Sometimes The Movie Deserves It

One of my favorite online time-killers is to read review snippets at Rotten Tomatoes.  (Rotten Tomatoes is that website that tells you what percentage of movie critics thought a movie was good (fresh) or bad (rotten).  And it has a one-sentence snippet from every review.)  And what I like best is reading the snippets from pans.

I'm a bit of theatre critic myself, and I never give reviews like this.  Probably because it's easier to be mean to a movie than it is to be to a play; I mean, with a play, you've actually spent two hours breathing the same air as these people.  When you mock a bad movie, you're insulting folks you've never met.  It gives you a certain degree of freedom.

But, man, I love reading them.  Of the five movies coming out this weekend (well, the five that made it to their front page) two got "fresh" ratings and three got "rotten."  And one of those was so rotten that only 3 percent of the critics thought it was good.  So, let's click on through to a see a sample of what Rotten Tomatoes' critics thought of Supercross: The Movie.  A few of choice excerpts are:

Angel Cohn of TV Guide's Movie Guide says:
"Director Steve Boyum's loud, down-and-dirty ride through the world of Supercross motorcycle racing comes to a screeching halt for its many pit stops for Hollywood cliches."

Elizabeth Weitzman of New York Daily News describes it as:
"A film whose level of imagination can be discerned right from its title."

David Foucher of Edge Boston sums it up with:
"Dumb as dirt."

Mark Olsen at LA Weekly comes up with:
"When huge chunks of character development and narrative exposition are relegated to a track announcer’s running commentary, it can never be a good sign."

And MaryAnn Johanson, Flick Filosopher scores with:
"And then came Supercross: The Movie, the long-anticipated filmic adaptation of Shakespeare's lost play..."

And if you think those are good, take a look at the jabs reserved for Dukes of Hazzard, several of which left me chortling away ("If this is how Bo and Luke translate to the big screen, I’d hate to see the movie versions of Coy and Vance." From Jeffrey Westhoff, Northwest Herald (Crystal Lake, IL).)

The pans are so darn fun to read -- and Rotten Tomatoes does all the work for you, collecting the best little excerpts --  I actually look forward to the release of bad movies, so I can get a good laugh over what happens when the nation's critics are let loose on a real stinker.