film / tv / substack / social media / lists / web / celeb / pajiba love / misc / about / cbr
film / tv / substack / web / celeb

hobbitimg.jpg

Don't Listen to the Movie Critics Who Say Negative Things About The Hobbit!

By Eric D. Snider | Think Pieces | December 7, 2012 |

By Eric D. Snider | Think Pieces | December 7, 2012 |


The first reviews of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey have arrived! Speaking as a huge fan of this movie, which I look forward to seeing for the first time when it opens on Dec. 14, I’m thrilled that most of the critics love the movie as much as I plan to. But a handful of reviews have made negative comments about it, and this saddens me. Why would a reputable publication allow its movie critic to behave so unprofessionally?

Look, I know that opinions are subjective. I thought Return of the King was the best Lord of the Rings movie, while some of my friends thought it was Fellowship. And we’re all still friends! But a difference of opinion is one thing. Saying something as blatantly false as “the movie itself is a bit of a slog” — as The Hollywood Reporter’s Todd McCarthy did — is borderline irresponsible.

“A bit of a slog”?? Are you serious? Did Todd McCarthy even see the same movie that I haven’t seen yet?

It’s absurd to suggest that The Hobbit is anything less than a great movie. I don’t have to watch it to know that. Did you not notice that it’s directed by Peter Jackson, who made the Lord of the Rings trilogy, aka the finest artistic achievement in the history of mankind? Have you not seen the trailers, which make it abundantly clear that The Hobbit looks and sounds exactly like Lord of the Rings? It even has a lot of the same cast members!

To get even more directly to the point: It’s The Hobbit. Obviously it’s a great movie. Why? Because it’s The Hobbit! What part of this is not clear?

And still some of these so-called “movie critics” don’t get it. (I put the term in quotation marks because their negative Hobbit reviews prove they are not legitimate critics.) For example, Jordan Hoffman at Screen Crush says it’s “saddled with tangents [and] jabberjaw scenes that never end.” Oh, those scenes “never end,” do they? So I suppose they’re still going on now? That’s some great “writing” there, “Jordan Hoffman.” Like I’m supposed to take anything else you say seriously when you start with bald-faced lies about scenes that magically defy the laws of time and space and go on forever.

The Hobbit has been my favorite movie of the year ever since the year that it was going to be released was 2008. There’s no reason to think that actually seeing it will change this. So it’s frustrating to me when trolls get on the Internet and say bad things about it, backing those statements up with specific examples from the film, which they have seen and I have not. Oh, so I guess “seeing” a movie makes your opinion of it more valid than mine? Yeah, right. What happened to living in a democracy?

It’s an outrage that Rotten Tomatoes includes these so-called “people who love movies and were able to secure jobs writing about them” who obviously don’t know what they’re talking about. Journalism standards have slipped so far that nowadays, all it takes to be considered a “movie critic” is to watch a film, think about it, express your opinions in writing, and publish it somewhere. Pretty sad, really.

Take this hypocrite for example: David Germain, from a blog called “Associated Press.” He says, “An Unexpected Journey looks like the start of an unnecessary trilogy better told in one film.” How does he know it should only be one film when he hasn’t seen the other two? That’s the kind of bias I’m talking about. These so-called “individuals who have seen the movie in question and have coherently stated their feelings about it” are a fraud, and it makes me angry to think that innocent Internet users will stumble across their dumb rantings and take them seriously.

We need to boycott these critics until they quit lying and admit they loved The Hobbit as much when they saw it as I will when I see it. We will not stand for such flagrant disrespect directed at the best films of 2012, 2013, and 2014.