Just Because You Can...

...Doesn't Mean You Should.

Stumbled across this article today while "working" and it really hit home. Although it deal more with the production end of things, the basic dilemma is very similar to the one I am facing now.

It took me a long time to figure out what it is I want to do with my life. Film has always been a passion of mine and while initially I thought that I, (like everyone else and his monkey), wanted to become a director, I eventually realized that what really excited me about film was talking about it. And writing about it. Analyzing the technical aspects and looking at what different films say about us or what they should be saying.

I had to really struggle to accept the fact that I am a writer. This is funny to me because I kind of hate writing. While I love the final product and the fame (ha!) and fortune (ha!) that it brings, I find the process of sitting down and trying to put my thoughts together in coherent sentences rather torturous. My fragile self esteem doesn't help much either as one of the reasons I resisted entering the writing field was that I have a hard time believing my opinions matter to anyone else. I do not posses the sort of personality that knows that I am right and you are wrong. I am, in most things, a moderate and would rather just walk away than have to defend my personal views to someone who obviously will not understand me. However, one thing I believe in is education, and I think that this is one of the things that makes criticism, filmic or otherwise, important. I like finding out about new genres and directors and sharing these discoveries with others. I take my job of knowing what I'm talking about very seriously and while I have on occasion made mistakes, I own up to my errors and generally just enjoy the educational process.

But, as this article drove home yet again, none of this really matters. Anyone with access to a computer, regardless of their command of English (or any language for that matter) can be a film critic. Just scroll through IMDb or Amazon and you will be confronted by hundreds of amateur critics. Hundreds. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. With so much free criticism floating all over the internets, why should anyone take what I have to say seriously, let alone offer to pay me to say it? The whole thing is just incredibly disheartening.

Yet, I am still plugging away. Earlier today my boss at the video store asked me about eFilmCritic.com. Because I wasn't familiar with that particular site, I decided to take a look and it seems like a solid enough archive site, similar to Rotten Tomatoes. Up at the top of the page was a link button: "looking for new writers". Curious, and getting a little desperate for ways to kickstart my "career", I clicked and was encourage to find that there was some sort of screening process and they ask you to submit two reviews, one positive, one negative. "Let your personality shine through," it says, "and, all things considered, maybe you'll be a movie critic in a week or so." Hey, sounds great. Although it doesn't look like they pay anything. And travel for any "assignments" would likely be at my own expense.

Wait a minute. I am a movie critic.