Ajit Jaokar is the founder of the London based publishing and research company futuretext (
Two star review of Avatar by Guardian journalist: But does anyone care for old media reviews any more?
Seeing Avataar this weekend yet again, I googled for a review and was amazed to find this two star review of Avatar by a guardian journo
The Titanic director’s monstrously-hyped creation does look fantastic but, in trying to cover all the bases with militarist sci-fi, vacuous eco-waffle and an intra-species love story, it’s too baggy
and
Be that as it may, Avatar tries to have it both ways, to be preachy and a thrill-ride at the same time. I can’t in all honesty say it pulls it off – it’s baggy, longwinded and, for all the light-speed imagery, just not quick on its feet. Cameron used to be the tautest film-maker around, but he just got slack.
Qs is: Does anyone care for Old media reviews? Did this review in one of UK’s major publications make a difference to the sales/popularity of the movie?
Today, with social media, we have so many choices. There are so many reviews on YouTube and people ‘review’ films by twitter from within the cinema as they watch it!
So, who cares for pompous old media critics?
Such critics would love us to think that some obscure movie which only critics like is ‘good’
This of course gives the critics a sense of importance ..
But with social media, I don’t think anyone cares for them any more since there is too much choice.
And other than ‘Andrew Pulver is the films editor of the Guardian.’ I dont see any other credentials for the critic!
And for that matter, what exactly makes a movie ‘Baggy’?(a word he uses twice) ha ha!
But WTF .. Like I said, who cares!
“But with social media, I don’t think anyone cares for them any more since there is too much choice.”
I wouldn’t go as far as claiming no one cares for them. I, for one, trust a rottentomatoes.com rating over an IMDB rating. The fact is that “expert critics” have a much deeper view on movies than the average tweeter-Joe.
You can claim that the voice of the lone critic is lost among the “noise” of the internet. But by aggregating (crowd-sourcing?) multiple critics, you get a more complete, “rounded” view.
Btw, Avatar has a 82% on RT compared to a 8.5 in IMDB.
The main difference is that RT is based on 250 film-critics, while IMDB is based on 200,000 users.
Which one is more powerful? I don’t know.
Saar
Comment by yosko_s — March 4, 2010 @ 8:39 am
“Who cares”? You obviously care, because you are writing about it.
You obviously care that somebody who knows more about films than you thinks that this particular film was not very good. And you are angry about this, because you don’t want to accept that other people can think you are wrong.
So you write a blog showing yourself, and the rest of the world, that you can invalidate your own comments within such a brief and poorly written post.
/facepalm
Comment by Stompy — March 13, 2010 @ 2:13 pm
facepalm
I dont claim to know more about films but I dont think that the credientials of the guardian critic are clear as well. If Steven Spielberg said the same thing, I would listen. But not some critic writing for a newspaper. and their impact grows lower due to the sheer volume of feedback(positive and negative) on the web. Thats what I mean by ‘who cares’ hope that helps rgds Ajit
Comment by Ajit Jaokar — March 15, 2010 @ 9:23 am