YES or NO to Movie Rating?
We have received a mail from Mr Sujish Nair, Dubai, criticising our movie reviews and rating. Excerpts:"the movie review you do on the latest releasing movies are very bad for the film industry. That too in the first week of the release. As you know, the movie industry has to get their money back from theatres. But u guys post bad comments about movie on the releasing day, who will show interest to watch it in theatre?"
We would like to know your opinion...
» Do you like to watch a bad movie just for the sake of supporting Malayalam film industry?
» Do you think indulekha should go ahead with its current style of film rating?
» Any suggestions for indulekha's Review Team?
Kindly post your comments below. Please note that anonymous comments may not be published. You can also mail us your views at reviewteam@indulekha.com.
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35 Comments:
We the viewers do not have any interest in film industry's business.
What we need is 'good film'.
The film industry need only business.
There is nothing wrong in reviewing a movie. I used to read movie reviews in magazines written by late Kozhikodan. As the producer has to get his money, the viewer's has also got the right to know about the product before he spends his hard earned money. nothing wrong, go ahead.
Hi Indulekha Team ,
My opinion is : Good Movies always get their money back from theatres and Bad movies not..Some ppl always see some reviews/other's opinions before they watch a movie.Others just book the ticket and watch the new releases.If this is the case , one review from Indulekha.com wont do much harm to the film industry.
But sometimes i feel , your 'Negatives' on many films are not the real negatives..If you had watched the film more closely , you could have even noticed more/other negatives.So its better to give a realistic film review after a minimum of 2 weeks of film release.
We don't like to watch a bad movie just for the sake of supporting
film industry. Yes, indulekha should go ahead with its current style of film rating.
I think you are doing a good job. If the comment is impartial that will help the film industry.
We need good and beautiful films in malayalam. At the same time your words will encourage the good directors and discourage the others.
It may be true that the movie reviews given by Indulekha on the latest releasing movies may sometimes affect the film industry badly ,especially when low standard movies are released.But how can one blame Indulekha for that? You have to see the other side of the coin because those reviews are very good for people to have a clear cut idea about the new films, and to decide whether to waste their money on that or not. As far as i am concerned Indulekha's film reviews are apt and accurate and i do appreciate their great effort on that. What i can not undestand is why should one urge to make film industry grow richer by making the poor people even poorer? So, i hereby extend my wishes and support to Indulekha to proceed on what they were doing sofar.
I red the comment of Mr. Sujish Nair from Dubai. My first reply to it is just ignore it as such. It doesn't deserve any discussion.
The movie as an art form has its own role in the society and has its own commitment too to the society( I know people differ on it). It is the responsibility of the critics to rate the films properly and ensure that the public gets the right one. As our great, late critic Mr. M.Krishnan Nair say, '' The inferior literature will damage / spoil the society''. This justfies the position of Indulekha on the attempt of film rating. My only doubt is this, whether the quality of rating in Indulekha is up to the mark( hereafter, I will try to go through the reviews in Indulekha).
This is totally a bad time for Malayalam film industry. The industry is going through the worst of its carreer especially in terms of quality of movies. Now, every one is a director and a producer. The number of qualified directors are very very minimum. We had a golden time in seventies. Its gone... Now, some people make somethig and call it a movie. This is what happening( these are not my words, its from our great actor Bharat Gopi ) now a days.
So My dear Indulekha, its not your duty to protect the commercial interest of the film industry. Your commitment should be towards the common public,continue with what you are doing and my humple request is to be more orthodox(to improve the quality of rating) in rating the movies.
Finally, people have their own sense and concept on movies(it may be a wrong concept) and that influences their decision to see a movie. The ultimate purpose of movie reviews and critics ratings is that it gradually helps the reader to develop or frame his own views and concept on the art form over a period of time. Now, the film viewers in kerala are on the wrong side. They think that what they are seeing now is the right movie.They have the right get good movies and see it.
So, its essential that the ratings of movies should be done with due seriousness to ensure quality.
Mr. Sujish,
It is not only Indulekha reviewing movies. Even if Indulekha is not going to review the movies in first week itself, and if it is a bad film, it is going to fail in box office. No doubt about that.
