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Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

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Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#391

Post by goto11 »

drnonsense42 wrote: post #387
goto11 wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This leads us to today, where critic reviews are functionally useless for the broad audience This is rather over the top, since the article clearly shows reviews and audience ratings does correlate, especially towards the top. But it is always interesting with movies where the difference of opinion is starkest. Note that the "audience ratings" does not always correlate with the average audience. Especially with div…

They haven’t sufficiently demonstrated correlation for me. I think the last chart demonstrates it’s a lot more complicated. Just one example… How many obscure art films are there with highly-selective audiences which receive perfect critical scores and perfect audience scores that mostly serve to add bias to the correlation? The movies we’re responding to- which could easily be a list of movies many average joes “car…

Presumably an average Joe watches average movies, i.e. blockbusters which are the movies which attract the largest audience. The articles shows a relatively high correlation compared to the more niche cheaper movies. But yeah, it would be cool to se correlation score for specific genres.

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#392

Post by [deleted] »

bin_bash wrote: post #389
goto11 wrote: post #361

The people rating movies on IMDB are not average audience members though. They are movie geeks and enthusiasts. But compared to professional critics, there is a significant difference because they still pre-select moves to watch based what they think they will enjoy. A movie enthusiast might have seen all science-fiction movies in existence but never a french new-wave movie. The professional critic on the other hand…

> Fans loved The Force Awakens because it was exactly the same formula as the original Star Wars. Critics were less enthusiastic. The Force Awakens has IMDB of 7.9 but RT is 93%. Audience scores are lower than critic scores.

[deleted]

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#393

Post by goto11 »

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #326
monocasa wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The critics don't decide the Oscars, the academy does. It's more a political thing than a statement of quality.

The want the same dumb, boring, monotonous somber shit every year and the Academy largely votes the way the critics tell them to.

> the Academy largely votes the way the critics tell them to

This is absolutely not the case. For example "Oscar campaigns" have significant influence on the Academy, and they happen after the critics have given their verdict.

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#394

Post by dagw »

bin_bash wrote: post #389
goto11 wrote: post #361

The people rating movies on IMDB are not average audience members though. They are movie geeks and enthusiasts. But compared to professional critics, there is a significant difference because they still pre-select moves to watch based what they think they will enjoy. A movie enthusiast might have seen all science-fiction movies in existence but never a french new-wave movie. The professional critic on the other hand…

> Fans loved The Force Awakens because it was exactly the same formula as the original Star Wars. Critics were less enthusiastic. The Force Awakens has IMDB of 7.9 but RT is 93%. Audience scores are lower than critic scores.

IMDB and RT scores cannot really be compared since they're measuring two fundamentally different things. Movie that everybody gave a 7/10 would have an RT score of 100% and an IMDB score of 7.0. Also RT scores are mostly based on reviews written shortly after the release of a movie, while IMDB scores keeps getting updated over time. For movies that come out with a burst of enthusiasm and then lose their luster on repeat viewings and closer analysis, IMDB score tend to drift downwards with time.

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#395

Post by bin_bash »

dagw wrote: post #394
bin_bash wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fans loved The Force Awakens because it was exactly the same formula as the original Star Wars. Critics were less enthusiastic. The Force Awakens has IMDB of 7.9 but RT is 93%. Audience scores are lower than critic scores.

IMDB and RT scores cannot really be compared since they're measuring two fundamentally different things. Movie that everybody gave a 7/10 would have an RT score of 100% and an IMDB score of 7.0. Also RT scores are mostly based on reviews written shortly after the release of a movie, while IMDB scores keeps getting updated over time. For movies that come out with a burst of enthusiasm and then lose their luster on rep…

On RT the audience score is also lower than the critic score. My point is simply that GP’s statement about fans preferring the film doesn’t match the numbers.

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#396

Post by dagw »

BizarroLand wrote: post #200
shrimpx wrote: post #196

Critics seem to rate movies on a global scale. How can I give this movie 9/10 when Citizen Kane is a 9/10? On that scale, this movie is at most a 6. Unsurprisingly, popular genres get trashed on that scale. Normal folks rate movies subjectively. Was it really awesome and did I love it? Then it’s a 10.

There should be a comparison system based on genre, by the best ever, this year, and this decade. Format would be something like: Compared to the best 10/10 all-time movie of the Genre, Movie A, Movie X is a 7/10. Compared to the other movies of the genre in the last year, Movie X gets a 8.5/10. Compared to the other movies of the genre this decade, Movie X gets a 7.75/10. Final verdict, 7.75/10, if you like movies i…

If you read the review and don't just look at the score, they generally make all those 'scores' implicitly clear.

