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I saw this posted on IMDB today. Is it just me, or does Roger Moore kind of sound like a jerk:
Newspapers Cutting Costs by Cutting Film Critics
In their effort to cut costs as subscribers desert them, newspapers are firing their film critics and replacing them with wire-service reviews. In a commentary appearing today (Thursday) in the Orlando Sentinel's blog, the newspaper's film critic Roger Moore, discussed the recent ousters of Jamie Bernard at the New York Daily News and Mark Burger at the Winston-Salem Journal and the reassignment of George Thomas at the Akron Beacon Journal. Moore wrote: "When a paper loses its critic, a town loses another local voice. The 'we can run wire service reviews' line may be true. But heaven help the movies the day we're down to a couple of critics in the largest markets syndicated everywhere. There aren't many who would play all over America." Moore noted that his own newspaper has also come under the knife. "We used to have two people on the movie beat here, which allowed us to cover the heck out of what was (and WASN'T) happening in a city that wanted to be 'Hollywood East.'" Moore concluded by giving this advice to young would-be film critics, who are thinking of starting out writing for websites or their college papers: "Don't even start. Don't try this at home. It'll break your heart."
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Note the lines: "There aren't many who would play all over America" (like the all-knowing, wordsmith that is Roger Moore, who can speak to the nation) and "a town loses another local voice" (like the all-knowing, wordsmith that is Roger Moore, who apparently speaks for everyone in Orlando who sees a movie that he happens to review).
What a pompous jerk. And the "Don't even start" line really annoys me too. Granted, I'm sort of one of the people he is addressing, so I'm obviously going to be like "fuck this dude." (to be honest, I agree with him only to the extent that reviewing movies is a dying, and almost pointless, profession these days).
Still, doesn't it sound like this guy is just trying to ensure that HIS own syndicated isn't bothered by competition. With all his talk about "movies losing out" and "it will be a sad day when...", shouldn't this guy be speaking out against this or emboldening others to do so. If he's worried enough to "speak out," why would he tell people to give up?
Oh, right, the money...
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