“An idea is like bird crap. It strikes you without warning or explanation and leaves you desperately scrabbling for paper,” Benj Clews said in his “fourward” for Four Word Film Reviews, a website turned book that attempts to describe 90 plus minutes of film in just four words.
The Journal brings you an exclusive interview with Michael Onesi, communications officer of news and media services at Queen’s and one of the editors of the book, as he talks about being associated with The DaVinci Code, getting on Oprah and dreams of drinking Guinness in London.
The book Four Word Film Reviews, started as a website, when did you decide for it to become a book?
There was an article in Time Magazine that talked about the trend in “micro-writing” and talked about Four Word Film Reviews, the website, and a New York Times bestselling book called Six Word Memoirs, where people summed up their lives in six words. I just remember thinking “If a six-word book about people I’ve never heard of can be a New York Times bestseller, then a book of four-word film reviews can be a best seller too.” So I emailed Benj Clews (the book’s co-editor) and asked him if he was interested in turning the website into a book. He was a web developer and said everyone tells him it would make a good book but he had no idea how to find a publisher. At the time, I was a newspaper reporter/editor at the Kingston Whig-Standard so I said “Let’s give it a shot together.” (I’m one of the top writers at FWFR.com and have written more than 4000 reviews.)
Who inspired you to write the book?
Benj Clews—the man who founded the website and co-editor of the book. Long before Twitter and Six-Word Memoirs, he came up with the idea for the four-word film reviews website in 1999! (Which makes the website about 100 years old in World Wide Web years). Today the site has 320,000 reviews of more than 38,000 films. He did all the hard work, I’m just the guy who came along and helped him take it to the next level.
What was the biggest challenge in writing this book?
Picking the reviews. With 320,000 reviews on the website, I’d say about 20,000 of them are brilliant and rate a 10/10 on the hilarious scale. It was hard to pick only 1,700 to put in the book.
Are you surprised at how successful the book has already become?
Stunned and amazed. When Benj and I started the process of looking for an agent and/or publisher, we decided to try for a year or two and if that didn’t work, we’d self-publish the book and sell it directly on the FWFR website. I sent out 20 query letters to agents and publishers and within three weeks we had four agents and three publishers interested. I decided to Google the name of one of the literary agencies that wanted to represent us (Sanford J. Greenburger Associates) and the word “clients” to see if they have represented any authors who have had decent sales. The first name that popped up was “Dan Brown”. This is the agency that sold The Da Vinci Code. I couldn’t believe that a major U.S. agency was interested in a book by a first-time author from Kingston. The cool thing is now I get to impress people at cocktail parties by saying the line “I was talking to my agent yesterday …” Why do you think people flock towards this type of pithy criticism?
I think people are impressed by the writing. Most people wonder how you can sum up a movie in four words or less. Then they start reading some examples, “From beer to fraternity” for Animal House or “What happened in Vegas?” for The Hangover, and are amazed at how you can actually say a lot with four words or less.
Is it a process thinking of the perfect tagline or is more of an arbitrary thing?
Arbitrary-reviews just come to me. I was watching Marmaduke the other day with my kids—it’s a really bad movie about a Great Dane. All of the sudden “Great Dane, bad film” popped into my head. For me, the reviews just kind of happen when I’m not sitting in front of a computer screen thinking, “write a funny movie review.”
Are you and Benj Clew, the founder of the Four Word Film Reviews website, still close?
We’ve actually never been “close”—I’ve never met Benj in my life. He lives in London, England. (I’ve also never met my agent who lives in New York City or my book editor who lives in Boston.) But Benj and I have exchanged hundreds of emails and talked on the phone a lot and he’s a great guy. I told him when we cash a big royalty cheque after Oprah mentions our book on-air one day, I’m flying to London and we’ll shake hands and have a pint of Guinness together.
Have you always wanted to be a film critic or did you have other aspirations growing up?
Not really, I was going to be a business man like my dad. I’ve always loved movies. My dad was an insomniac and he would rent one or two movies every day. I’d come home after school and watch them so by the time I was 20 I’d seen thousands of movies. Film critic seemed like a cool job growing up, but so did astronaut and superhero, they all seemed like unattainable employment for me. Even when you start work in the newspaper industry it’s still hard to become a film critic—everybody wants the job so once a critic gets it, they’ll stay in the position for 20 years.
How did being a reporter and editor help? What made you move into film reviews?
I started writing for FWFR.com because I love movies. There are more than 10,000 registered movie reviewers on the website and none of them are paid—we submit reviews because it’s a lot of fun. I literally laugh out loud when I’m on the website. I was a newspaper reporter and editor for 13 years mainly doing news and sports, but only a handful of movie reviews (mostly for my university newspaper The Eyeopener at Ryerson University).
Where is your book available in Kingston and how are you feeling about your upcoming book party at the Grad Club?
The book is available in bookstores across North America, including all three Kingston bookstores (Novel Idea, Chapters and Indigo) but unfortunately not the Queen’s campus bookstore. It’s also available from major internet retailers (Amazon.com, Chapters.indigo.ca). The book only costs $12. As far as the Grad Club party, I’ve been on an amazing journey the past two years and I’m looking forward to sharing in the success of the book with friends, family and fans of Four Word Film Reviews.
Finally, what is your favourite movie and what would your tagline be for it?
Goodfellas. My review is “Pesci’s house of whacks.”
The book launch for Four Word Film Reviews is tomorrow at the Grad Club from 7 to 9 p.m.
—Alyssa Ashton and Parker Mott
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