David Cronenberg backs 'legitimate' film critics over bloggers
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Version 0 of 1. Film director David Cronenberg has rallied to the defence of “legitimate” film critics who, he suggests, have been undermined by the opportunities for self-publishing on digital media. In remarks quoted by the Canadian Press wire service, Cronenberg said: “I think the role of the critic has been very diminished, because you get a lot of people who set themselves up as critics by having a website where it says that they’re a critic.” Citing reviews aggregator websites such as Rotten Tomatoes, Cronenberg suggested that the lines between “professional” and self-appointed critics are increasingly blurred. “There are legitimate critics who have actually paid their dues and worked hard and are in a legitimate website connected perhaps with a newspaper or perhaps not ... Then there are all these other people who just say they’re critics and you read their writing and they can’t write, or they can write and their writing reveals that they’re quite stupid and ignorant.” Cronenberg’s most recent film, Maps to the Stars, has suffered typically divided reviews, with a 68% total score on Rotten Tomatoes but with the “top critics” more heavily weighted in the film’s favour (by 14 to 3). The Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw was one of the most positive, calling it “a gripping and exquisitely horrible movie about contemporary Hollywood” on its world premiere at Cannes. Cronenberg does, however, see some benefit in the emergence of the internet critic. “Some voices have emerged that are actually quite good who never would have emerged before, so that’s the upside of that. But I think it means that it’s diluted the effective critics.” |