The new drama “October Baby” doesn’t hide its intentions. It’s a pro-life movie, period.
That shouldn’t impact how film critics receive it. The bigger question should be, “Is it any good?”
Many liberal film critics (redundant, I know) couldn’t simply assess the film’s core strengths and weaknesses. Instead, they had to attack the very notion it exists and trot out the dreaded “propaganda” word, the same word they can’t seem to find when critiquing “An Inconvenient Truth” or any Michael Moore opus.
The Detroit News‘ Tom Long calls the film “indecent propaganda,” while you can practically see the sneer plastered over The New York Times‘ Jeannette Catsoulis’ face as she banged out her review:
But not even a dewy heroine and a youth-friendly vibe can disguise the essential ugliness at its core: like the bloodied placards brandished by demonstrators outside women’s health clinics, the film communicates in the language of guilt and fear.
Ken Hanke of The Mountain Xpress used his precious space to critique the demographic the film hopes to reach:
In the end, it’s strictly for its target audience, who tend to be very uncritical where these movies are concerned.
The AV Club calls the film “virulent,” and the review adds it has an “extreme agenda.”
These critics aren’t writing for The Nation or The New Republic, outlets with a defined liberal agenda. But they can’t comprehend that some people may consider abortion to be a travesty, which is a perfectly valid opinion. It’s called an ideological cocoon, and too many critics rarely step outside of it.
And, for what it’s worth, I disagreed entirely with the messages behind “Avatar” but still placed it in my top 10 list for 2009. More recently, I threw my arms around “The Muppets” despite the hoariest of modern movie cliches, the evil rich oil baron.
Just wish my peers could put their ideology aside long enough to inform the public without bludgeoning them with their personal views and rigid groupthink.