Posted on 06/17/2018 8:15:20 AM PDT by EdnaMode
“Ocean’s 8” currently sits at a 68% on Rotten Tomatoes. That’s enough for a “fresh” rating, but perhaps not as high as the studio or the stars of the film had hoped for. Well, if you talk to a couple of the actresses involved in the female-led heist film, they have an idea why that might be – a lack of diversity among the film critics.
The issue of white men dominating film criticism is a bit of a hot-button issue over the last week or so. Ever since a report was published that shined a light on the fact that white men make up the vast majority of critics on Rotten Tomatoes, people have been speaking out, hoping that more underrepresented people would get their chance to contribute to the film criticism conversation.
READ MORE: Sandra Bullock Says Actresses In The ‘Ghostbusters’ Reboot “Literally Walked Into A Firing Squad”
And during an interview recently (via Telegraph), Sandra Bullock and Cate Blanchett, previously mentioned stars of “Ocean’s 8,” agree with that sentiment. “It would be nice if reviewers reflected who the film is for, like children should review children’s films, not a 60-year-old man,” said Bullock. “I guess his opinion would be kind of skewed.”
She continued, saying she would like there to be “balancing out the pool of critics so that it reflects the world we are in, like we are trying to reflect the world that I live in and my friends live in.”
“It’s not just all men. I love men, I want to be at the table with men but I also want to be invited to the table that the men are at”, she added. “I don’t know, but let’s see, let’s try it.”
READ MORE: ‘Ocean’s 8’ Is Familiar, But Still Sparkles With Cinematic Delights [Review]
When Blanchett was asked about if she believes Hollywood is getting better about featuring films that tell female stories, she continued the film criticism conversation by saying, “It’s Hollywood but it’s also the media, because a studio can support a film and it’s the invisible faces on the internet, and often male reviewers, who can view it through a prism of misunderstanding, and so I think that is a really big part of the equation.”
This idea that films should be reviewed by critics that are the target audience isn’t receiving universal praise, however. On social media, the discussion has been varied, with many stating that diversity is needed but Bullock and Blanchett’s assertion that certain films should be reviewed by certain people isn’t the answer.
Film critic Alison Willmore summed it up on Twitter, saying, “Maybe reviews of OCEAN’S 8 would have skewed more positive if it’d been majority women-identifying critics reviewing it. Maybe not! If you need to erase the opinions of female critics who didn’t like it in order to make this argument, it’s not a good one. Women aren’t monolithic!”
Alison Willmore ✔ @alisonwillmore The push for greater diversity in criticism should come on the basis that more people from more backgrounds should be heard weighing in on a film, not on people arguing their movie obvi would have done better critically — you can't know that and it shouldn't matter
Alison Willmore ✔ @alisonwillmore "This movie isn't for you" is the same argument an angry teen boy uses when telling me why I shouldn't get to weigh in on SUICIDE SQUAD. It's also an argument whose end point is that there should never be bad reviews, because that just means the critic wasn't the right audience
A friend asked me if I’d like to see Oceans 8 with her. I politely declined.
Says the misandryst.
I move that only women attend future Cate Blanchett and Sandra Bullock films.
Make that misandrist.
Just wait for some bimbo to try and review an Action movie. Some guy can then raise a hand and say, "Hold on there little Lady. You just keep your mouth shut, okay? No one cares what you think. It's a man's movie and you just wouldn't understand it."
I'm holding out for Ocean's ℵ0.
I watched the Trailer and it told me all I needed to know about the Movie , YUCK
I have no interest in an over done story acted by has beens mouthing words. I wouldn’t pay a penny to see any of these females.
“It would be nice if reviewers reflected who the film is for, like children should review children’s films, not a 60-year-old man,” said Bullock. “I guess his opinion would be kind of skewed.”
Ahh, Sandra. You are the kind of silly tool that socialists love.
The Ghostbusters reboot SUCKED - PERIOD. I actually went into it with an open mind but the story, jokes, acting just fell completely and totally flat.
The reason for building the ghost tech (from scratch) made absolutely no sense - In the original they built the proton packs specifically to capture ghosts purely as a get rich quick scheme. In the remake they just want to prove ghosts exist which they do in the first 5 minutes and then decide that they need to show the world that they were right so they build proton packs to .. uh... capture ghosts to prove that ghosts exist and will do it in a fire house so they can... uh... act like the guys did in the first movie. Then they hire a hunky male-bimbo secretary because they want to show how men stereotype secretaries (except janine was never treated as a bimbo in the original movie) then bad ghosts show up and they hunt down the ghosts to prove that they were real...
Of course Spy was a horribly panned movie too but they can’t blame that on the male patriarchy.
Haven’t seen Ocean’s 8 and have no desire to as the original Ocean’s 11 (and the remake) were about a complex heist and the mechanics of such to rob a bank. The trailer has only shown me that Ocean’s 8 is more about grrl powa and girls having fun than trying to actually rob a bank. That doesn’t sound like fun to me.
Well most male film critics are fags, so that might explain it.
Wow, they’re really getting defensive on this film. Mindy Kaling came out with the same talking points yesterday.
Another brilliant celeb with an IQ of at least 37.
“Prism Of Misunderstanding” = the movie sucked
Why has it suddenly become ok to be overly derivative. The Ocean movies are either fun to watch or they are not. They are not critical movies. They aren’t art, they are fun. If these women don’t produce a fun movie which is hard since its a 5th derivative of the original, then they are not going to have a hit. These ladies can all work hard to promote the film. And they can pay for lots of promotional ads. And who cares what the critics say. The critics did not like Star Wars or Caddyshack when they first came out. Maybe if there were more gopher and droid critics, they would have gotten better ratings.
There have been numerous movies that were trashed by the critics that nonetheless became box office sensations.
“...When Blanchett was asked about if she believes Hollywood is getting better about featuring films that tell female stories...”
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I’d like to see Hollywood just make a film using a good *story*, and not all the “social” construct. Seems everything they put out now is about gender, sexual orientation, and race.
We’re NOT going to attend films that give us a pseudo-LECTURE about the poor minorities problems. We all have our own problems in life, but heretofore we could escape for a little while with a good movie...not any more.
So, I just stay home, watch a little (non-liberal) TV, read a book, or surf the net.
The Hollywooders are so rich, and elite, they don’t need my money, at all.
Bullock has gone to the *other side*, and is not a draw, for me.
It was bad not because it was all female but because it was a bad film, period ( no pun intended). Pacing was slow, gratuitous flashbacks destroyed the narrative structure, characters were unappealing, the acting was unnatural, and the plot holes were big enough to drive a fleet of hazmat response trucks through side by side.
Apparently the balkanization of society leads to the balkanization of everything else, including movie criticism. Enjoy the brave new world everyone!
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