The Energon Pub

Burn wrote:

Shadowman wrote:You haven't heard of Roger Ebert? He's been one of the most prolific film critics for over 40 years. You know the term "I give it two thumbs up" or "Two thumbs down"? That was him.

You seem to forget, I don't live in America and as such don't get exposed to American critics.

That and oh, as i've said, I rarely read what critics write!

I can't speak for Shadowman, but I'd have thought that Ebert's notoriety and longevity would have transcended our borders.

Apparently, this isn't the case.

G.B. Blackrock wrote:

Burn wrote:

Shadowman wrote:You haven't heard of Roger Ebert? He's been one of the most prolific film critics for over 40 years. You know the term "I give it two thumbs up" or "Two thumbs down"? That was him.

You seem to forget, I don't live in America and as such don't get exposed to American critics.

That and oh, as i've said, I rarely read what critics write!

I can't speak for Shadowman, but I'd have thought that Ebert's notoriety and longevity would have transcended our borders.

Apparently, this isn't the case.

I thought the same thing, and I figured the internet would have helped.

Caelus wrote:To me, a movie is "good" if a viewer likes it. In other words, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, ergo the whole concept of declaring a movie "good" or "bad" by any process other than democratic majority rule is ridiculous.

Very much incorrect. Good/bad in terms of quality and like/hate in terms of enjoyment are two completely different things. It's entirely possible to like something that is poor quality and dislike something that's good quality. Ebert certainly was differentiating between the two concepts of quality and enjoyment, while the people getting annoyed with him are making the mistake of conflating the two.

Caelus wrote:Unless he's implying that one's assessment of this movie is a side-effect of some other adaptation, such that there is a noncausal negative correlation between one's reproduction and one's liking this movie.

Like I tried saying several posts earlier, Ebert never said he had a problem with people who liked the movie. He just thinks people who think it's a good movie need to broaden their film horizons to learn what makes for genuinely good filmmaking. So the people in this thread getting their knickers in a twist over thinking Ebert's insulting them for liking the movie are getting upset over something that wasn't actually said.

Jeysie wrote:

Caelus wrote:To me, a movie is "good" if a viewer likes it. In other words, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, ergo the whole concept of declaring a movie "good" or "bad" by any process other than democratic majority rule is ridiculous.

Very much incorrect. Good/bad in terms of quality and like/hate in terms of enjoyment are two completely different things. It's entirely possible to like something that is poor quality and dislike something that's good quality. Ebert certainly was differentiating between the two concepts of quality and enjoyment, while the people getting annoyed with him are making the mistake of conflating the two.

Caelus wrote:Unless he's implying that one's assessment of this movie is a side-effect of some other adaptation, such that there is a noncausal negative correlation between one's reproduction and one's liking this movie.

Like I tried saying several posts earlier, Ebert never said he had a problem with people who liked the movie. He just thinks people who think it's a good movie need to broaden their film horizons to learn what makes for genuinely good filmmaking. So the people in this thread getting their knickers in a twist over thinking Ebert's insulting them for liking the movie are getting upset over something that wasn't actually said.

And I very much disagree.

I do not believe there is any empirically valid objective criterion for delineating a good movie from a bad movie.

The goal of this movie was to entertain (and of course to make money by doing so).

It entertained me a great deal.

For me, it fulfilled its goal in spades.

Ergo, for me, it was a good movie.

Again, the 'universal truths':

"What is beautiful is good."

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

Ergo, what is "good" is subjective to the individual, and telling somebody that they are "wrong" or even "very incorrect" is either nonsensical or presumptive of personal godhood.

I completely agree with you. The comments coming from coworkers, family, friends, etc are overwhelmingly negative. I took my family and while I enjoyed some of the action scenes and humor, I was equally irritated by the choppy story and poor characterization. The cartoony twins were absolute garbage; the time spent on them could have been given to any of the other more interesting and less offending characters. I feel Bay is more concerned about being different than delivering a movie with a strong developed story.

