I recently read a brilliant article from Roger Ebert' s blog entitled "you give out too many stars". In it, Ebert goes to great length to defend his position in the terms of legendary critic Robert Warshow: "A man goes to a movie. The critic must be honest enough to admit that he is that man." Ebert, like most of us who view several films a month ultimately do it because we love movies. I use the term movies here in its most classical sense. That is to say, all kinds of pictures. Pictures that inspire, make you laugh, cry, or invoke anger. Pictures that revel in their own campiness, or melodrama. Pictures that sell-out multiplexes for weeks straight. Pictures that are viewed often times in the arthouse theaters that seem to desperately tread water in an industry that earns its bread and butter off of formula. So why am I bringing this up now....?
It has been brought to my attention by a few of you out there who happen to read this blog, that I perhaps suffer from a different type of movie rating malaise: That of the critic/man who is impossible to please. I realize that a lot of this may be from the confusion wrought by my own rating system (needless to say, I thouroughly hate most rating systems that are out there..including my own, but I'll get to that later.) So in an effort to rectify such a perception of "film-snobbery" I would like to clarify my position as a movie fan, and my system, as cut-and-dry as it may seem to be, for trying to gauge them.
The trouble with rating movies is that it is not a science. I'm sure there are countless critics out there who will try to convince you otherwise, but something about that belief just doesn't seem fair to me. A film should best be judged out how well it does what it is supposed to do to you as a member of the audience. In this sense, a film should sweep over you, the viewer. It should in a sense, manipulate you into thinking, feeling or reacting a certain way. This makes for a very hard system of trying to pin down where a film stands in regards to others. There are obvious things to consider of course. Did the story resonate in such a way to sustain interest? Are the characters developed enough for the audience to mainain a strong connection? Are the elements of the plot, and the characters themselves consistent in their actions and themes throughout? The hard part comes in trying to put on a scale of 1 to 4 or 1 to 10 how well the film did what it was supposed to.
The reality is that as a "critic" it is never my intention to 'deconstruct' a film to the point of inviting public debate. I am nowhere near learned enough, or in possession of the adequate tools to embark on such a task. My job is to try to express as best I can, what a film did to me. This is of course highly subjective. Most films, and the reaction they incite, are. There are a few obvious exceptions. I mean come on, who's going to argue that you don't gasp when you first hear Darth Vader utter those dreadful words to Luke about their true relationship? But since most films aren't obviously good, or obviously bad, it leaves much room for differing opinion, which is just that. Opinion. Not formula.
Having said that, let me explain briefly why I have chosen the rating system I currently use. The problem with the 4 star system (as with most systems) is that I feel it leaves too much room for comprimise. There will undoubtedly be certain films that jump from being good to great, or good to bad in order to give an easy-to-read scale. All though any scale should be indeed a mere "snapshot" of the quality of the film, a 4 star-system I feel does not best show the quality of the film in relationship to others. Here is the basic run-down of what each of my stars represent.
1 - This is a movie that I practically hated sitting through. It means that I found virtually no redeeming qualities to speak of, and the film did notihng to engage me, or to keep me involved.
2 - This is a movie that I didn't like. There might have been at least a couple good scenes, or an interesting story idea that either wasn't developed enough for my liking or just didn't work well. Nevertheless, it is not a movie that I would endorse seeing.
3 - This is a movie that I liked. It probably did what it was supposed to, and I enjoyed sitting through it. It it is not necessarily a movie that I would champion, but I would still encourage seeing it.
4- This is a movie that I really liked. It was clearly more engaging than a 3, and the kind of movie that after watching it you know it your gut that it was above a 3.
5- This is a movie that I absolutely loved. It is a rare breed, like the 1 rating, because these are the two extremes that are probably the least subjective. It is a movie that possesses some of the above and beyond qualities that seperate it from any normal movie-going experience. This does not mean however, that it was a "perfect" film.
For those of you who prefer the simple endorsement/no endorsement type of rating system, I will be including a simple "stamp" of approval at the beginning of each review. It will be a symbol that I haven't decided on as of yet, but will be the most basic snapshot of what I thought. Think a smiley face or a check mark for good, and a frowny face or an "x" for bad. I would use thumbs, but in today's lawsuit happy world I'm sure I would find that those symbols are trademarked.
Just for the record,, the "good" movie would fall under the 3-5 category, with the "bad" being 1 or 2.
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