To Indulekha,
I think the reviews should support the industry. There's no point in hard core criticism. It should be creative. There's no point in comparing Chengathippoocha with Chithram or Kilukkam (I am not saying Indulekha did it, just putting an example) and saying Chengathippoocha is not a good entertainer. It can be like, how good it is when comparing to recent releases. Then audience will get a chance to select a film, currently running in theaters. I think it will help the good films as well.
It is foolish to stop reviewing movies on the ground, that it will affect Malayalam Film Industry.
Keep up the good work.
--
I will never watch a film just for supporting the film industry. The current style of Indulekha's film rating is just good...and for heaven's sake don't change it.
If people are not watching movies, it's just a message to the film-makers that the film need to be improved. you can't expect people to watch all the trash cooked up as movies.
There so much of hype before a release these days, the maximum that can be done is to let the reviews, good, bad or indifferent appear after a week.
This amounts to doctoring comments to some extent.
With so much money going into a production why don't the filmmaker and production team use their 'grey cells' and take time to produce films.
Like 'thattukada'(s) they churn out films and expect the common man to lap it up! In interviews, you will hear directors waxing eloquent about how much they gave of themselves to make the film. YET, nobody accepted it.
It is time contemporary themes are taken up and not stereotyping of characters one after the other. Then there is no point in saying it 'bombed' b'cos of bad reviews.
Mr. Sujish Nair has every right to air his views regarding your ratings of the movies - so much so you too have your right to rate the movies the way you analyse them for the benefit or otherwise of your subscribers (free, of course).
Nevertheless, Mr. Sujish Nair's contention that your ratings are too bad for the film industry is highly deplorable.I fail to understand why your readers should blindly and unreasonably support the film industry or for that matter any industry or individual.
His critisism has given me an opportunity to spend more time to go deeper into your ratings and reviews and take them more seriously.
Rating and reviewing a work in an independent manner would certainly attract opposition from the interested parties. This is the rule of life in every aspect we encouter today. Even in such a situation, there are few who boldly face the challenges and put to pen their unbiased opinion.
PLEASE KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE COMMON MAN AT LARGE.
With all the very best to the entire TEAM INDULEKHA.
I believe the critics have the right to review and rate a movie when it comes out. That has been the way all major film industries work, including Hollywood. And the critics' rating has a major impact on the film's destiny in the box office. People depend on critics' comments about a movie to ceratin extent, as they built a confidence that the reviews will be impartial and authoritative.
Now malayalam film industry ( this includes directors, super stars, associations, critics, technicians, associations etc ) has its limitations,
politics and biases. This makes an independant review very difficult. I know ( as I am a film student here, I closely watch mal. film industry) many cases, political manipulations and organized moves have helped make or break for a movie. Critics have been used as tools to do this.
As long as Indukekha Team do their job right with emotional maturity, impartiality etc., they can continue do the same. Critics responsibilty is not towards producers and their interests, but to the medium and people and art.
when you do the review of a film, that should be a genuine one. that's why we people are interested in such reviews. so you should continue in the current style.
Movie review is a guide for movie goers. But moviegoers have to trust independant movie critcs only if the critcs have proved that they are competent enough to criticise. If you think you want to support movie industry which is mostly financed by illegitimate wealth, you have the freedom to do that. you cannot prohibit movie criticism for the sake of movie industry. recently the raid of pirated movies in Kerala have made lots of legitimate business people to loose their shirs to protect the wealth of the corrupt (income tax dodging) super stars and spirit mafia. Free society, a free economic system with government controls to collect taxes is the only way for the fittest to survive. Thank you for your reviews.
There is no problem in doing a realistic review, but I don't think the reviews reach to that level. We expect an impartial, encouraging review. For example, the review should say why you like it and why you didn't like it with explanations. Explanations in the sense, saying like it would have been better if they do so; It was wonderful because while watching it, we were sitting at the edge of the seat; we hardly blink our eyes for few minutes. Instead of saying 150 words, just a smiling shot was enough; etc, etc. Then, we also can understand why did so. After all, the review writers are human beings and if they don't do a realistic review, we won't believe in it. All human beings like pampering but it should be in the right spirit and in the right way.