The first movie and the hype surrounding it was partly responsible for making me a fan again after 20 years and while nowhere near perfect was much better than this second film.
Bay, should be kissing the buts of the fans for the movie’s success so far instead of alienating them. Without the fans this movie would have failed horribly

SoooTrypticon wrote:Except the diminishing returns show the contrary. Fewer and fewer people are going to go see the film- not more. If there was good word of mouth- then more people would go. Instead there is TERRIBLE word of mouth, because Ebert is right. It is a horribly crafted film that does little to impress those beyond the small minority who like Giant F---ing Robots.

And we are a small minority. And those of us who can sit through a TWO AND A HALF hour movie with little payoff beyond Giant Robots- well, they're an even smaller minority.

I haven't heard from anyone outside the community who had one good thing to say about the film.

It plays to a very small audience- everyone else who went was duped into going through a combination of marketing and summer movie drought.

Just because you liked it- doesn't make it a good movie. There are established qualifiers for what makes a good movie- just like anything else. That's why we laugh at the bad ones on MST3K.

If someone tried to sell you a car that smelled like a skunk and got a mile to the gallon- you'd say "That's a terrible car."

And if they said- "Yes, but the trunk is full of candy," would it somehow make it better? Would you want to eat that skunky candy?

And what if the car publications reviewed that car, and said it sucked because it didn't meet the standards associated with a good car- would they be out of touch?

A single good quality (Robot Action) doesn't wipe away terrible acting, shoddy story, poor humor, or pointless editing- all those BAD QUALITIES hurt the one good one. They stink it up.

Caelus wrote:I do not believe there is any empirically valid objective criterion for delineating a good movie from a bad movie.

Yes, there are. There are many, many criteria for telling good acting, good plot constructions, good characterization, good dialogue, good scene blocking, etc. Just like we can look at a random crayon scribble and call it not good art, there are many things you can look at to say whether a story or film is good or not.

Otherwise, there's no point in creative people trying to analyze their weaknesses, study technique, and try to improve their craft at all, because no matter what level you're at it's good as long as someone liked it, and anyone who tries to critique you means they're an elitist snob imposing their "subjective opinion" on you. Sorry, I don't buy it.

I have plenty of things I know are bad from a quality level that I think are fun anyway because they manage to get right some aspect I enjoy. Conversely, there are things I recognize as being well-crafted that I don't like just because the subject matter or type of plot isn't my cup of tea.

A mother may love her child's random scribble because it came from her child as a gesture of love, but that still doesn't make it good in terms of quality. If the kid ever wants to become an artist, they are probably going to learn to do better than random scribbling, because there is such a thing as objective quality.

Whether I like something or not says nothing about quality and everything about my own personal tastes. If people like something even though it's bad, that's fine. But we shouldn't be claiming that something poorly made is somehow "good" just because some people like it. I can accept that people enjoyed the movie. But you're just not going to sell me on the thought that the fact that people liked the movie somehow makes juvenile humor, gratuitous sexiness & swearing, non-existent characterization for many of the characters, deux ex machina plotting, etc. "good" writing from a quality perspective.

I'm tired of having to put up with so much poor writing because people don't care about the quality of writing so long as it's "fun", or make the mistake of equating "good" with "I had fun". You can have fun/enjoyment and good storytelling at the same time; the two are not mutually opposed.

First Gen wrote:If you had an inbox full of "Ur reviews are teh suck", I think you'd think the same way he did.

If all of us agree that story is a real disappointment in order to save next movie we may start to put a pressure on Micahel Bay before he destroys Transformers movie series.

More Robots OK
More Action OK

but Mr.Bay we didnt told you to crapisize story.

As a non US citizen (who doesnt hate US ) US flags everywhere, US army saves world(classic) whole Lebanese army is 2 chopters which are shot down immediately(US army saves them too ), Egyptian officers are midget (also i am nor arabian neither muslim and seriously a midget in army like a blind man in the army, inlogical). These things really irritated me and my friends with me and a great loss for the movie.

The Sam character's appearence must be lowered to G1 cartoon's.

More character robots and robot dialogs must be added(who didnt enjoyed Meggy and Screamy dialogues).

I trust at you guys if anyone can save the 3rd movie it is you.

