Kyle Smith (Twitter: @rkylesmith) is a film critic for The New York Post and the author of the novels Love Monkey and A Christmas Caroline. Type a title in the box above to locate a review. Find an alphabetical listing of The New York Post's recent film reviews here.
Buy Love Monkey for $4! "Hilarious"--Maslin, NY Times. "Exceedingly readable and wickedly funny romantic comedy"--S.F. Chronicle. "Loud and brash, a helluva lot of fun"--Entertainment Weekly. "Engaging romp, laugh-out-loud funny"-CNN. "Shrewd, self-deprecating, oh-so-witty. Smith's ruthless humor knows no bounds"--NPR
Buy A Christmas Caroline for $10! "for those who prefer their sentimentality seasoned with a dash of cynical wit. A quick, enjoyable read...straight out of Devil Wears Prada"--The Wall Street Journal 
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By Kyle | January 31, 2013
More like “House of Morons.” Kevin Spacey is a new Machiavelli of D.C. in a David Fincher-directed series for Netflix. My review is up.
Topics: TV |
February 1st, 2013 at 9:40 am
I knew this was one to be avoided when I saw the advertising for it. Anytime you see an ad showing a liberal actor standing in front of the American flag, you know you’re in for an overwrought sermon, not a movie.
February 1st, 2013 at 1:20 pm
I’ll probably watch this at some point but I doubt it will be a patch on the original British show, which was truly excellent.
February 2nd, 2013 at 6:58 am
As soon as I read “an adaptation of a BBC series” instead of “an adaption of the BBC series” it became clear that any criticism you were to provide would be grounded in ignorance. The narration and the delivery of said narration directly toward the camera is used in the original BBC mini-series, so any criticism of that should at least be aware that it is a homage to the original. When looking through your ratings on Metacritic it becomes clear that you don’t seem to even review most movies worth watching, and of the few that you do, you seem to give very negatively biased scores. Anyone who writes headlines as horrifically partisan as “Lefty Movies Flop Because Not Lefty Enough?” clearly shows that their interests perhaps aren’t in film but in maintain the title of “America’s most cantankerous film critic.”
February 2nd, 2013 at 6:19 pm
I haven’t seen the BBC series, which was seen by very few in the US. Didn’t say I did. It wasn’t my job to compare the two. As for the “few movies” I review, I post about 200 movie reviews a year. Is your problem that you liked the BBC series and therefore you know you’ll like the new House of Cards without seeing it? I ask merely because such fanboy ignorance seems to be the basis of a lot of the comments I get.
February 4th, 2013 at 8:08 am
I’d say as a critic it absolutely is your job to know the context of any film or tv show you review. Would you review The Godfather Part 2 without watching Part 1? Would you review Aliens without watching Alien? Would you review The Office (US) without watching The Office (UK)?
Anyway I actually am not a fan of the original House of Cards, but I did at least watch part one of the mini-series since I knew it was a both a hit with the critics and by popular opinion. I found it had too much of that “clearly filmed to tape, I was made in the late 80s/early 90s” look along with acting that doesn’t stand up to more modern television.
What I do appreciate are great actors, such as Kevin Space and Kate Mara, working with great directors, such as David Fincher and Joel Schumacher, and a great script written by Beau Willimon. I especially appreciate when it all comes together for a well filmed, thrilling, even-handed commentary of US political corruption.
Oh and with respect to your 200 movies a year, I checked how many of the Oscar Award Nominees for Best Picture from 2011 you reviewed, along with movies from IMDb’s Top 250 that are from 2011, to see how many critically and popularly great films you review in a given year. For Oscars you reviewed a whole 3/10, skipping Black Swan, Inception, The Kids are All Right, The King’s Speech, The Social Network, 127 Hours, and Toy Story 3. For IMDb’s Top 250 you reviewed a slightly more respectable but still absolutely failing 2/6, skipping The Intouchables, The Artist, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, and The Help. So either you choose not to review these films and therefore don’t seem to appreciate film, or perhaps your bosses choose the films for you to review and have put you on the B or C string.
So just to be clear, context matters, I’m not a “fanboy” and you aren’t reviewing a great number of great films by pretty much any definition.
