Everyone’s a critic, and I have a lot of critiques on this movie.
Critics have always had their critics about how they respond to movies, plays, and music. We can be judged as mean-spirited based on how we view a certain project, but I like to consider us to be like parents disciplining someone and trying to make them better. We can’t praise everything piece of entertainment that comes out, but we can praise whatever delivers the goods.
The latest film I’m reviewing is “The Critic,” which takes place in the 1930s, and stars Ian McKellen as a gay, feared, and hard theater critic, who uses his words wisely. He delivers his tone and mannerisms into this critic, but the movie gets overblown by its uninteresting characters and convoluted screenplay. It’s difficult to stay focused or care about anyone too much.
We meet the London theater critic Jimmy Erskine (McKellen), who works for the Daily Chronicle newspaper bringing the art of criticism into the 20th century. He’s also a representation of the mean and lonely critic, as if he was made by someone who hates film critics. When the newspaper boss dies, his son David Brooke (Mark Strong) takes over, and Jimmy is his least favorite person at work. In fact, he tells the old man to be kinder (“More beauty, less beast,” he says).
He also has a lover named Tom (Alfred Enoch), which is why they get arrested and searched by the police. He has to lie about being straight, and Tom does his typing as his secretary. The old man has the thoughts, and the young man has the fingers to write his stories.
Gemma Arterton also does some good work playing an actress and spinster named Nina Land, but her story doesn’t leave much to her full potential. Her mother Annabel (Lesley Manville) suggests that she talks to the disgruntled critic about how he treated her in the media. “I’m not meddling; I’m mothering,” as Annabel says.
The young woman comes up to Jimmy and demands an apology, but he refuses. But he’s also the reason why she became an actress to begin with, based on his passion and honest opinions about the art of theater. She was trying to reach his standards, but he still sees the potential in her.
Then, the actress soon wins herself a glowing review from Jimmy, and this isn’t out of pity. But she’s not without her turmoil, like the editor having his way with her or her affair with a married man named Stephen (Ben Barnes) or even her being part of a blackmail scheme by Jimmy. Now, that’s a lot for this woman.
“The Critic” works only with McKellen and Arterton expressing their passion for theater, and the former is gay, so he’s able to portray his character with some sentimentality. It was common at the time for homophobia and fascism to affect him, but the movie is too skittish to explore that subject. Instead, it relies on affairs, mistreatments, and even death, like it wants to play like a puzzle. And through my perspectives, it’s missing a lot of pieces.
I’m afraid I’m gonna have to be more beast and less beauty on this movie review. But that doesn’t mean I have to be a feared film critic. I gave you my perspectives in the introduction, and I hope you can acknowledge that.