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#397

Post by drnonsense42 »

goto11 wrote: post #391
drnonsense42 wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They haven’t sufficiently demonstrated correlation for me. I think the last chart demonstrates it’s a lot more complicated. Just one example… How many obscure art films are there with highly-selective audiences which receive perfect critical scores and perfect audience scores that mostly serve to add bias to the correlation? The movies we’re responding to- which could easily be a list of movies many average joes “car…

Presumably an average Joe watches average movies, i.e. blockbusters which are the movies which attract the largest audience. The articles shows a relatively high correlation compared to the more niche cheaper movies. But yeah, it would be cool to se correlation score for specific genres.

Maybe I didn’t read closely enough but I believe the article only showed correlation for “all” movies and movies with <20 million budget. It doesn’t show blockbusters or anything like that. It’s worth mentioning, too, what is considered “high correlation” should be quite different from the stock market and should be carefully debated. 0 correlation isn’t just 0 correlation; it would imply these people are aliens with different sensory inputs.

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#398

Post by watwut »

makeitdouble wrote: post #373
watwut wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I am getting your point, you are basically positing that critics are inherently disconnected for different reasons and we should see them as some fringe freaks more than anything ? They are writing for different audiences. That does not make them "freaks". And their audience is more biased toward a.) those more deeply interested in movies b.) those seeking out of mainstream weirder things. People only casually i…

I agree with your take on platform where there is near 0 barrier to entry. Netflix for instance, or TV programming. Casual people will be less willing to go through reviews to device on a piece, and they'll also probably have had other customer reviews or view count guide them in their choice. It is albeit different if to watch the movie you need to carve 3 hours of your time-off, go to a theater and pay 15€. Instead…

I had both casual and "serious" periods. And in casual period I just check IMDB score, genre and few top mini-reviews there. That is it, I definitely wont read full length article to figure out whether I want to see the movie. Half casual movie watching experience is about social anyway, you go because friends go and selection of movie is less important.

In periods when I am more interested, I don't read what movie critics write to determine whether I will see the next action movie. I read that to learn more about movies, to find movies that are different or because reading it is fun.

My point here is that movie critics nowdays are not all that much serving the function of "make average person know whether they will like the movie". Average person has easier lower effort ways to find that.

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#399

Post by crispyambulance »

edanm wrote: post #358
crispyambulance wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But to people who watch thousands upon thousands of movies this gets astoundingly boring. I would say that there's so many different ways to appreciate films, so many different types of audiences, and such wildly different intentions behind the films and the critics who write about them. It seems reductive and a bit misguided, to me, for someone to write an article about the divergence between metascore and imdb ra…

You're not totally wrong. But if I want to quickly decide if a movie is worth watching, looking up its IMDB score is a blunt but fairly decent instrument. I'm not going to read reviews of 10 movies, usually. Personally, I most enjoy watching reviews after I've seen a movie anyway, to get a critic's take on the movie I enjoyed (or didn't).

Yeah, it really depends on why you are evaluating these scores.

If it's simply to answer the question, "what will the wife and I watch tonight?" and you're presented with a algorithmically limited set of options based on your viewing habits and your up/down votes, yes, I think scores are a "good enough" blunt instrument.

If you want to explore the work of a particular director, genre, theme, period or actor but don't want to just watch all those films chronologically (or by only viewing "the blockbusters") then reading a bunch of reviews will help A LOT. The scores in that scenario would then merely be trite factoids.

Re: Are film critics losing sync with audiences?

#400

Post by janto »

chrischen wrote: post #360
janto wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Critics are not qualified to tell me what I should watch towards developing my own character. The disconnect between what they push as best and what audiences like as good, illustrates the postmodern critic's lack of relevance. Critics are pushers of entitled cynicism and ideology, not meaningful content.

But critics should be experts in the field (of movies), and at the very least have seen it all . Therefore they can commentate on what's been done before and what is actually new. > Critics are not qualified to tell me what I should watch towards developing my own character. Well yes since everyone is different critics can never satisfy that for everyone.

Requiring to have seen it all is a big problem if you identify as a critic, in all senses of the words. It's easy to be pulled in by irrelevant novelty that is not meaningful to viewers, or become disenchanted and find your critical sensibilities turn against what viewers find meaningful. There's an ideological and philosophical component here that is at the rift between critics and viewers.
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