I’m Sorry I Didn’t Like _____ as Much as You?

I thought Inside Out was good. I didn’t love it to the same degree that it seemed the rest of the world did. People seemed to think it was the cleverest thing ever put on screen. The movie was fine; it had a few laughs along the way but I didn’t love the concept and I felt like it tried too hard to get you to cry. If I want to cry, have your movie build up to a reason to cry within the story, don’t just have a bunch of scenes that exist solely to try to get me to cry; have a reason for it. All that being said, I think it’s a good movie. One day, someone at work was raving about it for about 5 minutes and then asked me what I thought about it. I told them I thought it was good and they gave me a perplexed look.

“Just good? You didn’t love it?”

“No but I thought it was fine.”

“Why are you so cynical? How could you not like that movie?”

And from that moment, I was labeled as an Inside Out hater. I was confused. I said I liked it. Some movies, I’ve come to find, are just like that. Even though we live in an age where everyone thinks they have the most singularly individual taste, some cultural phenomenona come along that dictate we all universally adore something or universally damn it. Any deviation from this, even a slight one, is wrong.

I liked Black Panther but when I told someone I thought some of the story was a little dull they were thrown damn near into a fury about how wrong I was. Again… I said I liked it; I just don’t fully subscribe to the zeitgeist that demands I love every aspect of it.

Some people think Call Me By Your Name is absolutely brilliant. I thought it was pretty good but it was also a lot of Euro-glamorizing and a little short-sighted to try to tell the audience that a kid’s first romance at 17 will be the absolute most special connection he’ll ever make in his life especially when the two actors didn’t really have the greatest chemistry. Of course, when I told a friend that, I was informed that I had no idea what I was talking about and that I didn’t understand it at all.

This perplexes me. Why does it bother someone if I don’t love something to the exact same degree that they do? It goes the other way too: I know that The Accountant is a pretty crappy movie but there are a few things I like about it. Upon telling that to a friend who hated it, I was branded as someone who loved it. What are you talking about? I said I liked a few small things; now here I am defending a movie that I didn’t even really like.

Maybe since I’ve never been a complete fanboy of any particular genre or franchise, I don’t get quite as swept up in the unrelenting hype around certain movies? I’ve listened to friends lecture me about Star Wars and the deep, very serious nature of these movies, that to me that are decent enough but I didn’t grow up with, so I don’t have the metamorphic pressure of decades of nostalgia fueling my hype. Can’t I just think Star Wars is pretty good? It doesn’t seem much better than most other blockbuster franchises.

What about Harry Potter? It was never really my thing; those movies were never particularly great nor particularly horrible either, but when I say that, I’m met with rage. I told a friend that I thought Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was decent enough and they ranted to me about how wrong I was: the world of Harry Potter is not cute and it does not center around imaginative creatures; it is a very dark story about pain and suffering and making it into a movie that isn’t rated R does a complete disservice to the source material. Oh? I didn’t realize. I thought they were kid’s books about a magical orphan boy.

Look, of course, anyone is allowed to feel strongly about a movie. I feel strongly about lots of movies, but for some reason they often tend to be ones that few people care about (I’ll always fight for you, Everybody Wants Some!!), but can’t we accept that someone who partially agrees with us is at the very least on our side? Wouldn’t you rather have a spirited debate with someone who feels differently about the art you love, rather than sit around giving it unending praise together?

Oh, and now that I think about it, Inside Out actually isn’t that good.