I dislike (but could understand someone else liking), one star to films I hate, and no stars to films I find worthless and offensive.

I have, in my seven-or-eight months writing for MZ, gone as low as half a star (see review here), and I felt that this particular film richly deserved it. And, of course, there’s the rub: if I start wantonly handing out low scores, they’ll have lost much of their meaning when a film truly deserves to be panned.

I hope that makes sense, and feel free to disagree. I know we’ve had this conversation (or one a lot like it) here at MZ before, but I’d like to hear the thoughts of whoever’s reading.

By: Banker

Banker — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 10:12:10 +0000

Luke, you seem smart and no one would deny that you obviously love movies. In fact you do a pretty good job dissecting them in the text part of the review. But give us some love when it comes to the actually star-ranking you give to movies. You’ve got five of them to work with, use the whole spectrum.
Its ok for you to like a movie and still think it’s not that great. As my art professor used to say “you can’t polish a turd.” Every movie (almost) has something good in it, but that doesn’t mean it’s a good movie.

By: Phillip Johnston

Phillip Johnston — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 00:42:13 +0000

I just re-watched Hard Candy a few days ago. Brilliant stuff.

By: Evan Derrick

Evan Derrick — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 23:56:27 +0000

Thanks for dropping by, Amye. Have you seen Hard Candy, Page's first serious role? It is, by far, my favorite performance by her, even above Juno.

By: Amye Sutton

Amye Sutton — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 22:46:00 +0000

I would like to take the opportunity to say that Ellen Page is amazing. That’s all there is to it.

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 01:49:32 +0000

I’m sorry to say I didn’t care for this one.

By: Sam Juliano

Sam Juliano — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 15:30:26 +0000

Luke, if it means anything, I rate TOKYO STORY as one of the three or four greatest films! LOL.

Good review here of a film I haven’t rushed to see, but I do like Thomas Hayden Church.

By: Evan Derrick

Evan Derrick — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:16:35 +0000

Cupcakes. Preferably with sprinkles and smiley faces on them.

By: Luke Harrington

Luke Harrington — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:09:05 +0000

Well…so far, Evan, you’ve won by default.

What fabulous prize would you like?

By: Julia Harrington

Julia Harrington — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 20:02:05 +0000

You do like too many movies. I thought film critics were supposed to be, you know, critical.

Anyway, I hope I’ve sufficiently proved that I do read your movie reviews.

By: Fletch

Fletch — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 17:59:16 +0000

As bad as the poster, title and timing of this movie were, I’m with Luke, and I enjoyed the insight on reviewing). It won’t cure cancer or inspire 1000s of children to become filmmakers, but it’s a good movie, pretty funny at times, “real” throughout, and the performances all worked for me (save for perhaps SJP, but I’ll save the reasoning for my own review).

Yea, I screwed up, too. I try to avoid reading others’ reviews as well.

By: Evan Derrick

Evan Derrick — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 15:27:09 +0000

Ok, here’s my caption for the photo:

“I am the walrus, I AM THE WALRUS!….wait, was that with my inside voice or my out loud one?”

So, what fabulous prize do I win, Luke?

By: Daniel

Daniel — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 14:49:54 +0000

Good review, but sorry, I have to take a stand against this one, Luke. We totally agree on the performances of Parker and Haden Church, but I was really unimpressed with the script. There were a couple of good lines scattered throughout, but there was little meaning and no chemistry between Quaid and Parker, in my opinion. It’s definitely not even close to the worst romantic comedy I’ve seen, but I did find it a bit of a waste of time. Not like you’re gushing over it or anything, but I just thought I’d throw my thoughts in.