A bad film review is rarely the work of someone with nothing to say. More often there's a real reaction underneath — a scene that landed, a performance that didn't, a niggling sense that the third act fell apart — and the writing fails to get it onto the page. The habits that cause this are consistent, and mercifully easy to fix. Here are five of the most common mistakes in amateur film criticism, what each one costs you, and how to repair it before you hit publish.
Mistake One: Retelling the Plot Instead of Reviewing It
This is the big one. A review is not a synopsis with adjectives attached. Readers can get the plot from the trailer, the case, or the first page of a search result. What they cannot get anywhere else is your response: whether the film works, and why.
Compare these two openings.
Weak: 'The film follows a detective who returns to his hometown to investigate a murder, and as he digs deeper he uncovers secrets about his own family.'
That is the blurb. A reader finishes it knowing nothing about whether the film deserves two hours of their evening.
Better: 'The mystery is almost beside the point. What holds the film together is the detective's reluctance to ask questions he already knows the answers to.'
The fix is straightforward. Write two sentences of summary — no more — to orient the reader, then spend the rest of the piece on the film's choices: the performances, the pacing, the ending, the way the camera behaves in a crowded room. After every paragraph, ask whether you have described or judged. Description has its place, but it should serve an argument.
One test: cover your summary paragraph and read what's left. If the review still makes sense, the summary was doing its job. If nothing remains, you have not written a review yet.
Mistake Two: Spoiling the Film Without Warning
There is a difference between discussing a film and giving away the turns that make it worth watching. Amateur reviews spoil by accident, usually in the second paragraph, when a death or a final-act reveal is mentioned as though everyone has already seen it. The cost is trust, and a reader spoiled once tends not to come back.
A workable rule for spoilers
- Anything in the trailer, on the poster or in the opening twenty minutes is fair game.
- A mid-film twist, a character death, an ending: warn first, then discuss.
- Put the warning before the spoiler, not after. 'Spoilers ahead' printed below the offending paragraph is not a warning; it is an apology.
You can also discuss structure without giving anything away. 'The final scene recontextualises the first' tells a reader a great deal and ruins nothing. That is criticism doing its job: pointing at how a film is built without dismantling it in front of someone who has not seen it yet.
Mistake Three: Vague Praise and Vague Criticism
'Amazing.' 'A masterpiece.' 'The acting was incredible.' These are feelings, not reviews. They tell a reader how you felt but not why, which makes the information useless to anyone deciding whether to watch the film.
Vagueness usually turns up in three forms:
- Adjectives without evidence. 'The cinematography is stunning.' Which shots? What is the light doing in the scene by the river?
- Praise aimed at the story rather than the telling. 'The plot was so good.' What did this plot do that a hundred others do not?
- Borrowed consensus. 'A must-watch.' Says who, and for whom?
The cure is specificity, and where you can manage it, a moment. Instead of 'the performances are excellent', write 'the lead spends almost the whole dinner scene saying nothing, and it is the most compelling passage in the film.' One well-chosen detail does more work than three paragraphs of enthusiasm.
Strong claims need receipts. Pick a scene, a line of dialogue, a cut, a costume choice, and explain how it produced the effect you are describing. If you cannot, you may be describing the film you expected rather than the one you watched.
Mistake Four: Confusing Your Taste With the Verdict
'I did not like it' and 'it is not good' are different sentences, and collapsing them makes criticism sound either pompous or defensive. A film can be made with real skill and still be a miserable two hours in the cinema. Both facts can sit in one review.
Be honest about where you stand. 'I have never got on with slow cinema, and this one tested me, though viewers with more patience will find plenty here.' A reader who loves slow cinema now knows to ignore your verdict and read your observations instead; a reader who does not knows the film is for them. Nobody has been misled.
The test is simple. Can you describe what the film is trying to do, and whether it succeeds on its own terms, even if the thing it is trying to do bores you stiff? If you can, you are reviewing. If you cannot, you are ranking.
Mistake Five: Writing for Nobody in Particular
Plenty of amateur reviews wander: a paragraph of context, a paragraph of plot, a digression about the director's politics, and an ending that trails off without a recommendation. The reader reaches the last line with no idea what they were meant to take from it.
Decide early who you are writing for. Someone choosing what to watch on Friday night? Someone who has seen the film and wants to compare notes? Then write to that person and cut everything that does not serve them. A few habits help:
- Open with your verdict, or with the question the film raises. Do not save it for a twist.
- One paragraph, one idea. If a paragraph makes two points badly, split it.
- Place the film — genre, director, the tradition it belongs to — without turning the review into a lecture.
- Close with something usable: a recommendation, a caveat, or a question worth chewing over.
Before You Publish
Criticism improves with practice, and a draft improves with a day's distance. Run this list over the piece before it goes out.
- Does the plot summary run to three sentences or fewer?
- Does every spoiler come after a warning, not before one?
- Is there at least one specific moment, performance or choice in here?
- Have I separated 'I disliked it' from 'it is badly made'?
- Would a reader know who this is for, and whether to see the film?
Answer honestly, fix what needs fixing, and move on to the next one. Good film writers are simply people who kept going after the review nobody read.
Photo: Vladvictoria / Pixabay
