Making Lemonade (out of badass, stylish lemons)

In homage to Rekha's classic post on movie trailers, I thought I'd turn the retrospective toward this tv spot advertising the dvd release of Smokin' Aces. I was a bit puzzled by the way the New York Times review by A.O. Scott was used to promote the film. I wondered, "Did the NYT really say that? Do the forces behind Smokin' Aces take such comments as positive? WTF?" Being somewhat familiar (I think) with Scott's style, it didn't seem to me that "Blam! Blam! Expletive. Expletive. FBI! Plot twist! Expletive. Roll credits" could possibly be complimentary. Something smelled fishy. I looked up the review.

The spot cleverly does not quote a few of Scott's longer descriptions of the film, the most choice of which describes the film as a "Viagra suppository for compulsive action fetishists and a movie that may not only be dumb in itself, but also the cause of dumbness in others." Ouch. Another of my favorite gems: "The editing scheme, jumping from one set of characters to another, with cute juxtapositions of image or dialogue, is annoyingly literal-minded, and the climactic surprise manages to be both predictable and preposterous." Double ouch.

I raise this in light of some of the blog discussions I've had (here and here) regarding "bad taste" (or "good taste") in film. Or maybe just my taste. And I think the way this spot uses the NYT review speaks to the frustration I've been struggling to articulate. Clearly the filmmakers behind Smokin' Aces weren't ashamed of their poor NYT review; rather, they're highlighting it in a coy, ironic attempt to say "we aren't fazed by such effete, precious reviews of our raucous thrill ride! Not only do we not care what you think, we don't think our fans will either!"

And they're probably right. And this wouldn't be a problem if I wasn't an effete and precious film critic.

So, has anyone actually seen Smokin' Aces?