February 4th, 2013 at 9:58 am
@Ronnie: Kyle has definitely written about Black Swan, Inception, The King’s Speech, The Social Network and 127 Hours. I’m pretty sure I remember reading him on The Artist & The Help as well. I don’t know where you “checked,” but it obviously was not on this website. There’s a search box top left. Feel free to use it.
February 4th, 2013 at 10:20 am
@kishke: My method for checking whether or not Kyle Smith has reviewed something was checking Metacritic’s list of professional reviews, IMDb’s list of professional reviews, along with checking the title of the film plus the word review on the search for this website. I’ve noticed he writes posts about movies, usually heavily quoting other reviewers, but when he actually fully reviews a movie he uses the format ‘Review: “Name of Movie”’
If he has written reviews for the movies I’ve listed, I apologize, but with my method of checking I doubt that is the case. Again my choice of wording was review, and with respect to reviewing movies Kyle Smith seems to skip out of reviewing most movies of substance. This leads me to believe either he chooses to not review great movies, or his superiors at The New York Post trust the reviews of great movies to other critics.
February 4th, 2013 at 10:58 am
Ronnie, just to be clear I’ll make this as simple as possible.
1) Nobody in the US saw the British House of Cards. (Guess what? Lots of people saw The Godfather.)
2) Therefore my US readers don’t care how the new series compares to the original. They just want to know whether it’s worth watching.
If I’m still not clear, next time maybe I’ll use pictures.
February 4th, 2013 at 11:58 am
71,538 ratings for House of Cards (1990) on Netflix seems to go against your claim that nobody in the US saw it, but regardless my point was that context matters when reviewing something. If you were to review Psycho (1998) ultimately at least some of that review would be in comparison to Psycho (1960). If you were to review Point of No Return (1993) ultimately some of that review would be in comparison to Nikita (1990). I don’t care how old, obscure, or foreign a movie is, when reviewing a remake one should at least be conscious of the original material.
The only reason I ended up on here even discussing this was the fact that out of 23 professional reviews of House of Cards you rated it a standardized 35 points out of 100 less than the next lowest score. You rated it a 25/100 compared to the next lowest score of 60/100. I figured I would try to understand what would cause such a disparity of scores and it seems like you have an inexperience reviewing good material, a lack of appreciation for context, and an inability to keeping your politics out of your reviews. So while I might need pictures to explain why understanding the context of a film doesn’t add to one’s ability to review it, I definitely don’t need any help in explaining why your reviews should be ignored. Hopefully The New York Post allows someone else to put in a bit more effort and objectiveness when reviewing other works of any quality.
February 4th, 2013 at 12:37 pm
I appreciate that you are a disappointed fanboy, and that when I shredded to molecules a show you mistakenly thought was good, you were completely unable to argue the other side. You felt like a fool for not noticing the flaws, and, your feelings badly hurt, you did what many others have done before you — you went to my Wikipedia page to try to find some basis for an ad hominem attack. “Aha! Kyle has a lengthy record of setting cats on fire! I can safely ignore his views on a television program.”
I am slightly embarrassed by the illustriousness of my resume, but there it is: You couldn’t find any negative information. Keep looking, if you want: You won’t find any.
In some sense such a lopsided fight is unjust, so I apologize for not giving you anything to work with, but a wise man knows when he’s been bested. Instead, in desperation, you came up with the bizarre line of argument that “he didn’t review 7 of 10 Best Picture nominees.” I may be a great writer or a lousy one, but I am surely not a lousy one because I didn’t publish a review movie X, Y or Z. If you want to make the case that I lack critical acumen, you’ll have to demonstrate that by pointing out some of my poor writing rather than idly speculating that my editors, who on a regular basis lavish me with praise and raises to top up my already embarrassingly large salary, don’t like me.
Good luck! Happy reading. Purely by accident, you may learn something from reading more of my writing.
February 4th, 2013 at 1:51 pm
Interesting how you defend yourself as a writer and not a film critic. That says a lot about why I don’t think you should be taken seriously. Really your review amounts to a flowery account of what I can assume is just the first two episodes of the series, with accusations of it not being subtle or realistic enough. If that is what amounts to a review today, I guess standards have gone down quite a bit.
