WGTC: Something I like to ask filmmakers is if they could remake or reboot a property and give it their own voice, what would it be?
Ti West: Maybe some Stephen King TV movie? That seems interesting. I generally don’t have an attraction to other people’s material, but I’ve always been a fan of King, so that would be cool. I kind of feel like I’d rather just keep writing and doing my own new projects, but King would be fun.
WGTC: As a final question, I’d like to get a little topical. For better or worse, some filmmakers and actors have recently spoken out against film criticism. Given your experience in the industry, do you read reviews, and has the criticism landscape changed over time?
Ti West: I don’t read them as much as I used to, for sure.
See, I think it’s OK for filmmakers and critics to have an adversarial relationship. It’s kind of interesting, you know what I mean? I definitely feel like – and this will sound bad because of the way I’m saying it – but I feel like critics get very sensitive when filmmakers hit back. I don’t think a filmmaker should be really upset by a critic, but a filmmaker challenging a critic? I think that’s just part of the culture of film. To me, I always thought critics and filmmakers were supposed to be a little tense. An adversary feeling. That kind of keeps it interesting.
I do believe that because of social media, everyone is a critic now. Because of that, the quality of writing has gone down. For instance – I’m here at South By Southwest, and my movie premieres, then, an hour later, there’s a review up. Thanks for thinking about my movie for thirty minutes before writing it? I don’t have a strong personal feeling about it, but when there’s a lot of people that make a movie, that can upset you. It’s like, I spent two years on this movie, and [a critic] wrote about it in half an hour. Maybe that’s where it comes from a little bit? But, again, I think we’re supposed to poke each other. That’s why the culture is there.
WGTC: That’s a really interesting point you make, because, as a critic covering the festival, I 100% agree with you, but find myself at the mercy of “FIRST!” culture. You’re missing valuable hits with every review that beats you, and it’s a struggle to find that balance of getting a proper amount of time to digest, while also beating the pack.
Ti West: To me, great film criticism is – and this is subjective – but to me, the best critic has a certain ability to extrapolate themes and ideas from a movie, and articulate them in a way the common person cannot. So when you read a review that feels particularly inspired, particularly dense, and particularly thoughtful – even if they hate the movie – it’s interesting. Where it’s a bummer is when someone writes “I sat down with my popcorn and was like, OHH NOOOO!” Then it’s just a big synopsis in the middle, and a closing paragraph saying the movie didn’t work. It just feels like – great, you checked off the box, yes, you wrote a “review,” but it feels like you’re not keeping the conversation going. There’s nothing wrong with that, and I don’t get upset about it, but even when your read a bad review, where someone looked deep into a movie, and really got after it – that’s great. That’s part of all this.
That concludes the interview but I’d like to thank Ti West very much for his time. Be sure to stay tuned for further updates on In A Valley Of Violence concerning its release!
