Film Review Styles: User and Professional Reviews.

In our modern society its a well known fact that the average person is going to be a lot more careful about how much money they spend, and what they spend it on. Leisure activities, such as going to the cinema is something that is becoming increasingly more expensive, because of this people are a lot less likely just to watch a film on a whim. Great news for online film reviewers! Although news papers and magazines have great long, intricate, beautifully articulated reviews of the latest films, sometimes all we want is a quick fix, punchy paragraph with a number of gold stars a the bottom to decipher whether we want to make the expensive trip out to the cinema. 

Some people may argue that these internet reviews are just written by a bunch of snotty teens, that have nothing else to do, which makes them pretty unreliable and biased. This actually isnt the case!The reviews written by the consumer are actually called "User Reviews" and they are written by the every day person. Often on websites such as IMDb users right a short paragraph or sentence just to give other people an idea. This is perfect for a person who wants lots of quick responses. 

However you have to keep in mind this isn't a generalized tactfully thought out review. Its just someones personal opinion, they may have a completely different concept of what makes a film good, compared to the next person. 

Professional film reviewers, who write for magazines such as Total Film and Sight and Sound etc tend to forget their own film preferences and look at the bigger picture of the film. Obviously they have to make an informed decision concerning the quality of the film, however it has to be more technical and specific to the extremely competitive and cut throat film world. These are probably slightly more reliable when trying to choose a film. The reviewer often has access to endless resources concerning the film, actors and directors. They are implored to write the highest of their standard, giving the film watcher a detailed idea of the good and bad qualities of the film.