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Hollywood Producer Blames Rotten Tomatoes For Convincing People Not To See His Movie (vanityfair.com)

Posted by msmash on from the wait-what dept.

An anonymous reader shares a VanityFair report: These days, it takes less than 60 seconds to know what the general consensus on a new movie is -- thanks to Rotten Tomatoes, the review aggregator site that designates a number score to each film based on critical and user reviews. Although this may be convenient for moviegoers not necessarily interested in burning $15 on a critically subpar film, it is certainly not convenient for those Hollywood directors, producers, backers, and stars who toiled to make said critically subpar film. In fact, the site may be "the worst thing that we have in today's movie culture" -- at least according to Brett Ratner, the Rush Hour director/producer who recently threw the financial weight of his RatPac Entertainment behind Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. Sure, the blockbuster made over $850 million worldwide in spite of negative reviews ... but just think of how much more it could have made had it not had a Rotten Tomatoes score of 27 percent! Last week, while speaking at the Sun Valley Film Festival, Ratner said, "The worst thing that we have in today's movie culture is Rotten Tomatoes. I think it's the destruction of our business."

25 of 395 comments (clear)

  1. Fixed That For You by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hollywood Producer Blames Rotten Tomatoes For Convincing People Not To See His Shitty Movie

    1. Re:Fixed That For You by Rei · · Score: 5, Funny

      Come on, be sensitive. Some people spent their whole weekend making that movie.

      --
      Aeris Died For Your Sins.
    2. Re:Fixed That For You by DickBreath · · Score: 5, Funny

      Very few animals were harmed in the making of this motion picture.

      --

      I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
    3. Re:Fixed That For You by Jeff+DeMaagd · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I think it's worse than that. The guy's movie netted big and yet he feels his movie should have been entitled even bigger windfall despite having plot holes that Superman can throw a container ship through.

      Rotten Tomatoes has a Critics score *and* an Audience score. A lot of popular movies have a higher audience score. BvS has a 63% audience score. Iron Man 3 got 78% audience score. Lest it be a Marvel v. DC thing, The Dark Knight got 94% audience score *and* 94% critic score, so it's not like so many reviewers are snobs about comic book super hero movies.

    4. Re:Fixed That For You by lbmouse · · Score: 5, Funny

      Hollywood Grassfucker Blames Rotten Tomatoes For Convincing People Not To See His Shitty Movie

      FTFY - If we are going to go all filthy-critic.

    5. Re: Fixed That For You by VernonNemitz · · Score: 5, Insightful

      "I think it's the destruction of our business."
      If that's the business of recycling old ideas, without adding any significant new ideas, then why not?

  2. Poor business by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If your business depends on tricking people into watching crappy movies, it deserves to die.

    1. Re:Poor business by Jhon · · Score: 5, Insightful

      One guys "crap" is another guys entertainment.

      The problem is that any given reviewer wont "mesh" with what *YOU* like. Or what *I* like. In the dark ages (before www), I used to religiously read two or three movie reviewers in my area. After 5 or 6 reviews the lights clicked. If X liked a given movie it would be likely that I WOULDN'T like it. If Y liked a movie, then it was pretty good odds that I would enjoy it. It was a bit more complicated than that but that's the gist. I learned what THEIR criteria was pretty quick.

      Occasionally, I'd see a crappy movie my "rules" would indicate I would enjoy it or vise versa but it was otherwise pretty accurate.

      Good example of an exception -- Back to the Beach (1980s reunion movie). I did *NOT* want to see that film. Some friends and I went to see the latest Bond film (can't recall what it was) but it was sold out. They decided to see this and I didn't drive. Everything told me that this movie would be crap. I'm embarrassed to say I enjoyed it. The opening on the airliner set the tone and it was just fun to watch. My "rules" told me to avoid this film like the plague.

    2. Re:Poor business by omnichad · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Rober Ebert was a genius, though. He understood that pretentious movies are not the ultimate in entertainment and is sometimes cheap crap is great.

      Just look at this snip from his review of Gremlins (movie picked at random):

      "Gremlins" is a confrontation between Norman Rockwell's vision of Christmas and Hollywood's vision of the blood-sucking monkeys of voodoo island..... At the level of Pop Movie-going, it's a sophisticated, witty B movie, in which the monsters are devouring not only the defenseless town, but decades of defenseless clichés.

  3. Can't see the forest for all the trees by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The problem isn't the review aggregators; it's the constant stream of bad movies.

    1. Re:Can't see the forest for all the trees by thegarbz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The problem isn't the review aggregators; it's the constant stream of bad movies.

      Yeah translation: More people would have seen our film if they didn't know it was garbage.

  4. EULA by goombah99 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Perhaps there needs to be an End User License Agreement for movies that bars unfavorable reviews. **ducks**

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
    1. Re:EULA by gnick · · Score: 5, Funny

      Maybe snuck in with the previews? "By continuing to watch this, all viewers agree to give this movie perfect reviews. If you disagree, please forfeit your ticket purchase now."

      In a related story, Consumer Reports just labelled the car I'm selling, "unsafe at any speed." Obviously, my next step is to sue Consumer Reports so that I can improve the safety of my cars.

      --
      He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
    2. Re:EULA by gnick · · Score: 4, Funny

      The ejection seat occasionally fires while the car is stopped. Admittedly, it was a questionable design choice.

      --
      He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
  5. Yes, you entitled fuck, it is the destruction... by mellon · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...of your abusive business model, where you make shit films, charge too much for them, trick people into going with clever advertising, and then get laws passed that criminalize format-shifting because you're so afraid that a tiny bit of revenue will slip through your greedy fingers. Even Hollywood accounting can't win in a free market. Man, that really sucks. Your life is so hard.

