Crazy Reviews

[BeyondTheGrave]

I am not big into reviews from "Hollywood" types but has their every been a review
 for a movie/game/product etc.. that was just completely off the mark? For example I have a video game that I knew despite reviews I was going to buy it. I always buy my games new so I read reviews from about 3 game magzines and a website to make sure its worth the money. It got ok reviews but one magzine gave some questionable reasons why it was bad. When I final played it not only was it good game but some of the reasons that made the game bad was not even in the game like if they didn't play that game at all.

Granted I know that everyone has different opinions but that review was just really off. So has this every happened to you?


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You can’t give it, you can't buy it, and you just don't get it!-Aeon Flux



Post Edited (05-18-05 13:10)

[odinn7]

I don't generally pay attention to reviews other than to get more information on a movie if I am unsure what it's about. Lately I've found that the people that review movies on this site are more believable and reliable than those idiots that get paid to review things.

[ulthar]

Well, here's a twist on that theme, but I think it fits perfectly with what you are saying.  During 2003, I was writing a book under contract with a publisher.  As I submitted chapters, they sent them to various 'experts' in the field for review and comment.  As the project was nearing completion, they sent it en masse to one particular reviewer who was supposedly some bigwig in the field; you know the type, his word is like those of God, whether he's correct or not.

He supplied a list of comments to the publisher about one particular chapter in my book that had the publisher all in a tiff.  Basically, the conclusion was that the book was worthless due to the comments this character made.  I tried to assure them that any changes would be easy to make and it was no big deal.  But alas, it was no-go; they just would not be comforted.

The real bottom line was that for him to make the comments he made, there is absolutely no way on earth he could have read that chapter.  He read the opening couple of sentences of the Intro paragraph and jumped to a conclusion that was completely erroneous.  Jerk.

It took me only two days to make the cosmetic changes that should have appeased the publisher, but by that time, I was wondering if I wanted to work with a publisher that had such little faith in the project.  I came to realize that this 'expert' reviewer probably wanted to use the book as a textbook for his classes and wanted a book perfect for that purpose (and no other, apparently).  The short version is that all of this started on a Thursday, and on Monday, I asked the publisher to release me from the contract.  In a matter of weeks, I got a new publisher, and they have the book now, nearly ready to go to printing.

Reviewers, whether of books, movies, games or whatever, have their own biases and are often blind to them.

[Menard]

I recall having read some reviews on the Blockbuster site a few years ago which seemed to come from people who had never seen the movies. A common review for Fulci's ZOMBIE (1979) states that it is about a mad doctor who raises an army of zombies (huh?). It does not seem uncommon, at least among movie reviewers, for them to use stock reviews for movies they have not seen, and a lot of these stock reviews are apparently from people who have never seen the movie either.

[daveblackeye15]

In the "Encyclopedia of Monsters" the writer got a few things wrong with his summary of "The Evil Dead" he got a few events mixed up and out of order. I know that's not a biggie but the writer should really make sure that he gets the story right. And two he got the ending wrong he said that "Ash is chased out of the forest by trees" how did he get that? Ash was struck by the Evil Spirit einstein, not a fast walking tree.

Nothing huge but still he should have gotten them right at least the order of events that happen in the movie.

[Ozzymandias]

I read a review for The Knack and How To Get It from a German guy on one of the websites that allow amatures to review movies (kind of like this one).
The guy lashed out at the film, director Richard Lester, star Michael Crawford, the score by John Barry, the Beatles (who weren't in the movie) and Superman (Lester directed 3 and 4).

He also didn't like that the characters "spoke in silly jokes" rather than "Marxist quotes" like the characters in Goddard's films. I guess he didn't realize The Knack was a COMEDY.  Nothing against Goddard, but Lester's film alone inspired the name of a rock group and the opening of two sitcoms ( The Monkees and Friends ).

[dean]

Not so much a misinformed review, but when I was reading the paper to find the movie times for Hitchhiker's guide, I noticed that the review they had for it gave it 1 star.  Now that's ok, they can say that, but then I looked further down and noticed that they gave XXX2 two and a half stars and I just thought that was crazy.

Which is why I never pay any attention to the reviews in that paper.

[Dr. Kobb]

I feel that now, more than ever, pro reviews of anything are not to be trusted.  Reason being: The constant morphing of huge corporations into mega-giganto corporations.  When a magazine (who's parent company just happens to also be the Hollywood production company who made the film) reviews a film, can they possibly do so without some measure of bias.  I don't think so.