Reviewing Critically
Posted on Monday, August 23rd, 2010I was sitting down at my office today when it occurred to me, that I look at artistic mediums differently now than I did even 2 years ago. Compared with my younger self I find that I critique things now, instead of simply enjoying it the medium. A good example of this is how I now think about movies. I have found myself, more and more as time goes on, criticizing story, plot and setting than I used to. A very good difference though is that I tend to do it in a very constructive way. A few years ago if I watched a movie that I didn’t enjoy I would say “Oh, I didn’t like that movie”, but when I was asked why, I couldn’t give the reasons. Or I could give individual points that I didn’t like, but I was unable to describe why the whole didn’t work for me. Now, I’m able to look at movies, whether like or dislike, and explain what didn’t work for me and what did. I also find it exceptionally interesting that I tend to talk about the differences using an author’s terms, not in the terms a movie or screenplay would use.
The first movie that I can remember doing this to was 9. You may or may not remember this Disney movie from a few years ago. It was an interesting computer animated film about a dystopia in which humanity has been destroyed. The only living things are 9 small creatures designed to look like men (at least in basic shape) and their enemies, the robots that destroyed the world. The basic premise of the 9 creatures was that a brilliant scientist created them before he died, animating each of them with a personality or aspect of the man’s soul. In the movie, the creatures not only have to figure out who made them and why they are here, but they also have to defeat the evil robots who seem to be carrying out their last programmed command of “If it moves, kill it.”
My final decision on the movie was that it was good overall but while I enjoyed it, it could have been much better. One of the arguments I gave for this was that “the movie didn’t keep its promises.” This frustrated the heck out of my husband who didn’t understand the term. I explained it to him by saying that the ending seemed to have been afraid to fulfill its promise of a gritty, philosophical ending. They had copped out instead by making everybody left alive sad about their friends’ death, but moving on, in a sappy scene where we see the earth healing itself. It didn’t seem to fit the movie, as though they’d cheapened it by taking the easy way out.
I do the same with music, which is actually where I first noticed me doing it. When I first started doing my music reviews, I had a few albums that were types I honestly didn’t enjoy much. I initially put off doing the reviews as long as I could. Eventually I realized that a good music review isn’t based on whether or not I ‘like’ the album in question, but whether or not it had been done well, noting where it was lacking and why and why the albums did excellently and why. It really taught me a lot when I began to look critically at all of the music.
Now I’m pleased to be able to say that I think I’m finally figuring out how to apply that critical thinking to my writing. I think this is a huge step for me in my learning curve. Now I just need to figure out how to connect it to the books I read. I think that I may have been doing so unconsciously since I’ve been having trouble reading anything. I seem to be catching the writers doing something that irritates me I’ll immediately put the book down and think about how to not make that same mistake in my own writing (or how I would improve it in that book).
On a related note, I started reading a favourite older book today, Sebastian by Anne Bishop. Set in the world of Ephemera, the book details how the Eater of the World is escaping his bounds. The best thing about the book (which is brilliant to begin with) is the way that the story really makes you think about the way their world works, and how we re-create our world with the truths within our hearts. It always makes me look back on my own life and try to untangle the strands that hold my heart and soul captive, trying to understand which of my life’s biggest issues have been brought about by someone else and which have been brought about by me.
It’s very interesting if only because searching the interconnected webs teaches me how people are tied together by their relationships and how sometimes the simplest of things can change our perception.
I think I’m going to start something new this week as well. I’m going to try writing up a 1k – 5k story on the writing prompts on the Writing Excuses podcast. I’ll try to post up most of them for you guys!
Writing Prompt: Write about an “Interspeciated workplace.” Or how your character has just received a “Cease and Desist” request from a Web Cartoonist.
Tags: "9", Blog, book reviews, learning to think critically, motivation, Movies, Music Reviews, Nanowrimo, Novels, Reviewing Critically, Writing, Writing Excuses, Writing Prompt
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