Is there any evidence for this?
Project Hail Mary is produced by Amazon MGM Studios and distributed internationally by Sony Pictures. The film cost $200 million to produce and needs roughly $500 million to break even. Amazon MGM has had a string of expensive flops (Crime 101, Melania, After the Hunt), and there was reported internal pressure for this film to change the narrative.
Amazon MGM's Head of Global Marketing is Sue Kroll, who spent 24 years at Warner Bros. serving as President of Worldwide Marketing and Distribution. Her deputy for international marketing, Charlie Coleman, also came from Warner Bros. Awards head Juli Goodwin spent nearly 20 years at Warner Bros.
This matters because Warner Bros Home Entertainment was caught by the FTC in 2016 paying YouTube influencers (including PewDiePie) thousands of dollars through ad agency Plaid Social Labs. Warner Bros settled with the FTC. Also lets not forget Sony Pictures invented a fake movie critic in 2001, and around the same time, were caught using employees posing as moviegoers in TV commercials for The Patriot. Sony at the end paid $326,000 to Connecticut's AG and $1.5 million in a class-action settlement...
The industry to do this on Reddit and other public forums is openly thriving. There are companies that will, right now, post on Reddit and HN? as "organic users" for paying clients. They describe these services on their own websites:
• Onemotion Group (onemotion.group) openly advertises "real-looking posts, comments, and threads that catch on" with a focus on "organic posts, community replies, and making threads spread naturally."
• Single Grain (singlegrain.com/agency/reddit-marketing-agency) sells "conversation monitoring," "question response systems," and "thoughtful comments and contributions that establish your brand as a helpful community member."
• OutreachBloom describes monitoring subreddits and responding with "helpful" answers using pre-warmed accounts with built-up karma.
Describes services including "engaging communities with compelling content and fostering active, loyal brand advocates across platforms."
I am not claiming Project Hail Mary is being astroturfed. I am pointing out:
1. Both studios behind this film (Amazon MGM and Sony) have documented, FTC-adjudicated histories of deceptive online promotion.
2. The marketing leadership at Amazon MGM comes directly from Warner Bros., where this behavior was institutionally tolerated.
3. An entire commercial industry exists to post as organic users on Reddit, HN, and forums, some of these agencies list Amazon Studios as a client.
4. The financial incentive is massive: a $200M film from a studio desperate to prove its theatrical strategy works.
5. The penalties when caught have been trivial relative to marketing budgets ($326K for Sony, consent decree for Warner Bros.), and there is no ongoing enforcement mechanism for community forum manipulation.
Speaking about that, have you seen the movie yourself?
It was a buddy film, and an American one, so had that culture in its humour, sure. But it was light-hearted and quite fun.
This is the first time I've heard of the idea of "true" scifi though.
Personally I'd classify Dune to be more of a fantasy than Star Trek just because of the style it is written in being very mystical and prophetic.
Consider the possibility that your opinions are not universal.
Critic and audience reactions are generally positive:
> On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 94% of 326 critics' reviews are positive. The website's consensus reads: "A visually dazzling space odyssey that's carried along effortlessly by the gravitational pull of Ryan Gosling at his most winning, Project Hail Mary is a near-miraculous fusion of smarts and heart."[47] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 77 out of 100, based on 55 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.[48] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.[49]
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Hail_Mary_(film)#Criti...
Do you believe in the concept of objectivity? Meaning some movies are Objectively better than others, some Reviews are Objectively better than other?
If I bring a bunch of kids and teens to the movie, and at the end they all cant stop talking about how much they loved the rock, should I give an Oscar to Ryan Gosling?
In this context? Absolutely not. One person's favorite movie is another's least.
> If I bring a bunch of kids and teens to the movie, and at the end they all cant stop talking about how much they loved the rock, should I give an Oscar to Ryan Gosling?
It's OK for a movie to not be an Oscar contender.
I am happy we can agree those metrics mean nothing...
> 100% of online reviews should be treated as manipulated.
IMDb is review bombed to shit, both positive and negative.
When it comes to the concept of entertainment? No.
Is the 2003 movie The Room (written/directed/produced by Tommy Wiseau) "objectively" good or bad?
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Room
If it is "objectively" 'bad' why do (many) people have such a good time watching it? Are they "objectively" happier after watching The Room? Are people "objectively" happier after watching Project Hail Mary?
What is the purpose of "art": in general and/or particular works of it?
You are confusing taste and quality....
If there is no objectivity....then you would have no basis to explain why a film is better or worse than another, A student first iPhone short would be equal to The Godfather. A child banging pots would be indistinguishable from a Symphony.
The moment you say something is good or bad, we can talk about craft, skill, storytelling structure and emotional impact, all of which can be measured and compared and where this movie fails on all parameters...
You can personally dislike something excellent...for example few people can appreciate the genius of Miles Davis, and enjoy something mediocre... Too many to quote here...but Project Hail Mary is one :-)
What is the purpose of "art": in general and/or particular works of it? What makes (a work of) 'art' 'good'?
Is PHM 'good' in its purpose? Is The Room? Was 2023's Barbie? When a child is banging on pots, is he accomplishing his purpose in his 'creative act'? Is Schoenberg's atonal music objectively 'good'?
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJg4XbzSV9Q
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atonality
> I think Michael Bay sometimes sucks (“Pearl Harbor,” “Armageddon,” “Bad Boys II“) but I find it possible to love him for a movie like “Transformers.” It’s goofy fun with a lot of stuff that blows up real good, and it has the grace not only to realize how preposterous it is, but to make that into an asset.