Your first two paragraphs essentially state that you won’t like anything with a serious tone involving politics, likely due to your warped political views. Your main complaints in the rest of the “review” seem to stem from relatively small pieces of well-timed information causing large results, such as with the leaking of the bill and the leaking of the editorial. While perhaps these things shouldn’t matter in politics, we now live in an age where how someone treated their dog is a story and can alienate voters. I don’t find leaked political positions or past positions on Israel causing political consequences so outrageous when so many stories over the past few years have been about “flip-flops.”
I probably didn’t find much written about you because you seem to be a second string reviewer with an axe to grind and writing about that seems like a waste of most people’s time. With respect to my “bizarre line of argument” I’ll give you an analogy: if a sports writer who usually focuses on football, baseball, basketball, and soccer doesn’t write about the Super Bowl, the World Series, the NBA Finals, or the World Cup he probably is either A) Not very interested in his chosen field or B) Not someone his editors believes is the best at what he does.
Anyway, since your blog has essentially no exposure and The New York Post doesn’t allow comments on their review pages, I think I’ll stop talking to almost no one and leave you with a clarification that I never said you were a lousy writer, I just implied that you were a lousy film critic.
February 4th, 2013 at 2:55 pm
Dear Ronnie, surely the analogy you propose is, like your termite-filled mind, full of holes. Baseball writer is to World Series what movie writer is to…that’s right. The Academy Awards. About which I have written. Many times. Look it up.
My political views are “warped”? How so. Please cite examples. In fact, since the show is about evil (and dumb) Democrats, and I’m probably more likely than the average person to find Democrats evil (or dumb), you would think if anything my political views would make me more favorably disposed to the show.
Nor did I say I had a problem with a “past position on Israel” causing political consequences. In the show, a guy who is now a drug addict/conspiracy theorist/all-around nutjob living in a shack in the woods, and is evidently for sale to whoever gives him the best mind-altering substances, claims, falsely, that a political figure wrote an anti-Israel editorial 30 years ago. Other D.C. reporters would, of course, want to find out the source of this story, would look up the nutcase in question, and decide that they didn’t want to be associated with him in any way. The story would die for lack of credibility. Any intern at the Washington Post could tell you that’s how it would play out, but the writers of this show are interested in silly moments of contrived drama rather than the actual workings of D.C. But then again, I consider plausibility and subtlety to be assets; you evidently do not. It becomes clearer and clearer why one of us is employed as a critic and one of us is not. You claim I won’t like anything with a serious tone about politics. When did I say that? The show is ridiculous bordering on campy, my friend: the opposite of serious. If it were in any way serious, I would have noted that with pleasure.
As for your last point, it remains completely unsupported, and I hasten to add that film critics are indeed writers. (We use words, and those words must be written….we are not mimes.) You might want to study the phrase “grasping at straws” if you think you have hit on an “Aha!” moment when you noticed that I described myself as a writer.
Do go on, though, as I enjoy humiliating you.
February 4th, 2013 at 4:06 pm
I doubt Roger Ebert would have the time or care to defend himself to an anonymous internet poster, further showing your C string status.
I’m not going to discuss politics online. It wastes everyone’s time and will distract from the main point of your review lacking depth, context, and therefore value.
Did you even read your own review? Your first two paragraphs include “[it] pulls off the impossible: It takes DC politics more seriously than DC does” and “Theater of the absurd — “Veep,” “Dr. Strangelove” — is really the only way to do Washington.” Pretty much the only take away from that is House of Cards takes itself seriously and in your opinion comedies are the best fit for stories about politics. So while I guess it was perhaps somewhat of a jump between “Theater of the absurd .. is really the only way to do Washington” to you “won’t like anything with a serious tone involving politics” I’d say that jump isn’t exactly a far one.
The source credibility you seem to think is the standard, is perhaps something more of the past. While a story sourced from a drugged-out hippie shouldn’t be taken seriously, recently stories have been published that have been totally made up and then picked up by other news outlets without checking any of the original sources. One reporter trying to make something of herself running with a story sourced from someone who has been confirmed to have the knowledge of who wrote the editorial getting it into the national discussion doesn’t seem so far fetched. Even if that story wouldn’t hold up under further scrutiny, if recent politics has shown anything it’s shown that blatantly false stories can have a lasting and significant resonance with the public.