I have felt that presenting a balanced collective view about a movie is always better than presenting a single person's view. As always, the customer is the king. Whether you rate it or not, I believe a good movie is one which has good viewership. What I am saying is that the rating should reflect the current popular rating, not a single viewer's judgement. And for a popular rating to evolve, it takes at least a week. So, if you ask me, I would prefer to wait for at least one week before publishing any review.
There is another thing called rating the rater. For example, if Adoor and Mohanlal are asked to rate a movie on a scale of 1-10, the ratings would be different. What are Indulekha's credentials as a rater?
I think, a better and non-controversial indicator will be based on statistics like viewership on urban/rural/gender/age/education, and on percentage capacity (such as 40% viewers in Maharani).
A film rating is a personal opinion, and I don't see why Mr.Sujish is so upset about it. If he is a regular reader of any particular review page of any publication, he should, by now, be able to rate his own tastes about movies from those reviews, and then choose whether or not to see it. Indulekha is only reviewing a movie from it's point of view, just as any friend would. Whether or not you choose to agree is a personal choice.
You guys are doing good work, carry on!!
I won’t watch bad movies for the sake of supporting any film industry. As a honest admirer and well wisher of Malayalam film industry, I would watch and appreciate good and sensible cinema. But not the bad ones.
Indulekha should go forward with its reviews in this same style. From my personal experience, I have felt that indulekha’s reviews and comments about films, fit to the T.i have always come across very impartial and sensible reviews, published by Indulekha.
I would like to conclude by saying that, presently every film industry, for that matter any entertainment industry, churns out huge amount of varied products as every such stuff has takers. But it is important that media (like indulekha) creates a good clarity about the quality of these products as well as the target audiences for these. Thereby connecting the right audiences to their kind of likeable movies, these reviews will only help the audiences and the film industry.
So reviews threatening the financial stability of film business is totally absurd. Like every other businesses, Films are also a business product. If the product has quality and clear cut target audience, they will work and such reviews would only be of help in that cause.
Three cheers to indulekha review team. Carry on the good work guys.
I am a regular reader of your movie reviews. Indulekha's movie review helped me a lot to select films on my weekends. And all your reviews are absolutely correct. I am not supporting the views of Mr.Sujish Nair coz there are other blog sites also contains reviews on first week itself. But Indulekha's current review system including the rating with scores, pros and cons of each film will help the film industry also to improve the standard of films, reduce imitating of other filmy incidents. And again I think you people do some scanning before publishing comments and reviews. Actaully Indulekha help peoples and industry from mad fans and supporters of superstars.
I am eagerly awaiting reviews of Vishu releases. Once again I wish all success to people behind Indulekha.
even i found ur reviews some what harsh. bt not as harsh as rediff. i think u should rate a movie out of 5 only as all others do. if a movie is not good for viewing theres no fault in reporting that. we r also giving our valuable mmoney in theatres and no body will want it to spent it own unworthy crap films. bt the reasons u put in the minusses column are not enough for a fil to be caled bad. i think more than two persons sholud review the film then put each of their reviews or put a combined review. pls allow users also to comment if they have seen the movie. bcoz critics have gone wrong in many octions.
There is nothing wrong in reviewing a movie; we need is 'good film'. Good Movies always get their money back from theatres and Bad movies not.. Yes, indulekha should go ahead with its current style of film rating.
is there anybody who likes to take bad food from a sub standard hotel, just to support the hotel industry? how idioitic these people are! unbelievable!!
GO AHEAD INDULEKHA! we need to know which movie is good and which is not.
I think Indulekha should continue with their present style. But, you should review the movies sincerely. Nobody would like to spend money for a bad movie at all. I, for one, would like to watch a movie on the basis of its director, actors, scriptwriters.
Indulekha should follow its current form of film review. Public is at liberty to view and critizise any form of art. They are not under any obligation to save the industry or the producers capital. Indulekha should hold its review like a mirror to public. Your commitment is towards the public. Please keep it up.
The request made by Sujish Nair - one of the producers(?) - is worth considering. If our resolution or findings abt a movie will ever spoil the income or the profit of the producer or influence the viewers, it is better that we keep aloof from such activities.
Afterall, it is not for fun they are spending the money to produce a film and if we become spoil sport for such an event. My humble suggestion is not to endanger their survival. LIVE AND LET LIVE!