Koray wrote:If all of us agree that story is a real disappointment in order to save next movie we may start to put a pressure on Micahel Bay before he destroys Transformers movie series.

Agreed. Michael Bay could ruin Transformers FOREVER.

http://transformers.wikia.com/wiki/Ruined_FOREVER

Jeysie wrote:

Caelus wrote:I do not believe there is any empirically valid objective criterion for delineating a good movie from a bad movie.

Yes, there are.

Or maybe there aren't.

There are many, many criteria for telling good acting, good plot constructions, good characterization, good dialogue, good scene blocking, etc.

All of those are judged subjectively, and using those as criteria for declaring a movie "good" or "bad" is subjective in and of itself.

Just like we can look at a random crayon scribble and call it not good art, there are many things you can look at to say whether a story or film is good or not.

I've seen a lot of random crayon scribble, splattered paint, and mangled metal that people declared "good", most of it in art museums.

Otherwise, there's no point in creative people trying to analyze their weaknesses, study technique, and try to improve their craft at all, because no matter what level you're at it's good as long as someone liked it, and anyone who tries to critique you means they're an elitist snob imposing their "subjective opinion" on you.

That's more or less what I'm saying.

Though I'd be inclined to say that "it's good as long as someone liked it" should be stated "it's good as long as the people whose opinions you care about liked it".

I'm tired of having to put up with so much poor writing because people don't care about the quality of writing so long as it's "fun", or make the mistake of equating "good" with "I had fun". You can have fun/enjoyment and good storytelling at the same time; the two are not mutually opposed.

No, they're not (always) mutually opposed.

But my point is that I believe "good" should equal "I liked it", and you have no valid grounds for saying that I am wrong.

What I consider makes a movie "good" (its capacity to entertain me) is not the same as what you consider makes a movie "good" and neither you nor Ebert has the right to tell me I am 'mistaken' in that, or to tell me I'm "unevolved".

We have different priorities in what we want to see when we go to a movie. I'm not saying I don't appreciate good writing, but if that was my top priority, I could get that from a library, or do it myself. Special effects good enough to make transforming alien robots seem realistic I can't really come by anywhere else though.

Arguably my criterion for what makes a "good" movie is more useful to me anyway.

If I'm trying to decide whether I want to drop $6-8 for some entertainment, a decision contingent on the odds that I will like the movie, being told by someone similar to myself that they liked the movie is far more informative for the purposes of making my decision than being told that the movie met the critical academic standards for a positive evaluation, standards which frequently depend on qualities I don't care about, or which are even contrary to the aspects I value.

I'm willing to agree to disagree, which was my point to begin with, that Ebert and other creative critics should say that it was a "bad" movie for them but not assume it was a "bad" movie for everyone.

It Is Him wrote:

Koray wrote:If all of us agree that story is a real disappointment in order to save next movie we may start to put a pressure on Micahel Bay before he destroys Transformers movie series.

Agreed. Michael Bay could ruin Transformers FOREVER.

http://transformers.wikia.com/wiki/Ruined_FOREVER

His next move could be killing Prime and universe's next move could be no more Transformers movie for 20 years

Koray wrote:

It Is Him wrote:

Koray wrote:If all of us agree that story is a real disappointment in order to save next movie we may start to put a pressure on Micahel Bay before he destroys Transformers movie series.

Agreed. Michael Bay could ruin Transformers FOREVER.

http://transformers.wikia.com/wiki/Ruined_FOREVER

His next move could be killing Prime and universe's next move could be no more Transformers movie for 20 years

He did kill Prime, and then brought him back just like Hasbro has done a couple of times, albeit more quickly.

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To put things in some perspective, and demonstrate how subjective Ebert's process is:

Ebert wrote:When you ask a friend if Hellboy is any good, you're not asking if it's any good compared to Mystic River, you're asking if it's any good compared to The Punisher. And my answer would be, on a scale of one to four, if Superman is four, then Hellboy is three and The Punisher is two. In the same way, if American Beauty gets four stars, then (The United States of) Leland clocks in at about two.