Although I agree that all film critics are writers, not all good writers are good film critics. Your book Love Monkey has a 3.13 on Goodreads and A Christmas Caroline: A Novel has a 2.64 so I don’t even really know if you count as a good writer, so clearly I don’t know why you would think that qualifies you to be a good film critic.
February 4th, 2013 at 4:24 pm
Roger Ebert, in fact, does take time to respond to commenters. Consider it a public service. But of course the reason I respond is simply to make you look bad while entertaining the general public. (Also, it’s fun.)
Donald Trump takes himself seriously. That does not mean he is a serious person. As a matter of fact his self-seriousness is a bit…ridiculous. Do you take my meaning? The somber, we-are-really-getting-to-the-bottom-of-the-swamp tone of “House of Cards” (illustrated by utterly farfetched doings) is one of the most ridiculous things about it, whereas the superficial absurdity of “Dr. Strangelove” and “Veep” carry a sort of terrible power, an underlying truth.
What totally made-up news stories resulted in major shakeups in D.C., such as the one on the show? You don’t seem to have a single example in mind.
As for my books, read them and judge for yourself. I watched “House of Cards.”
February 4th, 2013 at 4:47 pm
I doubt Roger Ebert would have the time or care to defend himself to an anonymous internet poster, further showing your C string status.
A very weak argument, even if it were true.
Love Monkey is a very entertaining read. I haven’t read the other.
February 4th, 2013 at 4:53 pm
Surely a sign of a commenter with a low self-image. “I’m so unimportant, no one who matters should respond to me.”
February 4th, 2013 at 4:58 pm
I’m glad that you want to entertain the readers of the 1,753,431st most viewed site online, it seems like an important public service.
I’m glad you brought up Donald Trump in a negative light, I was worried my example might muddy the conversation if you were on the wrong side of it. The entire “birther” movement is exactly one of those stories of dubious origin which was picked up by the media, discussed in a serious manner, disproved repeatedly, and still had a lasting impact on people’s opinions of Barack Obama, for whom you have an entire category for some unexplained reason.
Your review is about half as short as everyone else’s on Metacritic, not because you are such as succinct writer, but because you didn’t put in half the effort of your peers. Check out Alessandra Stanley at The New York Times, Hank Stuever at The Washington Post, and Nancy DeWolf Smith at The Wall Street Journal to see how your peers write useful reviews using depth and context and then think of how much better you could be.
February 4th, 2013 at 5:10 pm
If the site is so unimportant, why are you spending so much time on it? I can explain why I spend so much time on it: It’s my site. This is my house. You’re the one who keeps ringing the doorbell. I worry about your self-esteem.
“Half as short”? Again, what is your first language? You mean “half as long,” do you not? Alas, I am at the mercy of my editors: They gave me 500 words. That was the space on the page. We publish a tabloid newspaper and our stories run shorter than they do in broadsheets. (Getting straight to the point is, in my view, an asset of our kind of writing.) Your critiques grow ever stranger. “Your review wasn’t as good as X’s because it wasn’t as long as X’s!” By that logic, “The Postman” was a better movie than “The Untouchables.”
The birther movement, ah, yes, that really had a huge national impact. Remind me what it was again? Oh, yes, it gave lefty bloggers something to vent about. It gave Bill Maher something to joke about. How many high Washington officials were bounced out of office because of it? In the show, the nominee is ousted because of a lie peddled by a disreputable wingnut. That’s the point of my review: Nothing in the show plays out remotely the way it would in reality.
February 4th, 2013 at 5:18 pm
That first point is a very good one, goodbye!
February 4th, 2013 at 5:32 pm
I hope not, as you’ve been so delightful, but let us say farewell.
February 6th, 2013 at 7:11 pm
Kyle, you make an excellent point in comment #18 when you say, “Getting straight to the point is, in my view, an asset of our kind of writing.” When a new movie comes out I immediately check out your review (or Lou’s) and don’t even bother with the New York Times, who spend 2 to 3.5 pages writing trivial information about the film instead of actually getting to their take on it.
February 7th, 2013 at 12:53 pm
Kyle…you are one of the two movie critics I generally read, the other is Kurt Loder at Reason.
February 7th, 2013 at 12:58 pm
Kurt is a good one.