Words from Matt Goldberg, Holy Emperor of Eastern Internet / Film Critic

On a related and personal note, I have now been working as a professional film critic for five years. It’s kind of crazy when I stop to consider that I’ve been writing movie reviews since I was in high school, and that somehow after writing for Columns (the Galloway High School paper) and The Oberlin Review (Oberlin’s newspaper), I now get paid to write reviews and thousands of people read them.

Last week (and within a 24-hour time span), I was offered membership in OFCS (Online Film Critics Society) and SEFCA (Southeastern Film Critics Association). It was a tremendous honor and it blows my mind a little to think that I’ll get to have my say in what both groups choose as their best film of the year and put my two cents into the awards’ race. That’s not to say that we’re determining the Academy Award winner (last year almost every critics society chose The Social Network as best picture, but The King’s Speech took home the Oscar), but adding my voice to many lets me have a say. It’s a tremendous honor to be accepted into not one but two critics organizations and it makes what I’ve been doing for five years feel a little more real.

Now if you’ll excuse me, someone in the comments section of my Puncture review “was not impressed by your scathing commentary and grading.”

Friday, September 23rd, 2011 criticism, movies, personal No Comments

Too Nerdy to Live

Most cool people will never understand this, but for nerdy folks myself, there comes a time when you take a step back and go, “There is no reason this should infuriate me. I need to find real things to care about.” Then you go back to being infuriated over inconsequential matters.

Example: Here’s the trailer for the upcoming video game X-Men: Destiny:

More X%2DMen: Destiny Videos

Set aside for the moment that even after viewing this trailer I have no idea what kind of game X-Men Destiny is. Is it an Action-RPG? An arcade brawler like Marvel: Ultimate Alliance? A mixture of both? But that’s not what I find maddening.

It’s the stupid tagline at the end:

“Some Destinies are Chosen.”

No. No, they’re not. Destiny cannot be chosen. That’s what makes it “destiny”. It is the unavoidable endpoint and you have no say in how you get there. That’s why “Destiny” and “Destination” share the same root. Destiny negates choice. It happens no matter what you do. The game should be called X-Men: Choice or X-Men: Determination or X-Men: Experience-Based Leveling System for Character Customization. Not X-Men: Destiny.

I just spent fifteen minutes of my life ranting about this. That’s what sadness looks like. NEVER FORGET.

Thursday, September 22nd, 2011 personal, stupid, videogames No Comments

Spare the Innocent, Slay the Guilty

The long case of death row inmate Troy Davis is coming to a close. His case now stands before the Supreme Court as they deliberate on whether or not he deserves to die for a crime he most likely did not commit. The outcry has been vocal and people are refreshing news sites and checking their Twitter feed to see if Davis is free or if he is dead.

Meanwhile, in Texas, a man named Lawrence Brewer is being executed for the murder of James Byrd Jr.*

There is no outcry for Mr. Brewer because he is most likely guilty whereas Davis’ case hits to the heart of our deepest fears about the death penalty: what if we killed an innocent person?

We already have. In 1976, the death penalty was reinstated. 1,276 men and women have been executed as of September 13, 2011. The odds are slim that every single person executed was guilty of their crime.

But that’s beside the point. Mr. Brewer should not have been executed just as Mr. Davis should not be executed. However, we rally around Mr. Davis because it makes the case that if even one innocent person is executed, then the death penalty should be abolished. But really it just makes the argument, “Please be really, really, really sure someone is guilty before you kill him.”

The death penalty is wrong. Period. The innocence or guilt of the condemned is irrelevant. The death penalty is not a deterrent and it is not how a modern society should behave. A murderer is either too enraged to think about the death penalty or he/she doesn’t care. And if it doesn’t reduce homicides, then it is simply the implementation of an antiquated system of moral justice. The Code of Hammurabi was over 3,700 years ago. Surely, we must have made some progress since then. But clearly, at least in America and any other place that still executes its citizens, we haven’t.

The case of Troy Davis isn’t special unless you believe that some people deserve to die and others don’t and it is up to us to make that call. But if you believe, as I do, that the death penalty is always wrong no matter the guilt or innocence of the condemned, then the case of Troy Davis isn’t horrifying because an innocent man may be put to death. It’s horrifying because whether Troy Davis is executed tonight or not, Lawrence Brewer was and he won’t be the last.

