Film Critics
I don’t usually read reviews of a movie BEFORE I see the movie. Frankly, I often times disagree with them.
For years I’ve been reading Jay Boyar in the Sentinel and his reviews of the current movies. Was I asleep at the wheel when the memo came out that he wasn’t reviewing movies anymore??
I just read Roger Moore’s review of War of the Worlds and I fully expected to see Jay’s name there.
As per usual, I disagreed. To read my take on this movie (without any spoilers), jog on over to my blog.
UPDATE: Just found an article that talks about Jay Boyar leaving the Sentinel after 22 years to become a travel editor. Apparently this announcement was made last November. So I don’t feel terribly stupid now.
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I still feel stupid. I was just the other day looking at the movie spread in the Calendar section of the Sentinel and wondered why Boyar was not listed as having reviewed any of the movies. Now it all makes sense.
I didn’t always agree with Boyar, but Moore is so bad that I find him more reliable. If Moore hates it, I’ll probably like it (and vice versa). Plus, he says the stupidest things.
Take his “War of the Worlds” review. He starts right off saying that Spielberg’s movie is a “perfectly faithful version” of both the H.G. Wells novel and the 1953 film. Forget about the fact that he makes it sound like this is a bad thing, but how the hell can it be perfectly faithful to the book and the movie when the first movie wasn’t faithful to the book? Is it set in England? Is it 1898? Are there Martians?
It’s not supposed to be faithful to the book, except in it’s tone, which Moore finds “grim, heavy and ponderous”. Well duh! Have you ever read the book? That’s exactly what I was afraid it WOULDN’T be! I was afraid it would be just another Independence Day or Signs (which is another knock against it, according to Moore).
As usual, after reading Moore’s review, I now have a good idea of whether I want to see the movie, though. I do!
Roger is a jack-ass. He gave Batman Begins 3 stars and Bewitched 4 stars. Come on. Orlando needs a REAL film critic.
Boyar and Moore are two idiot-peas in a pod.
(Boyar gave more stars to ID4 than to Jackie Brown)