Crashing the critics' party

Going into the evening, I had absolutely no intention of watching this year's Academy Awards (and certainly not devoting one of my precious few blog post to them). No films I felt particularly attached to. A host I'm not particularly a fan of. But channeel surfing produced nothing better, so I embarked on the three-and-a-half-hour odyssey with the rest of America. I tried to tear away by some impromptu channel surfing throughout the show, but it seemed no other network was interested in competing with ABC tonight, so I was there for every video montage, foreign language film and live short action film.

I did find one way to entertain myself: Root for every underdog and film or person that critics didn't pick to win. Call it my protest of all those people who make me feel bad for going to see or enjoying a movie they didn't put their stamp of approval on. You see, film critics and I have a bit of a rocky relationship. There are those that I feel really want to inform people about the art they care deeply about. Those critics I can respect, even if I don't agree with their words. Then there are those critics — a great many of them — who seem to despise the people they're writing to. The ones who like to constantly remind us we are dumb and uneducated for enjoying a film that they did not endorse. The ones who believe their is only one good taste in film — theirs. It makes me wonder. Why do we listen to a few people tell us what is good or entertaining or quality in an art so subjective as film?

Not that I can't empathize with how the critic feels. It's the same way when I pick up a newspaper or watch a newscast on TV. I can't just enjoy them. I pick them apart — from their design to their use of quotations. Outsiders look at me strange if I go off on a diatribe about poor writing or design. They don't notice the subtleties of the use of a dominant element. So I understand perfectly well the feelings going on inside the critics head. But then again, I don't devote several hundred words in my next column telling every reader why they shouldn't read a certain newspaper or how thousands of dollars was wasted on the production of a certain poorly designed front page.

After all, it's hard being the expert among the masses of the uneducated. Having to listen to people talk about a process they know very little about. Listening to everyone else praise something you know was technically flawed. But the questions stands: Why not just let the masses enjoy it? Whether it's a newspaper or a movie, just because it doesn't live up to the expectations of the experts doesn't mean no one else should be able to enjoy it.

So I'll make a deal with you, film critics. You go on reviewing the art that you care so much about. But let me enjoy it, too. Don't make me feel bad for enjoying Crash or thinking that it was a good movie. Don't make me feel uncultured or out of touch for not rushing out to see Brokeback Mountain. Don't look down on me for spending $7.50 to see a popular but poorly reviewed summer blockbuster.

The arts are mine too — even if I don't know a thing about them.