Forget the critics

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XycloneKiller

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I sat watching John Carter again today, and I realized how good it actually was (though I loved it the first time too). It's ridiculous how critics have no sense in what people like, yet they determine if a movie does well or not with their words.

What are some movies that liked that the critics didn't?
 
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John Carter is actually a pretty dope movie. The problem was marketing; they didn't know how to do it. The original title was Princess of Mars, then test audiences came in confused going, "This isn't a Disney movie?" because of the title (y'know, about a frilly Alien Princess teehee!)

So John Carter of Mars was too long. So they shortened it to just John Carter, which... is honestly a terrible title. It tells us nothing of the Western-Cowboy-Alien-Sci-Fi-Opera we're about to embark. The trailer is also not so great, if I remember right, and again, the marketing... They just didn't. And when I mean didn't, I think I remembered seeing the trailer for the movie on TV maybe once the entire time it was out. Next thing I know, it's on DVD.

But yeah, it was a dope-ass movie.

Oh, but yeah, bomb movies that I like and critics didn't? Uh... Maybe The 13th Warrior? It legitimately wasn't a very good movie, but holy crap, VIKINGS KICKING ASS. And Spanish Antonia Banderes playing a Muslim. xD
 
It's not that professional movie critics have no sense of what people like, it's that they're looking at things from an entirely different perspective than general viewing audiences and they frankly should NEVER have become the trusted arbiters of movie quality by the general public. Some of them have very highbrow and artistic lenses, others are snobs about specific genres, many of them add or subtract points based on political ideology nonsense, etc. Average scores among critics are absolute ass for this reason. The only not-terrible way to make use of reviewer scores is to find a few of them you tend to generally agree with and check their reviews for whatever movies you aren't sure about to make up your mind about watching it or not.

Anyway, my little rant aside, I can think of a handful of movies that I liked a lot more than reviewers tended to like them.

American History X is perhaps my favorite movie of all time, definitely up in the top 3, but it got a resounding "meh" from reviewers. Fight Club also got just OK reviews, but I'd toss that one in my top 10 probably.

Reviewers in general didn't seem to care for Super Troopers, but it's my favorite comedy movie. Similar goes for Dogma: lukewarm reviews, but I love it. I've noticed professional reviewers just don't really like comedy that goes for dumb or crass jokes, but I enjoy a lot of them.

Oh, and on the flip side, reviewers tended to praise the 2005 The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe movie, but I thought it was pretty bland and boring. I also recall being convinced to go watch The Blair Witch Project in theaters back when I was kid because the reviews said it was very good, but holy crap that was such a waste of my very limited allowance money.
 
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Spaceguitar said:
John Carter is actually a pretty dope movie. The problem was marketing; they didn't know how to do it. The original title was Princess of Mars, then test audiences came in confused going, "This isn't a Disney movie?" because of the title (y'know, about a frilly Alien Princess teehee!)

So John Carter of Mars was too long. So they shortened it to just John Carter, which... is honestly a terrible title. It tells us nothing of the Western-Cowboy-Alien-Sci-Fi-Opera we're about to embark. The trailer is also not so great, if I remember right, and again, the marketing... They just didn't. And when I mean didn't, I think I remembered seeing the trailer for the movie on TV maybe once the entire time it was out. Next thing I know, it's on DVD.

But yeah, it was a dope-ass movie.

Oh, but yeah, bomb movies that I like and critics didn't? Uh... Maybe The 13th Warrior? It legitimately wasn't a very good movie, but holy crap, VIKINGS KICKING ASS. And Spanish Antonia Banderes playing a Muslim. xD
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Yeah, I remember the marketing, or lack thereof, being terrible. Truth be told, had it been anyone other than Disney, or maybe not a PG-13 rating I believe it would have done a lot better in the box office. I need to sit down and read the books now though just because I want more...

The 13th Warrior was awesome. I remember when we watched it in English class in Jr. High School because it was loosely based off of Beowulf, which was a movie that the critics seemed to like but I think they lost it along the way in that one...
 
Jorick said:
It's not that professional movie critics have no sense of what people like, it's that they're looking at things from an entirely different perspective than general viewing audiences and they frankly should NEVER have become the trusted arbiters of movie quality by the general public. Some of them have very highbrow and artistic lenses, others are snobs about specific genres, many of them add or subtract points based on political ideology nonsense, etc. Average scores among critics are absolute ass for this reason. The only not-terrible way to make use of reviewer scores is to find a few of them you tend to generally agree with and check their reviews for whatever movies you aren't sure about to make up your mind about watching it or not.

Anyway, my little rant aside, I can think of a handful of movies that I liked a lot more than reviewers tended to like them.

American History X is perhaps my favorite movie of all time, definitely up in the top 3, but it got a resounding "meh" from reviewers. Fight Club also got just OK reviews, but I'd toss that one in my top 10 probably.

Reviewers in general didn't seem to care for Super Troopers, but it's my favorite comedy movie. Similar goes for Dogma: lukewarm reviews, but I love it. I've noticed professional reviewers just don't really like comedy that goes for dumb or crass jokes, but I enjoy a lot of them.

