My Beef With Rotten Tomatoes
There I was at the end of the movie Geostorm, thinking of how wonderful the film I just watched was. And out of usual habit after I was done I googled it. The world had to share my opinion on how good this movie was, right?
You’ve got to be kidding me. The movie could not have been that bad. If you didn’t know by now, Rotten Tomatoes is a popular movie review site that calculates an aggregate based on the people there who reviewed it. So this means it only had an approval rating of 14%. Only 14% of them liked it. I checked Wikipedia like I usually do (don’t ask why) and here’s what I saw under Reception:
The site’s critical consensus reads, "Lacking impressive visuals, well-written characters, or involving drama, Geostorm aims for epic disaster-movie spectacle but ends up simply being a disaster of a movie”.
And another critic . . .
Mark Kermode of the Kermode and Mayo’s Film Review radio program stated that the film "takes stupid to a whole new level.... Honestly, and I say this, I think it’s the stupidest film I have ever seen", emphasizing that "it’s more stupid than Angels and Demons, and that’s not a phrase I thought I’d ever say out loud".
Wow.
Based on his recommendation I think I’d like to watch Angels and Demons.
But look what else I noticed . . .
Which means a regular movie goer loved the movie and naturally, in my own defiance to all that is evil in this world, I gave my own thumbs up as well.
This has been a trend for years. My personal battle against the critics. I’d watch a movie and love it so much and then I’d check what the critics had to say about it, only to find out that they bashed it. Rotten Tomatoes is usually my enemy in this situation. Some movies I leave thinking they were bland and boring and they’d have a high rating. Some movies I’d think are very emotional and good and connect with you, I’d go online and see a terrible review. We only seem to agree on Marvel movies, movies that are so good you’d be out of your mind to say they’re bad, and movies that are so bad you’d be out of your mind to say they’re good. I used to gauge whether a movie is worth watching based on their Rotten Tomatoes aggregate saying something like, “If it’s above 80% you definitely must see it. If it’s within the 50–70% rage it definitely is epic. If it’s in the 20%-40% range it is definitely still a good movie. If it’s below 10% then it’s definitely a bad movie.” considering the fact that if your movie is below 60%, it’s considered “rotten”. While they’re just aggregates, a lot of critics seem to agree with them, especially with reviews on the overwhelmingly negative side.
But one thing I noticed over the years is that sometimes, these guys are just critics. Their opinion is not always directly proportional to whether the viewers (intended consumers) actually love it and whether it actually brings in enough money to not be a flop. There are several movies that critics bash but still make hundreds of millions of dollars above the budget and even get sequels. Some movies that get critical acclaim end up being a flop. Sometimes, though rare, you have a combination of both massive critical acclaim and commercial success but even at that you still have a minority who would call those movies terrible.
The point? You can’t please everyone. Stop trying.
I remember when Black Panther came out. It was one of the most anticipated movies of 2018 and I watched it within the first week it dropped (loyal Marvel fan here). I absolutely loved it. Yes, I knew it wasn’t a perfect movie but I still felt it was a masterpiece. This was just around the time that possibly the hype spiraled out of control. To me, it lived up to the hype. To people who watched the movie weeks later, it was just an ordinay movie. You can imagine the twinge in my gut whenever I hear people say that Black Panther was over hyped and “T’Challa isn’t all that without the Black Panther”, making reference to how he took a beating from Killmonger. Sometimes I want to argue but sometimes I just keep quiet. They seem to forget that Captain America was once a skinny boy who couldn’t defend himself on the streets. So essentially, the argument is that Captain America too is nothing without the Super Soldier Serum. Or there was a time Tony Stark was having trouble facing half baked villains who essentially were just fighting him with his own suits. In those days, he couldn’t even try standing toe to toe with Thanos. He would’ve been mince meat. But now he has all the glory. Do you hear many people say they should take away his suit? Tony Stark is Iron Man. T’Challa is Black Panther. It was an origin story. Calm down.
So then it isn’t necessarily an argument of critics versus viewers, but just an argument on opinion, which everyone is entitled to. You might think Black Panther didn’t make sense and you’re entitled to that opinion. You might even think the whole Marvel thing is a waste of time and money. Fine. It’s your right to think. Maybe I’m even biased. Form your own opinions. In a way, everyone is a critic. The question is are you achieving whatever it is you intended to achieve with whatever it is you’re doing?
In the case of Geostorm, I can’t really say they did because I don’t know what their intent was. I do know it was a commerical failure so maybe they failed. Marvel wants to impress fans and obviously make money in the process. They’re doing that. Critical acclaim is just a bonus. People like Kevin Hart don’t really get any much of critic approval but in interviews he’s always talking about how he satisfies his fans.
But just as critics aren’t relevant is the same way they are. You need to be criticised. You can’t go on your own. When people crticise you even in harsh ways, sometimes your next step to improvement is in the midst of that disappoinment and pain. You need to learn to sift through what you hear on a daily basis, know how to pick the constructive things and when to ignore it all together.
So in all, think your own thoughts and don’t let an opinion be forced on you. Decide what you want to achieve and when the negativity comes in, ask yourself whether the original intent is being met. Some people only know how to degrade a product. They’d never come up with ways to make it better. Actively seek criticism, but only from the right places.
