Film Reviewers - Useful or useless?

[The Last Word]

Sight and Sound magazine is the one to turn to for intelligent, unbiased, agenda-free reviewing, something many newspapers can't be relied for these days.

Of the mainstream reviewers, I, like many, still have a soft spot for fusty old Roger Ebert. Though firmly of the old school, he can still (like a good reviewer should) make you see things differently now and again.

[Deuce Bigolo]

Even he had a point to make about reviewers when reviewing goyas ghosts

Now I must tell you that "Goya's Ghosts" got cruel reviews when it opened late last fall in Europe. I don't make a habit of reviewing reviews, but the advance word on this picture was impossible to avoid ("Creaks along like an anemic snail" -- Derek Malcolm; "Close to a disaster" -- the Telegraph; "Dull as dishwater" -- Neil Smith). Sometimes I wonder if critics aren't reviewing the film they would have preferred rather than the one the director made.

I doubt that Forman and the legendary screenwriter Jean-Claude Carriere lacked the ability to tell a conventional story. I think the clue to their purpose is right there in the opening scene of the Goya drawings. Look carefully, and you may find something in the film to remind you of most of them. "Goya's Ghosts" is like the sketchbook Goya might have made with a camera.

[Deuce Bigolo]

I've got the ultra cheap fares all sussed out but to be honest it doesn't make an ordinary experiemce anymore palatable