So many things...But anybody at The Juilliard School or Berklee College of Music can tell you if you are good or bad on your musicianship...Anybody at the California School of Cinematic Arts or American Film Institute Conservatory can advise you on your future as a future Director...and anybody at the Pratt Institute can comment on your quality as an Artist.
Why do you dismiss the concept of Quality?
Can anyone else tell us that, or only certain 'gatekeepers'? Who gets to judge the amount of Quality in a thing, or whether something is Good for its Purpose?
> Why do you dismiss the concept of Quality?
"Quality" as in the amount of 'Goodness' something has?
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_(philosophy)
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Form_of_the_Good
An Axe is a bad Chair because it does not have the Qualities for (e.g.) sitting, but that is not its Purpose.
Were the folks that made PHM trying to make Art or Entertainment (or a mix of the two)? If PHM was made to be Entertainment, and people were entertained, was it not Good at its desired Purpose? Did 2007's Transformers have the Quality of Entertainment that it set out to have? Roger Ebert seems to have thought so.
This is indeed the case. You can consult many film experts and get very different top ten lists. Some critics may hate The Godfather. Some won't get Citizen Kane. Some love a good popcorn fluff movie and find this year's Oscar contenders pretentious.
It becomes a matter of general consensus. And that consensus appears to be that it's a pretty satisfying movie; https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/project_hail_mary. (High art? No. But that wasn't its goal.)
Those are all attempts at objective measurement. You are using objective frameworks to argue objectivity does not exist. :-)
The fact that critics disagree does not prove there is no objectivity. People disagree about scientific questions too, but that does not mean science is purely subjective. Disagreement just means the question is hard, not that there is no answer...
The whole reason you cited that score is because you believe it points to something real about the film quality. That is an appeal to objectivity whether you realize it or not. :-)
I argue those manipulated reviews [1] are not...
Yes? Consensus is frequently how we handle things that don't have an objective answer. Which restaurant is the best in your city? Who knows? But you can say "a lot of people like restaurant X" just fine.
> The whole reason you cited that score is because you believe it points to something real about the film quality.
Opinions are real. They're just not objective. Objectively, most of the vetted reviewers RT tracks seem to hold positive opinions of the film, as do their (much less trustworthy) regular old users.
If it's a box office flop after a few weeks, that'll be good evidence for your theory. I'll be surprised, though.
Now go to IMDB:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt12042730/reviews/?rating=1&ref_...
sort by worst review and you will see the comments and reviews make a lot of sense...If you believe like some of commentators this is a 10/10 movie, you also probably believe these reviews are not manipulated...
This is about the worst methodology you could possibly use here.
> If you believe like some of commentators this is a 10/10 movie, you also probably believe these reviews are not manipulated…
100% of online reviews should be treated as manipulated.
By the contrary. It is the absolutely best methodology. I am surprised you cant see why.
You should do the same for hotel reviews or amazon products. Its about the CONTENT and nature of the bad review. The best way to judge a movie, hotel, or product is often to read the negative reviews first, because negative reviews reveal the failure modes. A positive review just usually tells you what worked for someone. A negative review tells you what can go wrong, and whether that problem matters to you.
You should always start with the worst reviews because they reveal the real weaknesses. Then you judge whether the criticism comes from an unreasonable person or from somebody thoughtful and fair. If the negative reviewer is intelligent, specific, and or balanced, that review is often more valuable than ten positive ones, because it shows the actual risks and not just the hype.
Use it for movies, books, hotels and amazon products...
You accidentally made my point here.
"Whether that problem matters to you" is a matter of opinion. You apparently find the smattering of negative reviews to match your opinion; that's fine! But they don't match mine, or everyone's.
Opinion-wise, the movie seems to be doing just fine. This weekend we'll get the actual metric that tends to matter, the % drop-off after the first week. That tends to be a pretty good indicator of actual public opinion and word of mouth.
(And frankly, at this point, I tend to assume the negative reviews on Amazon are competitors review bombing. They're no more immune than the positive ones.)
Now go to IMDb again:
* https://www.imdb.com/title/tt12042730/ratings/?ref_=tt_ov_ra...
and look at the score distribution.
Project Hail Mary isn’t Arrival, it’s ET mixed with Castaway. It’s about friendship and loneliness and the fragility of the human experience and the triumph of the human spirit!
Normally I’d just say “you didn’t get it, it wasn’t for you” but given the insufferable and total dismissal above, I’d wager it actually IS for you LOL but you chose not to receive the message.
Anyways, everybody’s a critic these days, I get that. I’d just encourage people to soften a bit and appreciate things for what they are (not what we want them to be)
So is every Disney movie and that is what this but with the crappy Amazon Studios take on it.
>> Anyways, everybody’s a critic these days,
Do you believe a movie can objectively be considered good or bad? If you do you then believe some are better critics than others, the same some way some are better Coders than others or better Basketball players than others?
Just off the top of my head as I briefly scan shit sitting on the shelves of my office:
- Joe Dirt
- Death Wish 3
- Thrashin
- Hackers
- Mortal Kombat
- Uncle Buck
- The Incredible Burt Wonderstone
- Tapeheads
- Prayer of the Rollerboys
- Weekend at Bernie's
Not exactly Fellini, and some are barely even Andy Sidaris if we're being honest, but every movie in that list is amazing for different reasons. An objective critique of any of them (especially in context with "film", as a shapeless, vague concept) misses the point and the spirit of each and every one. But I am an uncultured heathen, so ...