He considers Superman, Hellboy, and the Punisher to be comparable movies? On what grounds? They all originated in comic books? By that reasoning, cinematic representations of Pride and Prejudice and Lord of the Rings should be on the same scale together, because they both originated from books.

And the original Superman is the top of that list? The movie that had Gene Hackman smearing the screen with his rancidly bad, over-the-top interpretation of Lex Luthor and Reeves delivering his two dimensional rendition of a guy living on an alien world? That had Superman rescue a falling Lois Lane who should have instead been trisected by his arms? That had Superman simply reverse time by flying in circles around the Earth because the writers had painted themselves into a corner?

Yeah, judging movies isn't an exact science. Or even, you know, a science.

Caelus wrote:

Koray wrote:

It Is Him wrote:

Koray wrote:If all of us agree that story is a real disappointment in order to save next movie we may start to put a pressure on Micahel Bay before he destroys Transformers movie series.

Agreed. Michael Bay could ruin Transformers FOREVER.

http://transformers.wikia.com/wiki/Ruined_FOREVER

His next move could be killing Prime and universe's next move could be no more Transformers movie for 20 years

He did kill Prime, and then brought him back just like Hasbro has done a couple of times, albeit more quickly.

Not as quick as Animated Prime. I mean, that Prime was dead for like, what, 5 seconds?

At this point, it's almost cliche to kill Optimus. I would rather they do something more radical like blow up the Earth. Or the Sun.

On second thought, I'm fine with any explosions, really.

It Is Him wrote:

Caelus wrote:

Koray wrote:

It Is Him wrote:

Koray wrote:If all of us agree that story is a real disappointment in order to save next movie we may start to put a pressure on Micahel Bay before he destroys Transformers movie series.

Agreed. Michael Bay could ruin Transformers FOREVER.

http://transformers.wikia.com/wiki/Ruined_FOREVER

His next move could be killing Prime and universe's next move could be no more Transformers movie for 20 years

He did kill Prime, and then brought him back just like Hasbro has done a couple of times, albeit more quickly.

Not as quick as Animated Prime. I mean, that Prime was dead for like, what, 5 seconds?

At this point, it's almost cliche to kill Optimus. I would rather they do something more radical like blow up the Earth. Or the Sun.

On second thought, I'm fine with any explosions, really.

Killing prime just is an example if he make a new movie with ROTF quality story he could ruin TF too.

He could make a good story even he copy pasted some G1 cartoon's story thats that simple.

Hope admins could contact him and tell about all our feelings and fears for movie series.

can we get this guys face off of the front page? his cheeks are scareing me more than starscreams chin!

Koray wrote:Killing prime just is an example if he make a new movie with ROTF quality story he could ruin TF too.

He could make a good story even he copy pasted some G1 cartoon's story thats that simple.

Hope admins could contact him and tell about all our feelings and fears for movie series.

Somehow I don't think Hasbro is worried about Bay ruining Transformers. If Bay were somehow able to ruin Transformers, I'd imagine it would include Furbys and NERF guns.

Seibertron wrote:

First Gen wrote:

Darth Bombshell wrote:Funny. I don't. There's something about the last five words of that comment that makes me feel he's being more than a little condesending towards us, saying that the only reason those 90% of people said they liked the movie was because it's a TF site, and that if people say otherwise, the mods go after them.

Um.....uh.....what?

"...exit poll showing "90% of those polled thought the second film was as good or better than the first one" has been received with ridicule. Significantly, those are moderated forums."

He said that our discussions here on the exit polls have been laughable and that we are a moderated site making that a significant thing. In other words, the exact opposite of what you just said.

I 100% agree with First Gen's interpretation. It was a compliment to Seibertron.com.

Oh. Must have read it wrong. Never mind, then.

I think what Ebert is trying to say about "people having opinions, but opinions can be wrong"...

Nearly everyone here is admitting that the movie had no plot, disappearing characters, out of place humor, and poor editing. That doesn't seem up for debate. Those things, make TF2 a bad movie by the very definition of how movies are made. To like TF2 as a structurally sound cinematic story, requires a serious misread of what movies are.

