Three years ago, in the Covid-ravaged days of 2021, the world film landscape was gripped in a bleak winter and the entertainment publishing industry seemed intent on pushing film reviews into the cold. The American trade papers had had enough of “small” reviews of “marginal” movies from international producers, which were seen as cluttering up their websites and obscuring the widely read “important” reviews of Hollywood tentpoles. Even American indies swam in troubled waters, though it was (and sadly, still is) the non-English language films that had the biggest target on their backs.
Meanwhile, thanks in part to the ennui of lockdown, the digital age was exploding. But in terms of film promotion, it wasn’t much help with its blogs and social media and influencers, a cacophony of opinionated but often unlettered voices funneling everything out there into a fistful of must-see trends of the season, with a good deal of ascendancy on the followers. Is it any wonder so many movie theaters have been shuttered, and the survivors are down to recycling the same ten titles over and over?
If this lack of variety is a dire one for film lovers, it is an existential threat to the world film industry, whose bread and butter is selling movies to multiple platforms. But how to do that when your breakout film is made by a new director from Iran? Thus was The Film Verdict born, to offer a much-needed lifeline to movies from Chile to China, Norway to Nigeria, and focus our readers’ attention on films made with heart, wit, and off-beat creativity. Smart ideas developed well. Small-budget films with sweeping emotion. Political themes, futuristic visions, love stories and unclassifiable gems. Festival discoveries that risked being overlooked.
Here’s a thought-provoking quote from Jeff Bezos: “If you absolutely can’t tolerate critics, then don’t do anything new or interesting.” This assumes most critics are looking to fit new creative works into comfortable old cubbyholes, much as a comic book franchise seeks to duplicate the success of its pilot feature. TFV practices a different kind of criticism. It was designed as a space to ferret out the new and interesting film and then – of course! – critique how well it lives up to its ambitions.
In a way, our writing is the same kind of work done by the best film festivals, whose programmers spend their budgets seeking out new films that are relevant for their ever-expanding audiences. Our critics have always worked in symbiosis with international film festivals to highlight their finest programming finds and make them part of a lively discussion of film culture from around the world. What a pleasure it is to see, among the 500 feature films we review each year, some of our favorites appear on shortlists for the Oscars, the Baftas and other serious awards that recognize quality, innovation and artistry. These are saleable films and TFV reviews were among the first to note the fact.
In the digital age, we are still waiting for bloggers, influencers and social media to catch up with the explosion of incredible short films flooding the festivals. The Film Verdict’s Ben Nicholson gave over 100 of these films full-length reviews last year. We also pay a lot of attention to the documentary form and animation, which have now infiltrated every film festival and award ceremony. Finally, in acknowledgement of our wide foreign language readership, we translate all our reviews of Spanish-language films into Spanish (“CineVerdicts”) and in a few months they will be joined by a standalone publication, Al-Takdir, dedicated to the Arab cinema and its film industry.
The future of film reviews from our P.O.V.? More knowledgeable. More international. More of them.
Deborah Young is the editor and chief critic of The Film Verdict.
