What movie reviews have you read in which it is obvious that the reviewers had no idea what the movies were about or had preconceived notions which they were determined to stick in the reviews?
Three stick in my mind which have endured for over a decade.
People Magazine for “Highlander II” (I know, I know)- this is almost a verbatim quote… “As in the first movie, the Highlander and Ramirez are from the planet Zeist…” WHAT!!! One word change would have avoided that! Re: “UNLIKE in the first movie…”
Also People Magazine for the TNT-TV version of “Frankenstein” w/ Patrick Bergin as Victor Frankenstein & Randy Quaid as the Monster. Referring to the scene with the old blind man- “This is supposed to be more faithful to the novel but it seems to be based more on ‘The Bride of Frankenstein’ than the original.”
And finally the Louisville Courier-Journal for the Coppola-Branaugh-DeNiro “Frankenstein”- this is much more paraphrased but the essence of the review was this- “This is relatively faithful to the novel but who wants to see a Frankenstein movie which reflects a teenage girl’s anquished feelings on childbirth and loss? These movies are supposed to be scary and fun!”
I don’t know if this qualifies as clueless. The movie is Fanboys, about a group of Star Wars fans who plan to break into Lucas’ office to take a peek at Episode I before anyone else in the world. The review is by Tom Keogh.
Referring to a scene towards the end of the movie: “The misadventures at Skywalker [Ranch] include a few good moments, especially when the guards look like characters Lucas might have considered for either of the two trilogies.”
The guards actually look like the police from THX1138, one of Lucas’ earlier movies and that was the point. It was an homage or parody or whatever you want to call it. I realise that Tom Keogh may not have seen THX1138 but shouldn’t a film critic know more about films than the average moviegoer? (I googled this guy and it seems he watches movies for a living)
I was annoyed by Confused Matthew’s review of Jumper, in which he claimed the Paladin’s one liner about “Only God can be in all places at one time” was actually a mission statement, when the character actually stated in the movie why they did what they do (because in their experience, Jumpers always abuse their powers).
He spends the initial part of the review bitching and moaning about loud sound effects from the doors even though the doors don’t make any noise in the film. The next paragraph is a criticism of the movie’s inaccurate IMDB listing at the time. Then he complains about a few plot points as if they’re horror movie cliches when they’re fairly unique to the movie (well, as unique as a movie made in 2002 can be). He follows that up by sarcastically asking if the zombie lab’s security system is supposed to have a sense of humor even though the computer’s sentience (and sense of humor) is actually confirmed on screen. He complains about the dialogue during the small talk between characters. Then he follows that up with a complaint that none of the characters partake in any small talk. He finally ends the review by showing a complete lack of knowledge about a major plot point that is referenced throughout the entire movie.
All in all, it’s very clear that Ebert didn’t even watch the movie. I know it’s not high cinema, but that lack of respect really soured me on Ebert from then on. And it’s a shame too, because he used to be my go-to critic.
There used to be a movie/book critic in Diario de Navarra that I absolutely loved, because our tastes were such complete opposites and he refused to consider the material within its genre.
I discovered him thanks to a review of TMNT where he complained that “it’s a fairy tale” and “the main characters are unrealistic”… dude, they’re four mutated giant turtles and their rat of a sensei, nobody is expecting a Dogma movie. He led me, among other things, to Pérez-Reverte’s Alatriste series (“reminiscent of The Three Musketeers” is a minus in which universe? Not in mine!).
He disliked the epic battles in “The Two Towers,” which he said were contrary to the spirit of Tolkien, who was a “gentle medievalist.”
Yes, Tolkien was a gentle man, but he was also a combat veteran of World War 1, and knew a thing or two about slaughter on a large scale.
I saw a newspaper description of the German movie Stalingrad (which was a real shit kicker,totally recommend it) which said that it was about german officers living in luxury while their men fought and died.
When I lived in New York in the mid-1980s, The Village Voice was incapable of publishing a movie review without a snide remark about Ronald Reagan (of whom I was no fan at all, incidentally). When they ran a capsule about Gone With the Wind playing at a local revival theater, and sniffed that “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn” was “eerily prescient of the Reagan era,” I stopped reading altogether.
That Tolkien was a veteran is a bit of a non sequitur. It doesn’t invalidate Ebert’s point.
And then of course Ebert goes on to give a largely positive review of the movie.
His complaint is that there is too much emphasis on the “action hero” parts of the story. And there is an argument that Tolkien’s actual writing spent a lot more time (words, pages) on the non-action parts of the story. Ebert is complaining about a shift in tone, which de-emphasizes what he personally perceives as more important in the stories. You might disagree with his point, but it doesn’t seem to be evidence that his opinion is uninformed.
John Simon’s review of Star Wars is an all-time classic. It starts:
Right, because all those sciency-sounding words mean the same thing.
Not only that, New York magazine at the time had a policy of using a sentence from the review as a capsule summary of a movie for long as it played, which seemed to be years in Star Wars’ case. And that was the sentence they chose. Simon, remember, was the persnickety prescriptivist word Nazi who thundered down from Olympus at the word choices of others. I’ve always wondered whether New York’s editors deliberately used that horrible sentence in the capsule because they hated Simon as much as everybody else did.
I remember reading one review of a movie involving a false charge of workplace sexual harrassment, against the male protagonist (I think it was the 1994 Disclosure). The review blasted it as misognistic, citing a closing scene of a male character grabbing a female character’s ass. Only, it was a female hand grabbing the male protagonist’s ass.
I have question for you, folks, then. I asked Ebert this through email, but received no response.
In his review for Wanted, he says:
In the version I’ve seen, he meets Fox(Jolie) at the drug store, where she saves his life from that dude trying to kill him(uh, no spoilers here please).
Did Ebert actually see an alternate, pre-release version of the movie where this scene at the bar existed, or did he make it up? Was it in the trailer and that’s all he saw or something?
Nah, I think it was just sloppy note-taking while trying to watch the movie and scribble at the same time. In his (original) review for The Matrix he also referred to Keanu Reeves’s character as “Neal”. The online version is correct now, but when I first read it, it was most definitely “Neal”.
Even more beautiful because both words are misused. Quasar, obviously, quantum since he is using it in the scientifically illiterate sense of a major movement instead of the tiniest possible.
And speaking of 2001, Agel’s “The Making of 2001” has a bunch of reviews collected, many of which, by major reviewers, indicate that they had no clue about what was going on. (No, the star gate did not lead Bowman into the atmosphere of Jupiter.)
Ebert makes lots of mistakes like that. He often confuses minor details (which is no big deal) but sometimes misses entire plot points and then complains about them. One I remember is for the remake of The Italian Job, where he points out the implausibility of getting some loot from here to there, apparently having gone to the bathroom during the very scene where they show how that was done.
The current review on his site has removed the mistaken part.
