The Erosion of Criticism Over Time in Regards to Film

     Okay, so it's a stupid title.  I'm staying with it.   So there.

     It has long concerned me how people change their minds about certain films due to public perception.  Even critics do this.  They don't admit they were wrong in the first place either.  Oh no.  Critics have huge egos.  They just tend to pretend they thought a certain way about a film or director all along.  They've never made a mistake.  I believe most of you probably know that Stanley Kubrick films are pretty much universally loved by critics and that he's considered godlike by film lovers.  His work is brought up time and time again as some of the most important and greatest in cinema history.  Well....  When his films came out, and by this I mean pretty much all of them, critics were at best mixed in their appraisals, if not downright hostile.  For instance, Roger Ebert's initial review of The Shining (which can not be found on his site anymore) was negative.  It's now on his Great Movies list.  Clockwork Orange was deemed so immoral by film critics in the early 1970s, including by my own favorite critic Pauline Kael, that they trashed the film completely in their reviews saying it desensitized.  Barry Lyndon opened to mix reviews in 1975, and reviews are now considerably more positive.  2001 was considered a beautiful but pompous misfire.  It's not regularly mentioned among the best films ever made.  The only films of his that I can think of that got mixed reviews then and still get them now are Eyes Wide Shut and Lolita.  It seems as if these critics and indeed some audiences too, didn't like being in the minority as the world grew to love these films.

     It's not just Kubrick either.  There are films that were considered downright failures that are now considered classics or great works of cinema at the very least.  Some due to studio interference causing the director's vision to be cut down (Brazil and Blade Runner), some due to the political landscape (Citizen Kane and High Noon), and some just because who knows the hell why (Night of the Hunter and Bonnie & Clyde).   I suppose it could be argued that audiences were just not ready for some of these films, and that over the years they've grown to appreciate them.  Sort of like how there are some people who grumble about new technologies at first, and then 5 years later they can't live without them.  Of course, sometimes we love things at first, then notice we were horribly wrong...

      Remember M. Night Shyamalan?  Of course you do.  He's still around.  How about this?  Remember when he could do no wrong, and how he was going to be the modern day Hitchcock?  Now, pinpoint when that ended.  I know some of you are thinking Signs.  Others are probably thinking The Village or The Happening.  Well, a lot of people today consider Shyamalan to be a hack.  A horrible writer, not a much better director.  And I know a lot of these same people were the ones gushing over The Sixth Sense and Signs when they came out.  Well, the only movie he directed that got great reviews was The Sixth Sense.  To a slightly lesser extent Signs did.  I had thought Unbreakable got great reviews, but looking it up I found out that it got mixed reviews.  Guess what?  That's now considered his best film by many people.  Signs, which was so glorified by audiences when it came out is now routinely shat upon.  You'd think that audiences had hated it the whole time.  Even The Sixth Sense is now routinely trashed.  Now it's true that the man has made a few horrible, horrible films in the past few years, including this year's After Earth.  People now let out a collective giggle/groan when they see his name come up in movie trailers.  It's hard to think that just over a decade ago we considered him to be another Hitchcock.  What happened?  Did we decide to view his older films under a more critical eye due to his recent crap?  Did he just get really bad, really fast?  Did he die and get replaced by a lookalike sort of like what happened to Paul McCartney?!  I'm not sure.  I'm not one of those that hates on his older work (though his new work does suck). 

     Sometimes a huge mega-film comes out that everyone is looking forward to.  Remember this? 

Yeah, the most looked-forward to film in the past 25 years.  I remember how giddy us nerds were.  A new Star Wars!  Oh my God!  I can't wait to see new lightsaber battles!  New aerial dogfights!  More fun!  And then the film came out.  And you know what?  Besides some back of the room chatter (read: internet chatrooms), people originally thought it was at least alright.  It's hard to believe it, but though a bit disappointing, this film wasn't considered the great big pile of Lucas-dung that it is considered now.  No, that took a year or two.  Remember when Titanic came out and was surprisingly a huge hit?  (It was originally considered to be a massive failure.  It started doing better through word of mouth.)  Remember how the critics loved it?  Then they hype died a few years later and it's now got a very mixed reception.  Some love it, some hate it, others are indifferent. 

     This sort of thing happens faster and faster every year now.  It took years for The Shining and Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory to be considered classics or even to get good reviews.  It took years for people to realize that the 1976 version of King Kong and the 1970 film Airport were not the great films that everyone initially thought they were.  But now things can go great for films initially, only to suffer a gradual re-appraisal even just months later.  The Dark Knight Rises was released just last year to semi-critical acclaim.  Not to the extent of The Dark Knight, but more along the lines of Batman Begins.  It's now started to suffer a gradual chipping away of good graces just like its predecessor did.  If a film is overhyped now, there's a group of angry mouth-breathing sycophants just waiting to metaphorically beat the film into submission.  It's almost like these people have decided they need to show Hollywood who's boss.  And it's really annoying.  Though I can understand their need to lash out.  You also have fanboys who will stand by their film no matter what.  Their film/filmmaker is perfect and can do no wrong.  The internet causes a lot of strife... but we carry on.

     I think the whole reason I wrote this article is to point out that though a film may be considered junk or an absolute cinematic masterpiece today, there is no guarantee that in twenty years time views will be the same.  Hell, people have already started to jump on Richard Donner's Superman as some sort of travesty that must be erased by a remake with comic book fans in mind.  There are some that consider J.J. Abrams' Star Trek films to be the pinnacle of the franchise simply because it's not old fashioned, it's sleek, and it has lots of action.  People are weary of the new Star Wars film, partially due to the prequel trilogy's shortcoming, partially due to some peoples' distrust of J.J. Abrams.  Expectations can indeed poison the well, and I think people should know this.  Everyone needs something to complain about.  And with every new movie, they will... eventually.  Hate gets you an audience.  And you aren't a celebrity unless you have an audience. 

    Will we have classics in a few years?  Sure.  But will any modern films be considered classics?  I say that blockbusters will not.  Films like Argo, The King's Speech, Inglourious Basterds, and The Social Network will be the types of film that stand the test of time I think.  It'll be much like the early to mid 1970s where the dramas and more adult-oriented films get to be considered the best of the time-period instead of audience-pleasers like The Apple Dumpling Gang or this year's Iron Man 3.  Sure, some will carry over.  I'm sure The Avengers and Inception will be considered great films for years to come.  Others however will be left by the wayside.  Films that will be mentioned in ways like "Hey, remember The Man of Steel?!"  or "Alice In Wonderland!  Man I ain't seen that in years!  I remember everyone loved this movie. What happened?"  Yeah....  Don't bet on the current opinion being the lasting one.