Oh, and on the flip side, reviewers tended to praise the 2005 The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe movie, but I thought it was pretty bland and boring. I also recall being convinced to go watch The Blair Witch Project in theaters back when I was kid because the reviews said it was very good, but holy crap that was such a waste of my very limited allowance money.
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I can't even remember the times that a critic has praised a movie, then I sit down to watch it and am far more than disappointed. Blair Witch was crap then and still is, yet I want to say I saw something where they were going to try and reboot it >_>. I might be confusing it with something else though, so don't quote me on that.

Never sat down and watched American History X, but Fight Club and Super Troopers are great movies in my oppinion. I can understand that many people could be confused with the whole Fight Club twist, but still I believe it flowed really well.

"His name was Robert Palson."
 
OMG I think we were watching John Carter at the exact same time. O___O It was the first time I had seen it, and I loved it a lot. It's such a fun genre blend and now I wanna go hunt down the original book.

I am drawing a complete blank on underrated movies right now, but I agree that The 13th Warrior is a bombass movie. O:
 
Diana said:
OMG I think we were watching John Carter at the exact same time. O___O It was the first time I had seen it, and I loved it a lot. It's such a fun genre blend and now I wanna go hunt down the original book.

I am drawing a complete blank on underrated movies right now, but I agree that The 13th Warrior is a bombass movie. O:
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There are like 11 books... I think... But after watching it yesterday, or rather finishing it yesterday, for like the 10th time, I want to hit up the library to see if they have it. Pretty sure they won't though >_>

I think they said the copy write is expired on a lot of them here in the states, so they are up online in a lot of places, I'd just have to spend the time to Google them.
 
XycloneKiller said:
Blair Witch was crap then and still is, yet I want to say I saw something where they were going to try and reboot it >_>. I might be confusing it with something else though, so don't quote me on that.
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You did in fact see stuff about a Blair Witch reboot. Amusingly enough, both critics and audiences thought it was crap, so that's probably the end of any plans they had to make it the next big horror series.
 
Jorick said:
XycloneKiller said:
Blair Witch was crap then and still is, yet I want to say I saw something where they were going to try and reboot it >_>. I might be confusing it with something else though, so don't quote me on that.
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You did in fact see stuff about a Blair Witch reboot. Amusingly enough, both critics and audiences thought it was crap, so that's probably the end of any plans they had to make it the next big horror series.
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Horror movies in general have died out... They were good in the 80s and 90s, now they are just a type of comedy of their own.
 
First two installments of the Mummy franchise with Brendan Fraser. A lot of the Guy Ritchie films that don't get that much love (Rock n Rolla, The Man from UNCLE). Speed Racer. Titan A.E. (most people bring up Treasure Planet here, but I've never watched it). Troy.

Quite a few of the cult films from the 80's and 90's, but those seem unfair to bring up because they mostly became really well regarded in the 00's and 10's. Comedies also seem to get hit with this a lot, and I'll straight up admit to enjoying the frat comedy humor that people like Judd Apatow/Seth Rogen like to employ.
 
Aero Blue said:
First two installments of the Mummy franchise with Brendan Fraser. A lot of the Guy Ritchie films that don't get that much love (Rock n Rolla, The Man from UNCLE). Speed Racer. Titan A.E. (most people bring up Treasure Planet here, but I've never watched it). Troy.

Quite a few of the cult films from the 80's and 90's, but those seem unfair to bring up because they mostly became really well regarded in the 00's and 10's. Comedies also seem to get hit with this a lot, and I'll straight up admit to enjoying the frat comedy humor that people like Judd Apatow/Seth Rogen like to employ.
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Yes, Titan AE was awesome. I wouldn't say it's based off the movie Treasure Planet, but more so based off of the Treasure Island book, but only loosely. The Speed Racer movie was okay, but I grew up watching the cartoons and something about it just didn't feel right to me. Never did watch The Man from UNCLE, always wanted to, just never found the time.

Seth Rogen's stuff is funny, but at the same time there are spots where I have lost the humor. I will go out and say that I like a lot of the Will Ferrel/John Reilly movies. Those are usually comedic gold, but critics seem to think their humor gets in the way of a real plot. Not sure why people think that comedies need a true plot... They just need a basis...
 
I've long come to terms that critics and I will never be on the same page.

I like Dragonheart. I thought it was charming. But I was young enough when it came out that I didn't get hung up on Sean Connery's voice coming out a dragon.

Also I enjoyed Venom more than the critics did. It had some flaws, but I kept finding they were caused by forced cuts by the studio so I know who to blame there. Seriously, who reads a Venom comic and thinks it's anything under an R rating?
If they don't go R with Carnage I am going to lose my mind. I don't understand why they even tried to shove him into Ultimate Spiderman cartoon. He did a whole lot of nothing.
 
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Shiri said:
I've long come to terms that critics and I will never be on the same page.

I like Dragonheart. I thought it was charming. But I was young enough when it came out that I didn't get hung up on Sean Connery's voice coming out a dragon.

Also I enjoyed Venom more than the critics did. It had some flaws, but I kept finding they were caused by forced cuts by the studio so I know who to blame there. Seriously, who reads a Venom comic and thinks it's anything under an R rating?
If they don't go R with Carnage I am going to lose my mind. I don't understand why they even tried to shove him into Ultimate Spiderman cartoon. He did a whole lot of nothing.
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It's like I watched bright again the other day and was loving it. Then found d out the critics hated it... Netflix called them out for being disconnected from the public. XD
 
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