A RETRACTION OF MY REVIEW FOR DARK PHOENIX

The following article is probably the first retraction I’ve ever written. And let’s hope that it will be the last.

Anyways, a couple of weeks ago, I wrote a review for Dark Phoenix. I don’t wanna rehash what I said in the original review; it’s right here, so go read it to get up to speed. In summary, I didn’t particularly care for the movie and it did not connect with me as a film fan and a superhero fan. However, looking back on my review, I come across as very angry. A lot of things I say are mostly just there to make people laugh and probably make me look angrier than I actually was. There’s a particular passage that I want to focus on:

            “Even Jessica Chastain, one of the most versatile actresses working today, has managed  to have all of her ability sucked out by first-time writer/director Simon Kinberg.”

Now again, like a lot of things that I have said in the review, this was mostly just to make the reader laugh. And at the time, I didn’t think there was a problem with it.

However, in light of recent statements made by Simon Kinberg – the writer/director of Dark Phoenix – on the KCRW show The Business with Kim Masters, I feel the need to retract that statement and make an apology for the review, especially that statement.

If you haven’t listened to the radio show, Kinberg discusses the financial and critical reception to Dark Phoenix and places the blame of the film’s financially underperformance on himself:

           

            ““I’m here, I’m saying when a movie doesn’t work, put it on me. I’m the writer-director,           the movie didn’t connect with audiences, that’s on me.”

Now, a statement like that demands a lot of respect from me. Usually when a hyped-up film flops either critically or financially (or both), we see the director either pointing fingers at the marketing and studio or just outright blaming the critics and saying “I made it for the fans” or something along those lines. But Mr. Kinberg seems to be taking the whole situation in stride, looking more levelheaded than a lot of others who find themselves in his position.

I think part of it comes from the fact that Mr. Kinberg has been in the business for a long time, so he grasps the notion of “you win some, you lose some”, which is an idea that not a lot of people nowadays seem to understand. Not everything you do is going to be successful, so you have to take your failures where you can and move on. And besides, it’s not as if Dark Phoenix is the only film that Mr. Kinberg has been involved with. He’s worked on multiple successes from Mr. & Mrs. Smith, The Martian, Deadpool to Deadpool 2, and X-Men: Days of Future Past.

Now, none of this is to say that I think Dark Phoenix is a good film, but it does make me want to reconsider how I write reviews and the level of professionalism I should bring to it. After all, when Siskel and Ebert reviewed a movie, they were always professional, even if they were discussing the director’s successes/failure. So much of online film criticism, especially in the YouTube sphere, has been based around the Nostalgia Critic model of yelling and screaming and coming up with colorful, profanity-laden metaphors, which is an idea that many modern critics are starting to break away from. And it’s something I need to do as well in my film writings.

So all this to say, I’m sorry, Mr. Kinberg. If you ever read this, I’m sorry. What I said about you in my review was unprofessional on my part.