Fair enough. I will say it points to the extremely sad state of criticism in this country. In my undergrad days, reviews were seemingly written by people who either just happened to have a ticket for the performance or were dragooned into attending, and to this day, I see and read plenty of reviews by people who give glowing notices to boring or incompetent crap or who don't understand what they saw. Fortunately, if I suffer through enough of their writing, I can use their bad judgment as a touchstone and respond accordingly. (Sidenote: I just let my long-time subscription to the SF Chronicle lapse, in large part because of the dismal state of their arts criticism. There wasn't near enough space allocated to local events -- which is actually shocking, given the Chron's provincialism -- and what was there was bad. SF's theatre scene is one of the most vibrant and innovative in the country, and it seemed like only the four major houses ever got write-ups. On the other hand, gallons of ink were devoted to photos of the patrons of the opera and symphony.)
We have plenty of -- too damn many -- reviewers (that is to say, "I went to the show and this happened, then this happened, then this happened, and everyone involved did their jobs well") and not enough critics who can or will contextualize stuff. --Dave Sikula On Friday, February 15, 2013 4:03:14 PM UTC-8, PGage wrote: > > On Fri, Feb 15, 2013 at 3:33 PM, Dave Sikula <[email protected]<javascript:> > > wrote: > >> If you consider this a mugging, I'd hate to see what you think of a >> really savage review. The guy went to the concert, didn't like it or the >> genre, and reported that. Perhaps it would have made more sense to send >> someone who was a little more inclined to like it, but jeez, I personally >> find that "fiddle and banjo crap" (© Martin Mull) excruciating to listen >> to, and would have been far less forgiving. > > > My use of the term "mugging" may not communicate my point well. I don't > care that the WaPo published a negative review of a musical genre that I > happen to like. I would not care if they published a much harsher criticism > of the band. My point is, that what they published was not a review of the > band or the concert at all. > > If you send me to a punk rock concert I would not understand what I was > listening to, nor would I care to. The "review" that I would write would > provide no information or informed opinion or reflection on the quality of > the music or the performance. It would simply be 500 words of me saying how > much I hate punk music. Now, there may be a place in a newspaper for an > opinion piece about how much I hate punk music (I should hope so), but it > should not be confused with criticism of the performance. > > When Raiders of the Lost Ark first came out I told a friend how much I > enjoyed it, including the remark "this is almost a perfect movie". I had > not yet read a review of the film, but I think several included a similar > phrase. My friend went to see the film on the strength of my review, and > came back outraged, complaining that such a comic book, childish, action > film was far from his idea of a perfect movie, going on to refer > ostentatiously to Wild Strawberries and Citizen Cane. I tried to explain to > him that movies have to be judged in context, and according to what they > are trying to be. Raiders comes as close to fully realizing in every > respect the kind of film it is trying to be than all but 8 or 9 other films > ever made, and in that sense is just about perfect. > > I am a Professor of Psychology at a liberal arts college. A couple of > years ago a student came to my office and just blasted me two weeks into > one of my courses for being a bad teacher. Her reasons for my being a bad > teacher were that I spend all of my time in class on scientific evidence > related to human behavior and cognition, and did not spend any time on > intuitive and subjective reflections on human mystical, spiritual and > psychic abilities. I am no stranger to negative reviews of my teaching from > undergraduates, but in this case I had to (eventually) interrupt the > student and point out that she was not really telling me the ways in which > I was a bad teacher, but telling me why she did not like academic > psychology as taught in American colleges and universities. We agreed that > unless she was interested in reconsidering her views, she might be better > off just withdrawing from the class, but that I was not really going to > take her feedback seriously or try to implement it. > > I would be interested in a folk music expert writing a review that > explains why Mumford falls fall short of what good folk music should sound > like. I might even be interested in a punk rock expert writing a review of > why he is able to appreciate some folk music, but not Mumford because they > are trite or cliched or whatever. I am not interested in a punk rock fan > pretending to write a review of Mumford but instead simply indulging his > unreflected and (apparently) uninformed opinion about folk music in > general, and that is why I refer to it as a mugging and not a review. > > -- -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