It would be like going to a college class where the professor screamed gibberish for 3 hours everyday for 3 months and at the end you say "I think it was a good class and I learned a lot". That could be someone's honest opinion, but they either have never been to a class or are biased based on extenuating circumstances.

HOWEVER, you can enjoy the movie. You can like the movie. You can freaking love the movie! But that doesn't make it a good movie.

Example: I love the movie Commando. Its fantastic. Its a perfect encapsulation of the 80s testosterone filled culture. The action is awesome and the one liners are epic, however...IT IS A BAD MOVIE! I would never say Commando is better than Godfather...but if they are both on TV, I am watching Commando. TF2 falls in that category for the people trying vigorious to defend it here.

Bad Guy: "You said you were going to kill me last!?!?!?"
Matrix: "I lied"
*Drop off cliff

Caelus wrote:Or maybe there aren't.

Anyone who's ever studied a creative craft will beg to differ.

Caelus wrote:All of those are judged subjectively, and using those as criteria for declaring a movie "good" or "bad" is subjective in and of itself.

No more subjective than any non-creative field being able to judge what's good and bad work.

Caelus wrote:

Jeysie wrote:Otherwise, there's no point in creative people trying to analyze their weaknesses, study technique, and try to improve their craft at all, because no matter what level you're at it's good as long as someone liked it, and anyone who tries to critique you means they're an elitist snob imposing their "subjective opinion" on you.

That's more or less what I'm saying.

Well, sorry, but that's completely ridiculous. Not to mention a complete insult to all creative folk who have talent and have worked to be genuinely good at their craft.

Caelus wrote:What I consider makes a movie "good" (its capacity to entertain me) is not the same as what you consider makes a movie "good" and neither you nor Ebert has the right to tell me I am 'mistaken' in that, or to tell me I'm "unevolved".

We have just as much right as a scientist does to instruct others on what's right and wrong for their science, or an athlete to instruct others on what's right or wrong for playing a game, or a computer science major to instruct others on the right or wrong way to program, or any other instance where someone learned in a subject instructs someone less learned on the matter.

Just because the results of the creative arts are more accessible to the public than most specialties, doesn't mean that they somehow require less study or talent to do well. There are standards for how to do creative work well just like there's standards for how to do non-creative work well. Creative work doesn't get a magical exemption from there being general right and wrong ways to do it just because it's creative.

Caelus wrote:We have different priorities in what we want to see when we go to a movie. I'm not saying I don't appreciate good writing, but if that was my top priority, I could get that from a library, or do it myself. Special effects good enough to make transforming alien robots seem realistic I can't really come by anywhere else though.

Arguably my criterion for what makes a "good" movie is more useful to me anyway.

Except that still has absolutely nothing to do with whether a movie is good or not, only with whether you enjoy it or not.

Like I said, there are times when I'm willing to enjoy bad stuff. There's even rare times I enjoy something because it's bad. That doesn't make it magically turn good from a quality perspective, though, it just means I enjoyed it. Nor does it mean that I want to see bad stuff all the time because the filmmakers have no reason to do better due to people being content to lap up any old crap.

Caelus wrote:I'm willing to agree to disagree, which was my point to begin with, that Ebert and other creative critics should say that it was a "bad" movie for them but not assume it was a "bad" movie for everyone.

It's not a bad movie for them, it's a bad movie by the standards of filmmaking. Now, they can't assume that just because it's a bad movie, people won't still like it, and indeed Ebert did not make that assumption.

tile_mcgillus wrote:Nearly everyone here is admitting that the movie had no plot, disappearing characters, out of place humor, and poor editing. That doesn't seem up for debate. Those things, make TF2 a bad movie by the very definition of how movies are made. To like TF2 as a structurally sound cinematic story, requires a serious misread of what movies are.

It would be like going to a college class where the professor screamed gibberish for 3 hours everyday for 3 months and at the end you say "I think it was a good class and I learned a lot". That could be someone's honest opinion, but they either have never been to a class or are biased based on extenuating circumstances.

