Boiling Point: Critical Hits & Misses

Posted by Robert Fure (robert@filmschoolrejects.com) on June 29, 2009

Coming into this week’s Boiling Point I had just one rule – it was not going to be about Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.  All was going well, too, until I read our very own Reject Report by John Cairns that served less as a retelling of Transformers box office glory and more of yet another critic shitting all over a movie that the public has dumped garbage truckloads of cash on.  I couldn’t resist after that.  I’ve expressed it on my twitter account and dropped comments about it left and right, but I guess I’ll just come out and say it again – movie critics aren’t important.

Ok, so reel that back just a little bit.  Critics do serve a purpose in laying down some groundwork opinion on movies, helping to publicize lesser known flicks, providing insightful commentary, etc.  But we’re really not that important and Transformers is building a monument out of money to that fact.  Revenge of the Fallen is floating around 21% on Rotten Tomatoes, a site that collects reviews from around the nation and compiles them.  Clearly, critics hate this movie.  But on IMDb, as voted by the audience, the film gets a solid 6.8 out of 10.  On Box Office Mojo, again voted for by the audience, the film gets an even better rating of B.  More importantly, the audience also voted with their wallets to the staggering tune of more than $200million in just 5 days.  At this point critics could be saying the movie was a terrorist and would transmit an STD directly into your eye and the response would be the same: shut the fuck up and let me watch these robots fight each other.

If the story ended there it would be one thing – but the story doesn’t end there, because critics, with their delicate sensibilities and fragile egos, choose to insult the audience.  Choose to insult their own readers.  They insist this movie is so bad that anyone who goes and watches it is an idiot.  An idiot.  Well, my friends and colleagues, at least 70% of the people who walk out of Transformers walk out of it with a big smile plastered on their faces.  You’re calling 70% of an audience of several million movie goers idiots.  Because they didn’t agree with you.  If the movie going world were a democracy (of course its not – it thrives on anarchy) you’d be the idiot because the mob has spoken and Transformers 2 is the biggest success of 2009 so far and likely no movie will be able to touch it.

It would be clearly hypocritical of me to try to make some sort of argument that your opinion is wrong and you must fall in line and love this movie.  If there is anyone on this site who makes a habit of going against the critical grain it’s me – so I know what it’s like to stand in a sea of differing opinions and wonder just what the hell is happening to the world.  But what I will say is this: shut the fuck up and let them watch these robots fight each other. It may be hard for you to grasp this, after all some of you get paid to express your opinions and others just rewarded with Rob Hunter’s soft spoken words of love, but at the end of the day your opinion means Jack Shit.  Even the mightiest of the critics is meaningless.  Ebert took the biggest shit he could upon Transformers and believe me, he is capable of taking tremendous shits.  But it doesn’t matter.  Because the world is bigger than all of us.  When you see that, its ok to be scared, but do it with dignity.  Don’t point your finger at the millions of people internationally who see and celebrate this flick and call them idiots for not agreeing with you.  That makes you an intellectual tyrant who is missing only two things – an intellect and a kingdom.  All your serfs are having Baygasms.

I won’t name names on who among the critical world is the biggest bitch or the most egotistical, no matter how dearly I would love to.  But amongst us are those who claim to be the gate keepers of taste or those who spew vitriol and offensive words yet claim Transformers to somehow be offensive to them or even the bold few who ascertain their words can raise movies to new heights or destroy their box office.  For fuck’s sake get over yourselves.  Those of you who point a finger and call ‘idiots’ on the people who read your site and see these movies – you should be ashamed of yourselves.

In conclusion, to the audience who reads this – I apologize.  I don’t know how much interest you take in this subject.  But regardless, know that I don’t care what movies you go see, whether you love The Fountain or Revenge of the Fallen, that’s cool with me.  You’re not an idiot.  Anyone who calls you such based on your movie preference, well they’re worse than an idiot, they’re an uberdouche.  To my fellow critics who read this – mind your manners.  The same people who love Transformers love your site.  Though you keep pointing fingers and calling names and they’ll love it just a little less.  Just because Revenge of the Fallen isn’t your cup of tea doesn’t give you the right to piss in our punch. Transformers may not have been the greatest movie of all time, but that doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy it.  We can’t have fun with it.  That doesn’t mean we’re idiots for liking it and it doesn’t mean you get off scot-free for calling us that.  In the end, the joke is on you.  You think you’re big and bad and important, but the box office shows the truth – you’re just an asshole with a microphone.  So shut the fuck up and let me watch these robots fight each other or I’m going to transform past my boiling point.

Do you care what critics think?

Read more articles by Robert Fure