Controversial Movie Reviews

[Cheryl Bailey]

I was just loooking through my Movie Reviews and made a list of the ones I wrote where I had 3 or more people say it was not helpful. I was surprised when a list of about 18 movies came up out of about 180 movie reviews which means about 10% of my reviews are somewhat controversial. Here is the list of my controversial movie reviews:
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
The Savages
Expelled
Atonement
Made of Honor
You Can't Take it With You
Get Smart
The Spiderwick Chronicles
Jesus, theGreat Debate
Smart People
Nazi Medicine: The Cross and The Star
Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
Nim's Island
Frontline: Bush's War
Flawless
America's Godly Heritage: Wallbuilders

Okay, I know some of these are controversial movies or films because they are either political or religious. I totally get that, but "Nim's Island" or "You Can't Take it With You" I just do not get.
What about the rest of you reviewers. Do you also have controversial reveiws? What movies are they? //let's Talk About it...

[Cheryl Bailey]

You are right, that is the bottom line.

[Cheryl Bailey]

That would be better. You may disagree with what I say, I'm used to that and it is okay but to say I wrote a poor review.. That is what gets me mad!!!

[pihkal020]

but to say I wrote a poor review.. That is what gets me mad!!!

Then why post reviews in a public space???

[Cheryl Bailey]

What I'm saying or failing to say is go ahead and tell me you don't agree, I'm okay with that but to disguise your angst saying your review is just unhelpful is not accurate. I put it out there because I enjoy feedback.

[Dollardraw]

I, for one, have never voted helpful or unhelpful on anyone's reviews. Even the 300 or so I read for the Da Vinci Code. I'm just using and abusing your reviews for my own selfish reasons!

I wish the reviews just showed up randomly, so everyone who has written one for a movie will show up on the at-a-glance page eventually, and nobody can vote unhelpful for a review of the comic/graphic novel adaptation of the week movie.

[Cheryl Bailey]

Are you saying they should just rotate them through? That is an idea. Sometimes I feel why write one if it is just burried on the last page and you are lucky if anyone even reads it. Whether you vote or not at least you aren't going down a list and voting not helpful just for the fun of it.

[mighty]

Ok, I was wondering whether or not to post this but I don't find any of the films you think as controversial. I'll take the hit from everybody else no big deal to me. I am not trying to offend when I say this but the films you mentioned are not controversial at all in my opinion. I am partly wondering if this a ploy to get other people to find your reviews helpful/unhelpful. Heck, we all have to pimp ourselves out somehow to get people to read our reviews.

The majority of the people who found your reviews as unhelpful, I think just disagreed with the ratings and said unhelpful. I am not saying they aren't helpful by any means, since I didn't read them all, but the way NF translates that to others as disagreed.

If I read somebodies review and they didn't add anything that wouldn't convince me to see a film, then I would find their review unhelpful. If it is a good review and I am convinced to see the film, then I usually say it was helpful vise versa.

What you consider controversial is very tame and you might want broaden your horizons by checking out some real controversial films, but that might might make you upset and find other people's reviews as unhelpful because it didn't agree with your opinion.

[Cheryl Bailey]

No, this is not a ploy for you to read my reviews. According to what netflix says we should not vote unhelpful on a review someone reviews intellegently, maybe intelligently is not the right word. Whether you decide to rent the movie does not mean it is a bad review, you might not agree but that does not mean it is unhelpful either. I mean none of this, it arrived cracked or why did you send the wrong movie? I have even seen people look at an irrelevant comment like that and still mark it helpful. I thought a movie like Expelled was quite controversial by looking at the reviews. People either hate it or love it dependent upn their belief system. I saw some really offfensive reviews that wee taken off because they used a lot of profanity and name calling. What I mean by controversial is a big mix of hot and cold about a certain movie.

[ewd76]

I always mark "it didn't play and y'all never sent me a replacement" as helpful.

[Cheryl Bailey]

You have a great sense of humor don't you ?!!

[Desertflower]

HA! Mystery solved! I've been wondering who that lone wolf was...

[mighty]

I agree with you to a point. I am completely with you on well written reviews vs. non-reviews and that is why there is a flag button to say they aren't reviews.
As in regards to offensive reviews, as a gay man, I see offensive reviews all the time. If I said a film had too many niggers, spics, chinks, or any of the sort the review would be flagged immediately. But instead I have to put up with reviews about how turned off a person was b/c there was too much man on man sex or religious bible belts touting on why it goes against their religion/conservative values on why a person should not see a particular film when they hadn't even seen the movie. Films that a straight audience goes and sees that they find repulsive b/c they can't stand the thought to 2 men or women kissing or having sex. Check out some of the reviews on Brokeback Mountain to prove my point.
The majority doesn't see how it is offensive. I could go on about seeing reviews that simply say things along the line of too gay and didn't watch more than 5 min. b/c they were too repulsed. Except I am in the major minority and people don't see things like that as offensive.
With regards to your thread, I just didn't see how the films you reviewed would be considered controversial. Really there are a lot more controversial films that deal with politics, sex, religion, and any other controversial subject that are out there and that is why I had a hard time with the films you used as examples.