Cinema: Criticism Hurts

The average, cinemogul regards film critics as either free pressagents or costly saboteurs. Even when a bad picture is a box-office hit, the moviemaker resents the critic who has called it bad. MGM, which specializes in movies that the public loves, is particularly touchy about critics who refuse to love its products.* Last week MGM’s dislike of unfriendly reviewers had roused all of London’s critics to battle.

_The fight raged around Novelist E. (for Eileen) Arnot Robertson, who in 1946 was dropped as BBC’s film critic after M-G-M charged that her reviews were “unnecessarily harmful.” Because the movie company publicized its complaining letter to BBC, Miss Robertson sued for libel and slander and collected $6,000 damages (TIME, July 28, 1947).

A year later M-G-M persuaded a higher court that its letter was merely “fair comment,” innocent of “malice.” The court, reversing the decision, confronted Critic Robertson with a bill for $20,000 in costs —and her colleagues with the alarming possibility that they hold their jobs only at the pleasure of movie producers.

London’s Critics Circle began raising funds for a last appeal—to the House of Lords. The goal: $28,000, the extra $8,000 to cover costs if Miss Robertson should lose again. Out went a distress message signed by five members. In their zeal, the critics hinted that Miss Robertson had been a victim of M-G-Malice. The studio promptly threatened libel action.

Last week the five sent out a letter of retraction, accompanied by a new letter announcing “the fund is still open . . .” The London critics also appealed for “pledges” from their New York colleagues.

Britain’s most venerable and most crotchety critic, George Bernard Shaw, just couldn’t be bothered. The Shavian reason: there is a tacit agreement between critic and management not to go to law, since the critic always libels and the management always agrees to the libel in exchange for publicity.

*In Manhattan, M-G-M likes to avoid projection-room screenings and show its films to reviewers at “sneak previews” in regular theaters. The tactic seems designed to drown out critical judgments with loud sounds of audience approval.