Cinemaddiction
AmStar 14 Manager
Originally posted by BackFire
Critics aren't biased. Some may be, but many just give their opinions on films. Plenty of critics put down many independent films, if they genuinely don't like them. It's kinda a fallacious mindset to simply insinuate that all critics will by default love independent films because of a bias, without any valid form of reasoning or evidence to support such a silly claim. So if any critic likes an independent film that you don't, he's biased? They give valid reasons as to why or why not they like/dislike movies they review, if anyone is coming off as bias, it's you making up accusations about Bill Murray, no offense.Also, why do you say he's playing himself? So in real life you somehow know, factually, that he is the way his characters are in recent movies? How do you know this, how did you come to this questionable conclusion? Do you know him personally? Again, making a very very sloppy and baseless assumption that has absolutely zero credibility or merrit. He's just found a niche, and he's good at playing that type of character. He's basically become a character actor of a completely different form then how he used to be.
Also, you make it sound like he's untalented because he hasn't been in big overblown hollywood movies, as if those movies have good acting/actors to begin with. Plenty of good actors only do independent films because they are more artistic and they offer a more interesting roll then some shitty hollywood movie with explosions and a meteor coming to earth. Plenty of great actors choose independent movies so they can satisfy their artistic desires, where playing a doctor is some overblow shitfest with no brains doesn't appeal to them.
Sounds like you simply don't like Murray or his recent movies and so you are making stuff up to try and hurt his reputation/movies, when in reality you probably just didn't like his movies.
Critics, and their opinions, like actors, can be bought and sold. I wasn't speaking in generalities, including all critics, given they split down the middle, and it would be uncharacteristically naive of me to suggest such. There's plenty of Wes Anderson dick riding in the media, sometimes because it's en vogue, sometimes because critics genuinely feel he's something special. That's Hollywood, and that's their opinion, which is worth about as much as the next persons. It's all in how you voice your opinion that gets you respect. Some people base their favorite critics soley on the reader and critic liking or disliking the same movies, regardless of supporting causes. That's why I don't value any critics opinion.
I don't know Bill Murray personally, but himself and the characters are not too far detatched. He's washed up, not having a hit since "Groundhog Day". He plays roles of has beens in his last three movies, which is art imitating life. He showed up on Letterman, not once but TWICE, drunk as hell, on live television. That, coupled with jobbing to voicing "Garfield", don't bode well for his celebrity status, in my opinion. This "character niche" he's found is just Bill Murray being Bill Murray, so it would seem. I've read enough into the man himself to draw parallels, and they're not that distant. All these pretentious, mid-life crisis, dysfunctional family lifestyle bullshit movies that pass for entertainment really bother me.
In closing, I have nothing against Bill Murray, he's obviously tapped into a very reputable and profitable genre, that of movies for single adults who feel they've failed in every aspect of life. I guess the market for those kind of movies is out there, and are considered entertainment for someone, so, who am I to knock it, right? His talent is diminished, he's a shell of his former outrageous, witty, and cunning self, now, fodder for arthouse pity flicks and Criterion Collection DVD library titles. Watching him "evolve" in the films he's chose is like cinematic morphine.
That's just my opinion.