Many creators, most in their 20s or early 30s, specialize in a particular niche. Joe Aragon (Cinema. Joe, 931,000 followers) is known for his breakdowns of upcoming attractions; Monse Gutierrez (cvnela1.4 million followers) and Bryan Lucious (stoney_tha_great, 387,000 followers) demystify and rank horror films; Seth Mullan-Feroze (sethsfilmreviews256,000 followers) leans towards art house and foreign cinema.
Unlike the movie departments of major metropolitan newspapers or national magazines, the individuals at MovieTok generally don’t seek to review every remarkable movie. And while most have expressed admiration for traditional critics’ grasp of film history, they tend to associate the profession as a whole with false or unearned authority.
“A lot of us don’t trust the critics,” said Lucious, 31. He was one of many who pointed out the review aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes, where “Top Critics” scores often differ. from casual users, as evidence that the critical establishment is out of touch. “They watch movies and just look for something to criticize,” he said. “Fans watch movies looking for entertainment.”
The creators of MovieTok are not the first in the history of film criticism to rebel against their elders. In the 1950s, François Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard and other writers of the journal Cahiers du Cinéma rejected the nationalism of mainstream French criticism. In the 1960s and ’70s, New Yorker critic Pauline Kael attacked the moralism associated with Bosley Crowther, a longtime film critic of The New York Times, and others. And movie bloggers in the 2000s charged print critics with indifference or hatred of superhero and fantasy films.
“There’s always this contempt for so-called ‘other’ critics as elitist and old-fashioned while presenting yourself as the new avant-garde,” said Mattias Frey, head of the department of media, culture and creative industries at City University of London and the author of “The Permanent Crisis of Film Criticism.” He refers to criticism, by any name, as “rational analysis,” citing the philosopher Noël Carrol.
