The Paul King film took down ‘Citizen Kane thanks to its perfect score.
There are people who just want to see the world burn. The Internet (and Twitter in particular) entered an understandable state of euphoria when updates to the Rotten Tomatoes review aggregator led to a most beautiful scenario: The addition of a negative review of Citizen Kane published in 1941 caused the classic by Orson Welles to lose its status as the film with the highest number of 100% positive reviews, and consequently, the replacement title was Paddington 2, directed by Paul King in 2017. Paddington 2 was, according to the standards of this website, the new best movie ever, but his reign has not lasted long.
In the last few hours, Rotten Tomatoes has added a review written by Eddie Harrison of Film Authority. To the scandal of anyone with good taste, this review is negative. Harrison ugly at Paddington 2 having deviated too much from the Michael Bond books on which the film is based, considering it “contrived and ridiculous” and believing that the Paddington it presents is “too trusting, sarcastic and surly”. “Considerations of race and identity, the key to Paddington’s character, are not addressed,” continues his review, ending up attacking the dubbing of Ben Whishaw “His voice sounds like that of a member of some indie-pop band suffering from an agonizing ketamine high.”
Harrison’s devastating review has automatically caused Paddington 2 to lose its perfect score, from 100% to an ignominious 99%. The outrage has already assailed some Internet circles, and some think it could be a sophisticated trolling by Harrison. However, this critic has a long history behind him (for contextualization, at the time he gave positive marks to films like Johnny Mnemonic or Two Even Dumber Fools ), and in fact, insists within his criticism that he is serious: “I did a negative review of Paddington 2 for the BBC in 2017 and I stand by every word of it,” he confirms.
Paddington 2 and Citizen Kane have been disqualified as best movie ever in a matter of weeks, and now the only question is which new film will claim the position. The portal has already given the answer: after the King and Welles films, Toy Story 2 is the film with the highest number of positive reviews, so we have a new king to pay homage to.