Friday, June 27, 2008

Fuck Peter Travers

A fact you may not be aware of: Peter Travers is the worst film critic in existence. Yes, worse than Roeper. Yes, worse than Zombie Siskel. And yes, worse even this guy. (that guy is one bad movie critic. damn).

So anyway, I moseyed on over to metacritic to see if they'd posted any reviews of The Dark Knight yet, because I'm starting to obsess about it just the teeniest bit. And they had one posted. Travers' review. And I read the whole review - and he gushes about the movie (probably for the wrong reasons) - but they chose to excerpt this quote. God have mercy on you, Peter Travers:

"No fair giving away the mysteries of The Dark Knight. It's enough to marvel at the way Nolan — a world-class filmmaker, be it Memento, Insomnia or The Prestige — brings pop escapism whisper-close to enduring art."

1.Pop escapism? I understand, movies where people dress up in costumes and save the day are usually examples of pop escapism. But this is a movie in which a homicidal maniac drives the seriously imbalanced guy who dresses up at night like a bat to the edge of his sanity, all while the district attorney loses his mind and becomes a second homicidal maniac. Mmm, I can feel my worries about the economy receding already.

2.Whisper-close? You see, Nolan was trying really, really hard to make this particular piece of pop escapism "enduring art." He didn't make though. Kudos for almost making it, says Peter Travers.

3.Enduring art? How the fuck does Peter Travers know this movie won't endure. I mean, it's one thing if he says it's not art; I'm sure he's wrong, but he could say something like that. But it's not enduring? HOW THE HELL HAS A MOVIE THAT HASN'T COME OUT YET NOT QUALIFIED AS ENDURING? Apparently he has some sort of movie almanac from the future, which he's going to use to rule the world.

4.Pop escapism and enduring art are mutually exclusive? Last time I checked, both AFI top 100 lists had put Star Wars, The Wizard of Oz, and Singin' in the Rain in the top 15 greatest American movies ever made. Pop escapism? Check. Enduring art? Check.

This is the closest thing to a rant I have yet published. It's not very civilized. And I haven't even seen the movie in question, and I'm sure I just exposed myself as a raving lunatic fanboy unworthy of a keyboard, let alone a blog. Sorry.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

anything peter travers endorses, i steer way clear of.

Ashley said...

I second anonymous's comment. I have hated Travers ever since I began reading film reviews.

Anonymous said...

WTF are you even talking about....Travers loved The Dark Knight, it's on his top films of the year list.

Anonymous said...

Phucking moron. Peter Travers is by far the best movie critic today. It's obvious that "anonymous" has a shrine to Rex Reed in his/her/its bathroom, and yeah, Travers is tied in with an annoying pop magazine, but at least he shoots from the hip and isn't afraid dump on movies that seriously suck. I wouldn't put Batman on my best of list either, but Ledger was a force to be reckoned with, and loved every minute of his screen time. It's clear that "anonymous" is mostly pissed that Travers did not like "Bride Wars" and is just venting. Suck it.

Anonymous said...

A.Did you fools not see heath ledgers oscar preformance.
B.Inception enough said
C.The departed
D.No country for old me
E.Mystic river
Ill go to Z if i haven't made my point and you saying you stay away from anything he endourses i guess your to busy watching twilight to know what a movie is