Critics aren’t useless. No, seriously.
But they watch movies differently than most people do.
If you watch several movies for a living, predictable plots become irritating, sentimentality can get punished, and a movie that simply delivers two entertaining hours may not seem particularly impressive when you’ve watched three other variations of it that month.
The rest of us have a very simple, but different question:
Was it good?
More specifically: did we enjoy it, would we recommend it, and would we watch it again?
Sometimes the answers to those questions look very different from the reviews.
Here are a few movies where I think the critics missed what mattered.
Last Action Hero (1993)
I remember when this movie came out, the press savaged it. It was so pervasive, I almost believed it… until I saw it.
Genuinely one of my favorite Arnold Schwarzenegger movies.
Here’s the plot: A young movie fan gets pulled into the world of his favorite fictional cop, Jack Slater, where the kid understands the rules better than the people living by them.
Of course the bad guy is hiding there. Of course that explosion didn’t kill anybody important. Has nobody in this movie seen a movie?
Schwarzenegger is a big part of why it works. He’s willing to make fun of the screen persona that made him famous while still delivering the action you came for. And Charles Dance is terrific as the villain.
Some of the jokes land better than others, and it could stand to be shorter. But there’s considerably more imagination here than in another movie where Arnold simply shoots his way through a warehouse.
Although, to be fair, I’d watch that too.
The Ghost and the Darkness (1996)
Val Kilmer and Michael Douglas hunting man-eating lions… do I need to say more?
Kilmer plays an engineer overseeing a railway bridge in East Africa when two lions begin killing the workers. Douglas arrives as the hunter brought in to help. Finishing the bridge becomes somewhat less important than surviving the night.
The movie builds a nasty sense of vulnerability. There’s tall grass everywhere, darkness is coming, and being inside something doesn’t necessarily mean you’re safe.
The setting, the cast, and the suspense make this an easy recommendation from me.
Just perhaps not the night before a camping trip.
The Guardian (2006)
I think the Tomatometer is broken. The Guardian has a 37%.
On what planet does that make sense? Kids making movies in high school can get 37%.
Thankfully, the audience gets it: 80% with more than 250,000 ratings.
Kevin Costner plays a veteran Coast Guard rescue swimmer, while Ashton Kutcher is the cocky young recruit who thinks talent is enough. You know where this is going.
Doesn’t matter.
Costner is perfect for this kind of role, Kutcher is better than I expected, and the training gives their relationship enough time to matter once the rescues start. There’s also something compelling about watching people whose job it is to jump into conditions everyone else is desperately trying to escape.
Veteran and rookie. Check. Huge waves. Check. Cocky young guy gets humbled. Check.
What more do you want?
For Love of the Game (1999)
Apparently I have two Kevin Costner movies to defend. Fine with me.
Costner plays Billy Chapel, an aging Detroit Tigers pitcher looking back on his career and his relationship with Jane, played by Kelly Preston, while pitching against the Yankees.
The baseball and the love story split the movie. If you only care about one, the other may test your patience.
But together they give Billy something more interesting to deal with than the next batter.
What does his life look like when baseball is over?
That’s a good subject for a sports movie, especially one about a guy who’s been doing this long enough to know the end is coming.
And to be fair, that 47% Tomatometer score isn’t completely crazy. I’d probably put this one in the Watch If Free category.
That doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy it. I did.
I like a sports movie that understands there’s a life waiting outside the stadium.
Even if the athlete hasn’t quite figured out what to do with it.
Country Strong (2010)
Country Strong is a messy movie about people making a mess of their lives.
That's it.
Maybe critics don’t like that. That might help explain the 23% Tomatometer score.
To be fair, some of that mess belongs to the screenplay, so I’m not going to pretend every criticism is unfair.
Gwyneth Paltrow plays Kelly Canter, a country star trying to make a comeback after rehab. Tim McGraw is her husband and manager, while Garrett Hedlund and Leighton Meester play younger performers joining the tour.
There’s ambition, drinking, romance, and a collection of decisions you’d probably advise everyone involved not to make.
But the music gives you a reason to care about these people as performers, even when you’re frustrated with them as people. Hedlund is a particular draw as Beau, and his scenes with Meester give the movie some needed warmth.
Don’t expect a cheerful concert movie. It gets heavy.
Still, the songs, the performances, and the relationships all worked.
I enjoyed it, flaws included.
A bad review isn’t a veto
I’m not arguing that these five movies are flawless. But I am recommending them.
Some are Watch If Free. Others are Worth Renting. Last Action Hero probably gets pretty close to Must Watch territory.
There are fair criticisms of every one, and some will bother you more than they bother me.
Big Tomato has had its say, but I say these are worth a look.
The Critics Didn't Like These. I Did.
Critics have a different job than the rest of us. Sometimes they dismiss exactly the things that make a movie fun, memorable, and worth watching again twenty years later.
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