Barry Norman Seems Like a Dick

Barry Norman just wrote a tribute to Robin Williams in which he bashes the recently dead actor relentlessly. Norman used to host the BBC’s Film Programme and is one of the most well known British film critics, a cringeworthy double whammy of pretentiousness. He opted to go against the British tradition of stuffy congeniality and instead just wrote a roast of Williams with no jokes:

“Admiration is called for, but also sadness, not just for his tragic death but for an enormous talent which, if not exactly unfulfilled, could sometimes be spread so thinly as to be almost invisible… Every actor makes bad films occasionally but what was remarkable about Williams was not that he was so good in the good ones but that he was so very bad in the bad ones… He made no secret of his addiction to drugs and alcohol but there was another addiction, which he never admitted but which became increasingly evident in his own work – to saccharine, tooth-rotting sentimentality.”

This is a tasteless thing to do when so many people who never before mentioned Robin Williams are Facebook distraught over his death. The thing that makes it most fucked up is he is right. Williams was frequently annoying and sappy and made a shit ton of bad movies, but its uncouth to say so right away. Whatever Williams’ faults with overacting and poor script choices most everybody agrees he was definitely a nice guy so why not let people realize on their own that they haven’t enjoyed one of his movies since they were children.

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