Peter Howell, a full-time film critic describes himself as very fortunate.
Many aspiring film critics would surely agree.
"I've been very lucky," he says. "My two biggest interests in life are
probably music and movies, [and] for the first six or seven years of the '90s
I was rock critic for [a newspaper], and for the past 14 years I've been movie
critic, so I've been able to indulge both of my big passions."
Howell says the thing he most enjoys about being a film critic is probably
"the aspect of discovery." He usually gets to see films before the public
does.
"If possible I see them without getting too much advance notice on what
they're on," says Howell. "I just saw a film this morning that I didn't have
a chance to learn what it was about, and so I went into it totally cold. It's
always interesting when you get to see what an artist has in mind before it
has been filtered through a whole lot of other people."
The two most important qualities a film critic should have, says Howell,
are a keen mind and a love of movies.
"I think you really have to love film, and I think you have to love all
kinds of film," he says. "You just have to have a passion for it. It's not
something you can approach as a hobby or as half measures or even as a job.
It's got to be an absolute passion or you just can't do it."
There's another quality film reviewers should have, says Howell. It might
surprise you: A high degree of stamina.
"I see between five and 10 movies a week," Howell explains. "During a film
festival I might see 20 or 30 movies a week. [And] there's a lot of stuff
at home, like if you're catching up on a previous film by a director and you
might want to refresh what you saw before, or if you missed a film that was
important you can get it on video and watch that. I always try and do that.
You often feel obliged to read the book, [too].... I don't always think that
the book is required reading, but it helps sometimes."
Dan Kois is a freelance film critic whose reviews appear in the Washington
Post and Village Voice, among other publications. He offers these four suggestions
for aspiring film critics: "Suggestion number one is to watch as many movies
as you possibly can. If you are interested enough in movies to be a film critic,
you're probably already doing that. But watch new movies that are coming out,
watch old movies that you hear about, watch random movies that are on... when
you happen to turn on the TV, just watch everything.
"Number two is to read widely. That is to say, read lots of critics that
you like and get a sense of how criticism works and how good writers write
about movies. But also read magazines and books and non-fiction and novels
and things that are interesting to you to give yourself the broad base of
knowledge that you need to be able to talk about pop culture in an interesting
way. If you've never read a novel in your life, you'll be a bad film critic,
no matter how much you know about movies.
"Three, I would try to take some kind of film production class at some
point... even if you have no intention of ever making a movie. Going through
the process of seeing what it's like on a set, what it's like to try and operate
a camera, what it's like to try and edit something together, will give you
a great appreciation for those things when you see them done well or badly
on a movie screen.
"Number four, start writing now. Don't wait for somebody to hire you to
write for them, because no one ever will. Start a blog, or start a Tumblr,
or start tweeting, or do movie reviews on your Facebook page, or just write
them at home. But start writing about movies now because the way you get better
is by practicing, and the way you get noticed is by having things out there
that people like to read."
If you want to be a film critic you can get started right away, says Steve
Biodrowski. He's the administrator-editor of Cinefantastique Online.
"Nowadays, we have the Internet, so you can always start your own blog
and hope you get some attention," says Biodrowski. "So you have more than
just two or three writing samples, you've got an entire [blog or website],
and you can say, 'Look, I've got a following, if you publish my stuff there's
X number of readers who are going to follow along.'"
Biodrowski also suggests becoming extremely knowledgeable about certain
types of movies. Then you can become known for your expertise in those areas.
"I think specialization is probably a way to go these days because there's
so many people out there writing about this stuff," he says. "So there may
not be a huge audience for... Italian movies or whatever, but if you make
yourself the person who is the expert on that, it's probably a good thing."
At the same time, film critics benefit by exposing themselves to a broad
range of topics. Reading widely will make you a better writer and a more thoughtful
reviewer.
"Nobody wants to read somebody who doesn't have a decent command of the
language," says Marilyn Ferdinand. She's an independent film reviewer who
operates a site called Ferdy on Films.
"I truly think the best reviewers are people who have a very broad knowledge
in a wide variety of fields, not only in the other arts like literature, theater
and music, but also things you might not expect, like history and even something
like economics," she says. "If you're covering certain types of documentaries,
it's helpful to provide background, to give a rounded picture of the film
that you're seeing, not just say, 'This is my opinion, like it or lump it.'"
Howell encourages anyone seriously interested in film criticism to stick
with it. Despite the discouraging job numbers and the uncertainty, over the
long run the cream always rises to the top, he says.
"If you really want to do it, find a way to do it," he says. "And I think
that's in any kind of job.
"I think there will be a future for film criticism -- what form exactly
it's hard to predict, but I think people are always going to be interested
in intelligent discussion of an art form as important as film, and film is
the most important art form of the past century," says Howell. "There's no
other art form that has as much appeal as movies do, so I find it hard to
believe that we're getting to an era where people would not want to have critics
of some kind. The big question is, 'In what form will we engage with those
critics?'"