Morning Thoughts: Venom vs. Kurosawa

A few days ago my film history class finished watching Akira Kurosawa's classic, Seven Samurai. I'm lucky enough to have a lot of kids in that class with strong opinions about both movies and social issues, so it makes for some great discussions. There's one student in particular who is constantly treating us to his movie reviews, including a 1-10 rating of each film he sees. 

I understand the utility of this kind of rating for giving audiences a simple data point on which to base their decisions about what to watch, and for summarizing a critic's overall impression of a movie, but I don't personally find them very helpful. Still, it's interesting to hear what kinds of ratings this kid gives to what movies. He's a fanatic for Kaiju films, to the point that when, in a different class and a previous year he was tasked with making a short documentary, he chose the history of Kaiju films as his topic and named himself as the expert source who could be interviewed on the topic. He also loves superhero movies, and has recently given very high ratings to Venom: Let there be Carnage (9.5), and Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (8, if memory serves). 

Perhaps unsurprisingly, he's highly prone to influence from passionate sources, and very invested in older Japanese films (the Kaiju ones, at least). I was interested to see how he would react to Kurosawa. 

After the film, without any preamble, he announced, "you know, that was actually a pretty good film. 7.5."

Good to know it's within three points of the latest Venom. 

My consolation is that after our class discussion on the topic, he modified his statement to "That was actually a pretty good film," delivered in a much more thoughtful tone, and leaving off the number rating. 

Anyway, that's what I've been thinking about this morning.