*I feel it’s important to note that Brewer was a white supremacist convicted of dragging Mr. Byrd to death from the back of his pick-up truck. Despite the ugliness of the crime, I feel that Mr. Brewer should have been left to rot in prison for the rest of his days. Executing Brewer doesn’t bring back Mr. Byrd, it won’t stop future hate crimes, and if the only benefit is that we as a society feel justified by Mr. Brewer’s execution, let me remind you that Mr. Brewer felt justified in his slaying of Mr. Byrd. Brewer’s execution may bring comfort to the friends and family of Mr. Byrd but if the purpose of “justice” is only to bring comfort, then our definition of justice is on par with a tub of Häagen-Dazs and a warm bath. The purpose of justice isn’t to serve individuals but to serve society as a whole.

Wednesday, September 21st, 2011 politics, stupid No Comments

Reviews: CONTAGION and TIFF 2011 Films

Contagion (Rating: B)

And here’s the full list of movies I reviewed at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival:

Monday, September 19th, 2011 criticism, movies No Comments

We The Entertained

Obama had to move his big jobs speech up to 7pm (EST) so as not to interfere with the first football game of the season. This speaks to two points:

1.) How far Obama has fallen in the public’s eyes. The President’s approval rating has reached a new low and it’s not tough to see why. The economy isn’t growing new jobs, unemployment remains stuck at over 9%, and people see banks returning to normal while their own lives have fallen apart. Beyond that, it says something that a gifted orator like Obama can no longer command an audience. Part of that speaks to the public’s weariness with politicians in general and the continued disenchantment with Obama and his pro-big business policies with only lip service to small businesses.

2.) We care more about entertainment than we do about our country. Will Obama’s speech be full of big ideas, empty promises, and a vague road map sure to be thwarted at every turn by Republicans? Probably. But this is a Presidential Address. Our country’s leader is speaking. You may not agree with what he has to say but this isn’t Sunday’s weekly, “Hey, how ya doin’ America? Really wish the Republicans would shape up. Oh well.” He wants prime time and the country says, “Sorry, but we’re ready for some football.” So Obama has to move his speech up to 7pm (4pm PST when most people will be in front of a TV), and it sends the message that the speech is less important than a sporting event. The speech is about jobs, it’s about the economy, it’s about putting our country back to work, but unfortunately there are two championship teams squaring off and we don’t want people to miss the first quarter.

And that speaks to the greater character of our country: our entertainment is more important than our nation’s welfare. We are amusing ourselves to death. Even how we perceive our politics is cast in the mold of entertainment. We don’t want to hear policy. We want to hear who’s up, who’s down, who looks good, who looks bad, the latest flub, the soaring rhetoric, and enjoy the horserace.

Even outside this “Football Beats the President” story, we can’t afford to not be plugged into something. I went to the pharmacy today and people waiting for their prescription to be filled were immersed in their mobile device, myself included. I was handling e-mail but there was nothing urgent in my inbox. Our phones are filled with games, music, movies, the Internet and everything to help us dodge the awkward silence and interactions with the people sitting next to us. A guy who looks down and doesn’t talk to anyone at a party is awkward and shy. A guy who looks down and doesn’t talk to anyone but is typing into his iPhone might be awkward and shy, but he looks busy and perhaps even important as he can’t be bothered by the people around him due to his intense game of Angry Birds.

Entertainment is important. It’s our cultural touchstone. It’s how we’ve come to communicate with each other and define our identity through our interests. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that. But when entertainment is deemed more important than a Presidential Address, then our citizenship no longer really matters. We don’t belong to America because we’re now part of the Packers nation or Team Edward or the Browncoats. I was never a big believer in pledging allegiance to the flag, but now we pledge our allegiance to our entertainment. We pledge allegiance, to the entertainment, of the United States of Distraction, and to the Episode, Sequel, or Game for which it stands, one Nation, under fandom, with liberty and justice for all who are on my side.

**Please note that when I say “we”, I’m not using it in the accusatory sense that really means “Everybody but me.” I’m as guilty of these distractions as anyone if not more so since my job is to cover movies, TV, and video games plus I’m a big football fan.**