Signs you're reading a bad movie review, vol. 1

My many years as a customer of online rental services like Netflix and Greencine, coupled with many wasted hours browsing Jump the Shark, Rotten Tomatoes, and the Internet Movie Database have given me a lot of time to read a random selection of people's comments on film and television, usually when I was trying to figure out if something was worth a rental. Unfortunately, a lot of these reviews just weren't very helpful, and I started to perceive some common elements of bad reviews that contained no insight or information, or were coming from a perspective so skewed or limited that their experience could never match my own. As a result I started to recognize a series of cues to stop reading or discount certain reviews, mostly brain-dead and negative but even some well-written and positive reviews. As a service to my vast readership, here is the first sign a movie reviewer has nothing of value to say.

#1: Any mention of who else was in the room

Often this goes into bad reviews, taking the form of “My wife and I were sitting on our couch and as soon as the movie was over we looked at each other and said,'Wow, Ben Affleck really can't act.'” For some reason “on the couch looking at each other” is a very popular meme in useless comments, but generally the more extraneous detail, the less the person actually has to say about the movie. Other forms include a long introduction about what theater they saw it in, and if it's an old movie the year and the crazy clothes they were wearing, but generally the actual direct commentary they make about the movie can be summarized in two words: “It rocked!” or “It sucked!” Longer comments are possible, but rarely more insightful. Also included as a subset of this is any recommendation of who to watch it with.

Sample review:

I saw this movie back at the old Chesterfield Theater on Wabash back in 1977, with my future ex-wife and her sister. As soon as the credits rolled, I hiked up my bellbottoms, brushed back my mullet and looked at my then girlfriend and the future bitch-in-law and said “You know what baby? After being with you, Star Wars is the coolest thing ever!” and it was true. And even my ex who was usually all cranky had a good time, so you know this is a good movie to watch with your girlfriend.