HOWEVER, you can enjoy the movie. You can like the movie. You can freaking love the movie! But that doesn't make it a good movie.

Quoted for so much truth.

Jeysie wrote:

Caelus wrote:Or maybe there aren't.

Anyone who's ever studied a creative craft will beg to differ.

I have studied creative crafts, and I do not disagree with me. By existing, I have defied your logic and proven you wrong. Bwahaha!

Caelus wrote:All of those are judged subjectively, and using those as criteria for declaring a movie "good" or "bad" is subjective in and of itself.

No more subjective than any non-creative field being able to judge what's good and bad work.

Bull, but we'll come back to that in a bit.

Caelus wrote:

Jeysie wrote:Otherwise, there's no point in creative people trying to analyze their weaknesses, study technique, and try to improve their craft at all, because no matter what level you're at it's good as long as someone liked it, and anyone who tries to critique you means they're an elitist snob imposing their "subjective opinion" on you.

That's more or less what I'm saying.

Well, sorry, but that's completely ridiculous. Not to mention a complete insult to all creative folk who have talent and have worked to be genuinely good at their craft.

Just because it invalidates someone's purpose in life doesn't make it ridiculous. By that logic, we would have had to reject democracy, because it was a complete insult to all the regal folk who had divine blood and had sort of worked to be good at sitting around all day.

I could also go into a nasty tangent about the purpose of art not being to search for shallow validation from strangers, but that would be really far off topic.

Jeysie wrote:We have just as much right as a scientist does to instruct others on what's right and wrong for their science, or an athlete to instruct others on what's right or wrong for playing a game, or a computer science major to instruct others on the right or wrong way to program, or any other instance where someone learned in a subject instructs someone less learned on the matter.

Just because the results of the creative arts are more accessible to the public than most specialties, doesn't mean that they somehow require less study or talent to do well. There are standards for how to do creative work well just like there's standards for how to do non-creative work well. Creative work doesn't get a magical exemption from there being general right and wrong ways to do it just because it's creative.

Scientists work with facts, whether it be in the realm of biology, computers, etc. Our education is based on facts and logic. Rigorous observation and experimentation, with constant, brutal re-examination. Refusal to accept untestable hypotheses. And in spite of this rigor, we're still willing to accept we're wrong when valid empirical evidence is supplied; hell, a major portion of being a scientist is trying to prove that someone who came before you is wrong. And of course, unlike film critics, art teachers, etc., if people don't follow our recommendations, they may in some cases actually die.

That gives us the right to tell someone there are 'right and wrong ways to do something'. We apply such excruciatingly rigorous standards, that when we say something is 'right' or 'wrong' you can be damn well sure that only God could be more justified in his certainty. By the time a modern scientific theory has jumped through the hoops of the scientific method and community, it's closer to 'truth' than anything you'll find. And those principles, along with the information they have generated, are beaten into our students thoroughly.



But, if you're going to be so insistent that the "results of the creative arts" can be and are held to the equally rigorous standards, can be evaluated objectively without bias, and be classified as "good" or "bad" in an empirically correct fashion not contingent on the individual making the claim, provide the research.

I want:

1) Statistically validated scales for scoring movies/art/etc. and determining whether they are good or bad. Additionally, they need to have been validated across all relevant demographic variables, or have adaptations for use with other groups which have been proven to yield comparable results.

2) Proof of inter-rater reliability, with associated statistics.

3) Peer reviewed journal articles that provide the variances (R^2) in the quality of movie/art/etc. accounted for by different variables ("writing", "acting", etc.), with p-values of course. A more comprehensive model (HLR or even just MLR) will obviously be preferred over a string of bivariate correlations.

4) Research that shows that the evaluations of "good" or "bad" regarding creative endeavors, as defined, have practical real-world applications, making them more 'useful' to humanity than alternative definitions of those terms.

x) Additionally, I always prefer laboratory research with experimental manipulations over field studies, for obvious reasons.

x) Qualitative research, especially anecdotal work, will be automatically rejected.

I agree with Caelus in that for certain kinds of media, effectiveness of that media should be judged upon the way it influences its audience.

