Hi, Ben here. This is the concluding half of a two-part post. If you're so inclined, kindly follow this ol' link here to read the first half. In today's discussion, I turn my sights on the online movie writing generation and what it means to be pro-movie.
Where the “old school” of movie criticism fail as Inciters, the new generation of online movie writers excel. Arguably, Harry Knowles set the standard for tone and content in online movie writing with Ain’t It Cool News. Luckily, Knowles loves movies – all kinds of movies – more than perhaps any other human being on the planet. Unluckily, Knowles is not the best editor of his own writing, which does a disservice to his passion for and knowledge of the movies. Full disclosure, I’ve known Harry personally as an acquaintance for a few years now. He is an inspiration, but his greatest impact on the movie community is not his writing.
Rather, Knowles’ importance can be measured in how singularly he set the ground rules for what online movie content would look like (not to mention his infectious excitement for movies). Ain’t It Cool News is the standard for online movie writing. Anyone who has come after Knowles must reckon with the online community he built almost single-handedly. /Film, HitFix, Cinematical, Film School Rejects, CHUD, and Collider (to name just a few) have all followed Knowles’ lead, and all feature some mix of Variety-esque movie new and rumors, casual reviews, and vintage retrospective features similar in tone and content to Ain’t It Cool News. These sites cater to what is essentially the same readership, and feature strikingly similar content. Line up the headlines from these sites on Google Reader and you will see the same stories repeated ad nauseum.
This generation of online film writers has blurred the line between critic and news reporter. Many writers for the websites listed above are required per their job title to write mostly news and rumor stories. Many complain that they wish to write substantive content, but that their hands are tied. They are paid by advertising dollars, and advertising dollars are garnered by site traffic. The latest Batman rumor will get you thousands more hits than a Michael Powell retrospective. I’ve even noticed it here on The Movie Advocate. I can write my heart out about Son of Frankenstein, but it won’t get even a sliver of the traffic that our admittedly cursory Ong Bak 3 review does. Unless you have a stable position and title with a newspaper, magazine, or the like, you are doomed to a life of chasing $4 a story here, $10 a story there writing about Twilight.
Many of these news and rumor writers still write reviews and retrospectives, however, and are therefore subject to my same criteria of inspection. I have already mentioned that many of the online generation are terrific Inciters, which is true. There is a great love of movies in this community, even to the point that people like Harry Knowles are often accused of not being discerning enough in their tastes. Of course, it is worth keeping in mind that it is the “old school” generation often doing the complaining. In terms of content, the online generation has revived interest in movies as a platform for craftsmen and women. Whereas the old school critics adhere to the standards of literary criticism – and therefore implicitly exult the work of the writer and “auteur” director – the online generation rewards quality, material film craft. This is the generation that has fetishized special effects, who finds Ben Burtt’s sound design in Wall-E just as important to that movie’s success as Andrew Stanton’s direction. In this way, the online generation has revived an important aspect of the critic’s role as Interpreters that has long been downplayed.
This is not to suggest that online critics are, overall, good Interpreters. The vast majority of the online generation of writers are white, male, straight, and socially identifiable as “geeks.” (I am certainly not exempt from this stereotype. Remember, this article is called “Pot, Kettle, Black.”) Rarely will you see one of these writers stepping out from the uniform point of view of his caste. Certainly, this generation appreciates the craft of moviemaking, but downplays the primacy of movies dealing substantively with other genders, other races, other credos, other life experiences. Earlier I mentioned that the older generation's adherence to literary critical method has deemphasized moviemaking as a craft. The opposite is true of the online generation. The fetishization of movie craft has impeded critical interpretation. In this milieu, the debate over quality and merit rarely rises above the most rudimentary criteria. The online generation of critics has a homogeneous standard of quality, and has lost the ability to approach movies from discrete frames of interpretation and criticism. The old motto “write what you know” doesn’t work if all the writers know only the same things.
Movie criticism requires a flexible mind. My defense of The Deadly Spawn requires discussion of the movie's inspiring craftsmanship. My critique of Gone with the Wind, on the other hand relies on a feminist framework for support. Discussing Splice with any accuracy requires me to dip a toe or two into the post-structuralist pool of thought. I don’t think it’s to my deficit to “wear” all of these critical personae like prosthetics. My primary goal is the promotion of the movies, and I will collect as many tools in my toolbox as possible to do so.
Movies are fascinating. Movies are inspiring. Movies are expansive and suggestive. And right now both “old school” print critics and “new school” online writers are doing a poor job of expressing this. The older generation blames internet journalism for ruining the field of movie criticism. The younger generation blame each other, and their own inability to get out from under the iron thumb of advertisers. Criticism eats itself alive. Meanwhile nobody is providing an invigorating, passionate defense of movies for their audiences.
The Movie Advocate is pro-movie. We actually enjoy the damned things. We want other people to enjoy them too. It's as simple as that. In fact, it’s why I call them movies, not films. I think that in our cultural climate, "film" suggests something removed from the masses, something that requires some specialized knowledge to appreciate. If that's the case, I'm not interested in film. I'm interested in movies. I want to spread the joy of cinema.
If I spend my time looking for excuses to badmouth something, I am a bad critic. If I spend my time navel-gazing complaining about the state of criticism instead of getting people excited about the movies, I am a bad critic. It’s not a critic’s job to deride movies for fun. It’s not a critic’s job to stare at it's own reflection. It is a critic's job to be pro-movie. We have many tools and methods of going about that, but once we forget that primary directive, we’ve lost relevancy. You’ve dedicated your career and/or a significant amount of your free time to this passion. Act like it.
We have real work to do! We don’t have time to gripe about the state of criticism. We don't have time to sit around potshotting people who like Inception . We need to be the Johnny Appleseed’s of movies, planting ideas and passion in everyone who reads us! Regardless of prestige, regardless of finances, it is the job of the movie writer to encourage and grow passion for movies in every reader. Let's get to it!
As always, thanks for reading,
Ben