Nostalgia Critic: Children of the Corn

Thanks Chris
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10 comments:

  1. Bryant BurnetteOctober 27, 2015 at 1:02 AM

    Mom says not to say anything if I can't sy something nice; but boy oh boy, do I hate that f#@%ing Nostalgic Critic guy.

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    1. PrisonerNumber6October 27, 2015 at 3:10 AM

      I have to agree, actually.

      While it's right to say "COTC" is a bad movie, what he then neglects to do is consider the "valid" reasons why its bad.

      For instance, he could have pointed to the source material. While the short story is a more or less effective little shocker, there's still probably not enough in the story itself to warrant a full scale movie adaptation.

      "That" would be a legit criticism. Instead, I'm not sure he ever really tackles the movie's subject matter itself. He seems to go by only the most vaguest of reactions the material causes him to have. Or (what's arguably worse) he let's his ego (which seems considerable) get in the way of the job of providing an "actual critique" of the film.

      In fact, I kind wondered if turning this over would be such a good idea.

      ChrisC

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    2. Bryant BurnetteOctober 27, 2015 at 3:52 AM

      Evidently, he's very popular; which means that one sort of has no choice but to take him seriously.

      Still, I just find his approach to criticism to be utterly vapid. Heck, does it even count as criticism? He's got the word "critic" right there in the title of his show, so he's at least making pretensions toward that status. For me, though, he's just got nothing of interest to say.

      None of which should be interpreted as implied positive feeling toward the movie version of "Children of the Corn"! It really is quite bad, although in a way I find watchable.

      And I do agree with you, Chris; the story probably doesn't quite have what it takes for a full-length movie.

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    3. PrisonerNumber6October 27, 2015 at 7:01 PM

      (Sighs) Apparently I'm at least "some" kind of sucker for punishment.

      I just saw this NC guy do something that "has" to sum up what's wrong with his particular style of criticism.

      He gave a show (never mind which) such a low rating because (get this) he couldn't guess a reference to the late newscaster Andy Rooney.


      ...Yeah, he actually went there, people!

      Now, to give an idea of why this is such a good example of how far modern criticism (at least among the Millennials, perhaps) has fallen, let's compare this guy with, say, Siskel and Ebert.

      Even if these two had, by some fluke of circumstance, never once seen or heard a segment of Rooney's broadcasts, they would "never", in million years count that as against a show's favor. They would instead acknowledge that the film was too clever for them, "and they would acknowledge that the fault was in themselves, not the filmmakers!"

      In other words, this Critic guy literally castigates a film for being smarter than him, rather than embracing it as an opportunity to expand one's horizons, like the best art always traditionally offers!

      Now the punchline. He does the same for Ray Bradbury's "The Halloween Tree."

      While I'm a firm believer in Freedom of the Press, I have to say I gotta wonder what kind of deleterious effect guy like the Nostalgia Critic will have for any "real" artistic discussion. It just doesn't sound like anything good.

      ChrisC

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    4. Bryant BurnetteOctober 27, 2015 at 7:55 PM

      In a sense, I do the same thing the Nostalgia Critic does: amateur criticism. In my case, I can at least claim to holding a college degree in English, so I've received training for it. I deviate quite wildly from the norms of that field, but I do so knowingly, and I like to think that my stuff occasionally ends up being insightful.

      N.C. comes from a different school altogether: the urge to treat everything as fodder for would-be stand-up comedy, given form as an attempt to capitalize on the fact that technology has enabled any dips#!t with a computer the ability to broadcast his face and voice to the world. In years past, there would have been gatekeepers to prevent stuff like that from reaching the masses, but now, that's a thing of the past in some ways.

      And here's the thing: the Nostalgia Critic deserves the opportunity to put his stuff out into the world, just the same as I do, or you do, or ANYONE does. That's the upside.

      The downside is that there are now a lot of people who think this is what criticism is. But that's the risk you run when you level the playing field, I suppose.

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  2. Brian SchwartzOctober 28, 2015 at 6:00 PM

    Children of the Corn has to be evaluated for what it is which is teenage horror. It requires looking through some plot holes to enjoy the horror for what it is.

    It's not the Exorcist or The Omen. It's not high brow fare. It's not meant to be. It has to be enjoyed on its own level.

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    1. Bryant BurnetteOctober 28, 2015 at 7:43 PM

      I agree. I do have a soft spot for that movie, and even for the sequels. They're all awful, but that doesn't prevent me from enjoying them (to a degree).

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  3. WriterJoshNovember 6, 2015 at 7:41 AM

    I must admit I'm a fan of the Nostalgia Critic. Partly because I know that he is mostly mining these movies for comedy, but he also does engage in legit criticism, and even where I don't agree with his criticism I still find him funny.

    I also have to say, he did pick the right targets to go after as far as King's properties. The only problem I have with that is that more than once he's hinted that the problems lie with the stories themselves, that King isn't really a very good writer, or at least, nowhere near as good as everyone seems to think.

    Big fat "wrong!" on that score. With the exception of Maximum Overdrive, every King movie/miniseries he's done so far was as bad as it was because of stupid decisions made by the filmmakers adapting it, including (most often) budgets nowhere near where they need to be, airing them on stations where any impact the stories had is blunted by attempts to make it TV-friendly, scripts that take crazy liberties with the source material (usually for no reason), bad casting, worse acting and nowhere near enough time devoted to telling the story (seriously, three hours for both It AND The Langoliers?).

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    1. WriterJoshNovember 6, 2015 at 7:43 AM

      And as for Maximum Overdrive, that was just King biting off more than he can chew. He's a novelist, and he does that very well. He's not a film director. And he chose a story where the implications were more scary (well, unsettling is probably a better word) than anything happening on page, then blunted that impact by tacking on a happy(ish) ending. I will never understand what he thought he was doing there.

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    2. Bryant BurnetteNovember 6, 2015 at 12:27 PM

      I can't blame him for wanting to try directing. It didn't work out, though, that's for sure.

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