The so called NRI movie enthusiasts are the ones who encourage pirated CD's of latest movies. We can trace out movies under shoot from Dubai and Sharjah. The strange thing which I have observed is, after watching those pirated CD's they will scream and weep about the crisis of Malayalam movie industry in fm stations and blogs. Indulekha can do a lot by introducing world classics, masters and their works. For Eg: Director Kim Ki Duk from South Korea, Iranian Directors Majid Majidi or Mohsen Makmalbaf have gr8 impact in Kerala, I mean on people who consider Cinema as an important-creative art. There is no point in reviewing Mayavi, Abraham & Lincoln and that stuff. And the public dont want to think that the above said masters are making 'buji' movies, they are simple as we say "great stories are simple"!!! Letz watch movies like Lastrada and Cinema Paradiso and believe that "Cinema is love 24 hours per second" Courtesy: ISC Group
A review is an opinion that is formed after seeing a film. Freedom of speech is a constitutional right in our country.
I would value an honest unbiased review of any film. But that is what is hard to come by.
A potential audience does get affected by a review which is why they are so powerful. But going by the trend in Malayalam movie reviews- it is rarely that a spade is called a spade. Most movies are given flattering reviews depending on which banner it carries or which star is part of it. It has become a case similar to the Emperor who wore no clothes but no one except a child had the audacity to point it out. Many a time one is shocked at the pathetic level a movie is at, compared to the rosy reviews it receives.
Its time for a reality check and I would value an honest review about a movie. If people are genuinely concerned about the films' collections, then probably a more concerted effort should be taken to curb the piracy of music/films. I mean individuals should refuse to watch /listen to pirated material and actively prevent their friends and family from doing so. That kind of an act would take the collections much further than curbing someone's opinion on the film.
By the way, it also occurs to me that, it would be a tiny sliver of Malayalam movie audience that checks the online reviews of a film before rushing to buy tickets the first weekend of release!
We need to see good movies. We don’t want to spent our money and spoil our time for bad movies. Please proceed with your review for a general view of the new films.
There is nothing wrong posting review for the new releasing movies.cYou are doing a good work. Keep it up.
I think Indulekha should hire a new team of reveiwers. The team gave a score of 5 /10 for Karuthapakshikal and 6/10 for Chotta Mumbai, Mayavi and Vindoayatra!! Surely there is a lack of quality reveiwing here as no sensible person with a knowledge of Film making or Film crticism would give such flipside marks! And to be honest in the age of the internet it is the many spineless and namelesss ad self proclaimed crtics who virtually know nothing about the art of cinema who are the real threat to good cinema and the industry! So if you don't have a good team stop reviewing or change the team!
I am not agree with his view but your film reviews always are partisan view. You are always supporting only one super star's film(Mohnlal filoms). If cant review films in health way, it is better to stop the review, that will help the malayalam film industry........
how can you say indulekha is pro-mohanlal?? just have look at the rating of the following lal-movies:
1. mahasamudram - 4
2. photographer - 3
rating for some mammootty starrers:
1. kayyoppu - 7
2. palunk - 6
and the top rated movie, with Rank 8, is neither a mammootty film nor a lal flm. it's classmates! as far as i know, indulekha is very much impartial and reliable.
(advice to indulekha: DON'T give space for comments like the one shown above. they're not genuine film lovers. they are just fans; mad and blind fans. forget them and you go ahead! all the best)
The current policy is right. I usually read the review and it is very helpful for me. Because i feel a real sense in it. So please don't support bad films. If you support bad films for the security of film industry it will affect the credibility of your reviews. you have no responsibility to give a helping hand to the cinemas which promote evil thinking and violence.
The film reviews which appear in your site is fair and judicious.We don't need reviews for the sake of reviews.The movie industry can survive only with the unbiased reviews .The constructive criticism from your side will help the industry a lot.I hope that you will stick to your standards in the future also.
Vivek Vijayan
We malayalees always support good things . Cinema is also a product of idustry. Like any other product in the market, if the customer like it they will accept it .
With this concept it is nonsense to tell that we shouldn't criticise a product. The NRI 's coming from other countries with money and making something called film. The criticism should be a lesson for those people. Like any other products, we need only good films in Malayalam.
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