The Role of Expectations in Movie Reviews

1989-12 CSUF Back Pages movie review - Drowning in a sensuous Sea — 1989-12 CSUF Back Pages movie review – Drowning in a sensuous Sea

My first assignment writing for CSUF’s student newspaper, The Daily Titan, was working on the Back Pages section, doing mostly movie and music reviews. I loved that job. It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who knows me that I love movies. I love being taken away on a journey. I love movies that make me think, which is why I’m a big sci-fi fan. I love a good story, especially if I cannot anticipate where it’s going. As a writer, I’m a sucker for movies about artists and creatives struggling to make their dream happen. At the same time, I know that I need to adjust my expectations based on the genre of movie that I’m going to watch. It would be dumb to expect a Mel Brooke’s film to be a tear jerker or to expect for there to be no bloodshed in a Tarantino movie. There was a local LA movie critic on ABC TV in the 1970s that bugged the crap out of me because he judged every movie on how good it was as a serious drama. I can only guess that he did this because he hated the silly Burt Reynold action movies that were popular. There was and still is a lot of crap out there, but this guy didn’t help sort things out at all.

This past Sunday, after the Oscars a friend posted on Facebook about not getting why Oppenheimer was such a big deal. Which reminded me of a podcaster who said that he was taken out of the movie when they showed the test of the first atomic bomb and used a yellow/orange flash of light instead of white light, because he knew that Nolan preferred practical effects and used conventional gasoline pyrotechnics when witnesses of the above ground atomic tests “reported” that the flash was white. Sometimes I don’t get it when really smart people seem to miss the point of what the filmmaker seems to be attempting to do. Another critic was “meh” about the recent release of Dune Part 2 saying that it felt flat. He said that the only really exciting part was Paul’s first ride on a sand worm. Really? What was he judging the movie against? What more did it need for him to be “satisfied” with the movie? Granted, it is the second part of a three part story and most part 2’s suffer from a slight dip at the end that’s expected to be resolved in the third part. But to say that the movie was “meh” and flat, I don’t get that.

I’m a fan of movies, so maybe that makes me too forgiving. When I saw Cameron’s Avatar 15-years ago I wasn’t taken out of the movie because it was relatively predictable and I felt like the comparison with Dances with Wolves was too harsh. I saw it in a relatively full theater in 3-D and left the theater wanting to spend more time on Pandora. I wanted more. I’ve loved most of what Marvel has been doing since the first Iron Man because they’ve told stories of flawed people with extraordinary abilities and equally huge responsibilities struggling to do the right thing. I felt like the last Black Panther wasn’t as good as the first and that the story of this hero’s journey was less convincing. Then again, how do you come back from losing someone like Chadwick Boseman. I was entertained, but felt the loss of the original Black Panther.

For a time I only watched Sci-fi/Action Adventures because I needed to be taken on a journey and needed to forget about the pressures of the rest of my life (a no-win scenario called public school teaching…. I’m better now, thanks). I still needed the stories to have some intelligence and internal-logic but I stayed away from dramas because I didn’t need more emotional pressure in my life. Like any escape, it didn’t make anything any better in my real life, except that I had fun for the several hours I spent in the theater. That’s what I was going for and that’s what I got. Then there was a time when I was able to share my love of movies with my siblings and we’d make a point to watch whatever big movie was happening, like the Lord of the Ring, together. Friends, family, significant others, it’s been an important through line in my life to be able to share a love for movies together.

I don’t expect some movie to answer life’s questions. Just give me a good story, let me identify and care about the characters, make me feel something, let me think about that world and maybe linger a bit wondering about their next story. Every once in a while, maybe the story helps me see something outside of my own experiences or expectations, outside of my assumptions. I saw a documentary, Beyond Utopia, that told the story of several families trying to escape North Korea for a better life. And even though I’m only two-generations removed from my own grandparents leaving their home in Mexico, making a decision between moving to Kansas or California, this isn’t something that I regularly think about or imagine what they must have gone through and all the “what ifs” about leaving home. I appreciate that filmmakers and creators out there are trying to tell all these different kinds of stories.

It’s far too easy to pass judgment from Facebook and dismiss someone’s efforts as something less than what they would have done (like any of us have the means, talent or ability to do what it takes to make a feature motion picture… ha!). There are some stinkers out there, but given all of the great stuff out there, I generally don’t bother with the crap. I just don’t have that kind of time (and have already wasted a hell of a lot of it just channel surfing and watching movie trailer after movie trailer… my bad). I don’t know what to tell you if you don’t get why Oppenheimer is worth watching. Maybe lower your assumptions and expectations and look for the struggles of the characters trying to do something that they feel is ultimately essential. It helps when they get most of the history correct, but it is a movie and they are going to leave out stuff that gets in the way of the story they’re trying to tell. If something about the director’s or actors’ personal lives distracts you from seeing what’s going on in the movie, that’s unfortunate and maybe you shouldn’t bother with that movie (or read less US magazine….). If all you see in Poor Things is a Frankenstein rip-off with way too much skin, then you’re missing this fable’s message. It’s a morality tale where the assumed “deviant” doesn’t suffer the consequences for questioning cultural expectations and exploring everything that it means to being human. I found it a bit sad (and funny) when I saw some reactions against Poor Things in social media because of the sexual content. What were you expecting? It’s right in the trailer when Bella asks her lover after they’d obviously engaged in sex, “Why don’t people do this all the time?!” What do you think she was talking about? Literature?!

Well, I need to catch up on For All Mankind and StarTrek: Lower Decks. I hope y’all find the entertainment you’re looking for and that it speaks to you in positive ways. Part of what it means to being human is the connections we make with one another through our storytelling, that’s why I love movies.