Certain corners of the internet are talking about Chris Stuckmann.
The popular YouTuber recently released a non-review of Madame Web because he “had to.” If you aren’t familiar with Stuckmann, he’s been doing video reviews since the early days and generated a huge following. I don’t find his commentary terribly insightful or charismatic, but the guy clearly loves movies. Somewhere along the way, he decided that he would only talk about movies he likes, which raises some red flags.
If film reviewer is his chosen profession, he has to address the good with the bad, or else it’s just a hobby.
Turns out, Stuckmann is transitioning into a filmmaker. Good for him. Honestly. So I understand his not wanting to offend anyone in that sphere. Back in the mid-2000’s one of my favorite reviewers, C. Robert Cargill, did the same thing. Only he was upfront about the fact that because he’d moved from observer to participant he couldn’t be as vocal in his criticism. Also, Cargill was working in the industry, alongside the people whose work he used to savage, whereas Stuckmann has gone the independent route.
Big difference.
So what did Stuckmann say to raise such ire? Basically, that studio interference is the root cause of Madame Web’s disastrous creative failure. We can’t blame director S.J. Clarkson, in her feature film debut, for what Sony did to her movie. Making a movie isn’t easy, I know that just from doing shorts in film school, and Stuckmann has produced a feature. Neither of us knows what it’s like to take on such a massive project with millions of dollars at stake and bean counters making demands every step of the way.
But David Mamet does.
In his new book, Everywhere and Oink Oink, Mamet talks about his journey from theater reviewer, to Hollywood screenwriter, to director. If Stuckmann thinks studio interference is something new, he obviously doesn’t know his film history. It's always been the case and we've still gotten good movies. Even Casablanca, film historian Noah Isenberg explains in his book, We’ll Always Have Casablanca, had everyone from the studio head on down trying to take control of that ship. What Mamet and Curtiz had, that Stuckmann lacks, is grit.
The director has to have grit.
Mamet tells the story of being in the cutting room working on a movie with his editor, while some high up muckity-muck kept pestering them to do the scene his way. Eventually, Mamet broke down, surrendered his authority as director, and let the guy wreck it. As soon as he left, Mamet and the editor went back to undo the damage. Everyone has a function, a dictated role, and when someone takes over another’s, when the person in authority hands it off to someone unqualified, the project suffers.
The director’s job is to direct.
How many enemies has Mamet made by being unyielding? How many projects has he walked away from before they’ve begun? All while being both a reviewer and a creator? I think Stuckmann would be eaten alive in the studio system, and I think he knows it too. It’s the rare person who can be handed a difficult job and then hold onto it with tenacity when less knowledgeable people try to take it away, against all reason.
I don’t know that I could do it.
But refusing to talk about bad art, or excuse it, or claim that the reasons are something new when they aren’t, won’t change a thing. Constructive criticism won’t change Hollywood, which is beyond saving. However, the next generation of filmmakers can and will learn from their mistakes, if (and only if) we’re willing to point them out. Stuckmann isn’t helping anyone.
Even himself.
