Why I was a lousy movie critic
February 4, 2009 Category :media| movies| new media 0
Many, many years ago back when the FCC mandated news and public service commitments for radio stations, one of my duties as a local radio newsman was reviewing movies, TV shows and local live music venues. I came to have great respect for the Eberts and the Maltins (even when I didn’t agree with their opinions); knowing too much as a critic can cause you to lose objectivity.
Unless you’re writing for an industry mag, you’re speaking to an audience who may see a movie a month, while you’re seeing a movie a day, and it wasn’t long before I was an insufferable boring movie elitist for whom the grittiest little twisted indie was gold and everything coming out of the major studios was shit.
Javier's Jesus
How I got there was seeing the ground-breaking material that was the one good scene in some cheap indie being ripped off two years later by a major motion picture. It never failed to piss me off, and it just happened to me again–this time in new media–when I viewed the highly lauded first runner up (The Power of the Crunch) in the Doritos Crash The Super Bowl filmmaking contest.
I sure hope the producers of Power of the Crunch had Javier Prato on their team (I can’t find any credits listing him). He’s a talented DP and obviously a pretty creative guy, considering his Jesus Christ: The Musical went viral three years ago. You’d think it deserves at least a hat tip from the Power of the Crunch producers, considering they shamelessly ripped off his payoff right down to the framing.