  6. No, it's the hour in the middle you can skip by ka9dgx · · Score: 4, Informative

    I watched the movie in question online a few weeks ago, I got bored and skipped an hour in the middle, and honestly don't think I missed anything important. I can't possibly imagine having to wait though the ever so slow plot line in a movie theater with no other distractions available.

    1. Re:No, it's the hour in the middle you can skip by DarkOx · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Did not watch myself. No need the concept is stupid on its face. Either super wild liberties would have to be taken with cannon, at which point its not the same story any more an using the existing character names and treating their elements as a grab bag is just lazy writing or Batman was going to have to use some device based on Kryptonite to be competitive with the S. Super boring and super predictable just like all DC's shitty Justice League stuff.

      It all gets a pass because Batman comics were inventive and cool, Superman comics told a story the public needed to hear at a certain time and will always be loved.

      Puting the two together though is just silly. Superman is for all intents and purposes a god. While not wholly omnipotent, he is so far above man that he can freely toss our greatest war machines around like children's toys and even slow the spin of earth altering time. Batman simply isn't in his league. Additionally Superman's original character was almost Christ like in his unfailing sense of justice and strength of character regarding doing the right thing. The Superman of the early comics would never have agreed to even associate with the Bat, so okay we have some conflict but we know who should prevail; Batman is going to have to come around to the S in terms of how they resolve any external conflict.

      There just isn't any story there. The only reason those comics get read and the only reason that movie got watched all is the audience is hopelessly uncritical. They love the characters so much they will watch or read anything with them no matter how strained the story surrounding them is. Personally I love both Batman and Superman to much to allow these dumb mashups to ruin them both for me.

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
  7. Re:Rotten Tomatoes is getting self-important by peragrin · · Score: 4, Informative

    Bateman vs super man was a mediocre movie at best. The problem is these are big characters and you had no backstory for. 2 out of 3 main characters were new. If they had done a Bateman movie alone with Ben affalac (?) and had the ending, a cut scene etc tie it into Bateman vs super man it would have been a much better movie. Bonus you could also tie in sucide squad members being arrested after a confrontation with Batman.

    It took Marvel a couple of tries to realize that. Now people look for cutscenes for the next marvel movie.

    If you go back to 2007 and iron man and play the movies and tv shows in order you get a mostly consistent plot.

    Batman vs super man is taking the plot of avengers 2 with out the character building arcs to make you care.

    --
    i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
  8. Re:Or... by omnichad · · Score: 4, Informative

    They're able to - they just don't want the risk. Rebooting old movies from the 80's or making yet another sequel is safe - even if it's terrible people will buy tickets (unless they're warned in advance by terrible reviews).

    Turns out, it's not safe to make garbage and expect to turn a profit.

  9. Re:Rotten Tomatoes is getting self-important by ophix · · Score: 4, Funny

    I went in expecting a terrible movie and was pleasantly surprised to find it was a mediocre movie. I still think it deserves the poor RT rating though

  10. Quit making crappy movies. by WCMI92 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's very simple. Stop remaking the same movies over and over. Come up with something NEW for once.

    --
    Corporatism != Free Market
  11. Re:The Lemming Society is pathetic. by jareth-0205 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I find humans being utterly reliant upon reviews for every fucking thing in their life completely pathetic. Can't even drink a cup of coffee or eat a pizza without asking a panel of five-star rated liars. Ever heard of product satisfaction being subjective?

    Use your own brain for once and make your own judgements. Live a little. Good or bad, it is satisfying knowing at the end of the day the decisions you made were yours, and not made based on sponsored bullshit.

    Or, you have limited time and resources, try to spend it wisely. I see about 6 films a year, and I would prefer them not to be terrible if possible. Why would you *not* use the resources available to you to pick well?

  12. Blame the others by damaki · · Score: 5, Interesting

    All recent DC Comics universe movies are know to have had an awfully hectic production process. The producers, and generally the Fox production teams have turned the movies into horrible mess.
    By the way, Batman VS Superman is surely not the worst of all. Sure it is bad, but not so bad. This movie is just an average failure.
    Man of Steel was a total trainwreck. The worst is that it looks awful. Visually, Man of Steel is the worst high budget movie I have seen for years. It looks like utter crap. It feels like the director had no steering power over his own film to make it consistent. I had not seen so many lens flares in a video since I watched Babylon V. The colors are mostly awful, and for whatever reason, the time in the movie is almost always late afternoon, whether the scene is in the US or in the foreign country. As a photographer I know that the golden hours sure look good, but it should be used sparingly.
    How can such high budget movies can be shot so badly?

    --
    Stupidity is the root of all evil.
  13. Re:Rotten Tomatoes is getting self-important by operagost · · Score: 5, Funny

    Bateman vs super man was a mediocre movie at best.

    I would pay good money to see Jason Bateman versus Superman. Should there be an Arrested Development tie-in?

    If they had done a Bateman movie alone with Ben affalac

    I didn't know the duck's name was Ben. But if AFLAC reconciled with Gilbert Gottfried and got him to do the voice, I would be waiting in line to see that one as well.

    --

    Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
  14. Ratner's Resume by Volfied · · Score: 5, Informative

    Brett Ratner is one of the biggest problems in Hollywood, not Rotten Tomatoes. Here's his directorial resume (I count one decent movie):

      2014/I Hercules
      2011 Tower Heist
      2007 Rush Hour 3
      2006 X-Men: The Last Stand
      2004 After the Sunset
      2002 Red Dragon
      2001 Rush Hour 2
      2000 The Family Man
      1998 Rush Hour
      1997 Money Talks