I believe that this is a key element that critics often fail to take into account.

That being said, media, film, and cinema can certainly be judged in terms of quality and even on something as rough as a good vs. bad set of standards.

Stories with plot holes, characters who heel/face turn with no establishment of cause, and poor pacing of scenes are all things that can easily be identified as 'bad'. These things detract from the experience.

Ebert is correct in every technical sense of his point when he says 'The film is bad.' RotF fails in several easily identifiable film aspects.

What Ebert does not do, is weigh those failings against the fun, impact, and ability of the film to relate its experience to the audience in a fair and honest manner. His critic sensibilities override this.

I think the fact some of us are overlooking is the fact that the story for the movie sucked Devastators wrecking balls and thats what Ebert is saying.

If you try to argue with me that the story was good I won't respond cause you obviously have no idea was a story is to begin with.

If you liked the film, good for you. I didn't. But as I've stated before, I'm a reader and I enjoy stories very much. If a book has to have pictures in it to hold your interest, I don't want it.

First Gen wrote:I think the fact some of us are overlooking is the fact that the story for the movie sucked Devastators wrecking balls and thats what Ebert is saying.

If you try to argue with me that the story was good I won't respond cause you obviously have no idea was a story is to begin with.

If you liked the film, good for you. I didn't. But as I've stated before, I'm a reader and I enjoy stories very much. If a book has to have pictures in it to hold your interest, I don't want it.

Wow.

This is pretty insulting right here.

I seriously don't appreciate this. You tell me that I don't know what a good story is and then you insult me by essentially calling me a child in need of picture books.

I thought the movie had a good story. It has a Transformers story. They're ALL in this vein.

Now, it is missing elements of good cinema which help to keep the story fluid on-screen, but the story itself is a good one.

You, as much as anyone else on the boards need to have a balanced argument. Backhanded insults are not going to fly around here.

Counterpunch wrote:

First Gen wrote:I think the fact some of us are overlooking is the fact that the story for the movie sucked Devastators wrecking balls and thats what Ebert is saying.

If you try to argue with me that the story was good I won't respond cause you obviously have no idea was a story is to begin with.

If you liked the film, good for you. I didn't. But as I've stated before, I'm a reader and I enjoy stories very much. If a book has to have pictures in it to hold your interest, I don't want it.

Wow.

This is pretty insulting right here.

No its not. No ones arguing that the story was good, even those who liked the film. The whole point of this argument is the bad story that was bashed together with the incredible action.

Caelus wrote:I have studied creative crafts, and I do not disagree with me. By existing, I have defied your logic and proven you wrong. Bwahaha!

I've studied classes in art, music, and writing, and all I can say is, if I tried handing in my scribble, or singing off-key, or a badly written story full of mistakes, and tried telling my teacher I deserved an A because "my mom liked it, therefore that means its good and I don't have to improve", I do believe that a great deal of mirth would be their reponse.

Now, it may be that I'm perfectly content to be no better than those levels of skill, and my intended audience is also content. I mean, for example, I can live with the fact that I can't do better than so-so sketches, so I draw purely for the kicks, and it gives my friends a little amusement anyway. That doesn't make me a good artist by any stretch of the term, however, especially compared to people who get paid to draw.

Caelus wrote:

Jeysie wrote:No more subjective than any non-creative field being able to judge what's good and bad work.

Bull, but we'll come back to that in a bit.

OK, what is so magically different about creative work that it can't be held to any standards of what's good and bad in terms of quality? I mean, for instance, if someone presents to me a story full of typos, 1-dimensional characters, plot holes, run-on sentences, and other writing errors, I'm somehow not allowed to say it's badly written if someone likes that story anyway?

I just find that really, really sad if you honestly believe that sort of thing. If you really don't care about quality, so be it I guess. But I see no reason to accept trash as good just because some people's egos can't cope with both liking something and knowing it's bad quality. I like seeing creativity treated with respect, and I see nothing insulting about wishing more people would study creativity and demand something better than the lowest common denominator. I really hope most people come to care about quality in creativity as much as they care about quality in everything else, rather than having your attitude.