In the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly, in a provocative mini-essay that, alas, isn’t posted on the magazine’s website (yet), critic Lisa Schwarzbaum explains why she was more than happy to turn the chore of reviewing Captivity over to fellow EW scribe Owen Gleiberman:“It’s quite simple: I hate these movies. I won’t see these movies. Never saw Saw or its sequels, never will. I’m not impressed with the ‘quality’ of the gore or the ‘wit’ of the filmmaking. I’m not enjoyably scared; I’m horrified, and not in the way horror fans get off, groaning and screaming with pack-mentality excitement. Instead, my horror is one of disturbance and anger: Who makes this vile crap? What is remotely defensible about a movie like Captivity, in which a woman is abducted and tortured for the sake of ticket sales? Nothing, that’s what. While moviegoers can vote with their wallets, I vote with my computer keyboard. Or rather, the silence of the keys, as I stay away from stuff I have no stomach for seeing, even on the job.”
3 comments:
Joe, excellent find!! I always liked Lisa's reviews, and now I know why - she has a BRAIN!!
I hate these damn movies, too. The modern horror movie is dead, dead, dead.
www.therecshow.com
Good for Schwarzbaum. I don't necessarily share her opinion of the genre, but it's obviously not her cup of tea and if she doesn't understand it, I don't need to read her opinion of it.
What about you, Joe? Do you get to pick and choose the movies you review or are you obligated by editors?
As I have written elsewhere: At this point in my career, I see only those movies I want to watch, and those I’m paid to review. Some films (Knocked Up, Reign Over Me, The Motel, Small Engine Repair and The Prisoner: Or, How I Planned to Kill Tony Blair, to cite just a few recent examples) fall into both categories. Others don’t. I was paid to review Captivity and Black Christmas, so I did. No one offered to pay me to see Saw or Hostel (or any of any of their sequels), so I didn’t.
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