Last week, “Don’t Look Up” writer David Sirota claimed that the L.A. fires were all the proof needed to know that critics were wrong about his film. Of course, many people called him out as tone-deaf for these comments, and for good reason.
In a new interview with NME, Adam McKay. who directed “Don’t Look Up,” at least acknowledges that comparing the movie to what’s going on in L.A. “seems really small and ridiculous,” but he just can’t help but point out, much like Sirota did, how the “critics” and “gatekeepers” unjustly hated the film.
“What was inspiring and energizing was the popular response to that movie, not the critics and the cultural gatekeepers who hated it,” McKay said about the movie.
He continued, “The estimates of how many people saw that movie – Netflix will never say exactly – but it’s somewhere between 400 million and half a billion. Viewers all really connected with the idea of being gaslit. Being lied to by their leaders, lied to by their big news media, and being lied to by industries. It was funny – when I realized that was the common connection point, I was like, of course! It’s happening everywhere now with this global neo-liberal economy that we’re all living in. It’s such a cancer and everyone is feeling it.”
“Don’t Look Up” is Netflix’s second most-watched original film of all time, McKay assuming that half a billion saw the film is batsh*t crazy — has any one film been seen by that many people? The latest Netflix estimates have the film at 171 million views.
McKay should know better than to tout the number of views the film received on Netflix. Viewing numbers should never be correlated to the quality of a film. Just look at the Netflix all-time top 10 which includes “The Adam Project,” “Damsel,” “We Can Be Heroes,” and “The Mother.”
Back when “Don’t Look Up” debuted on Netflix, McKay caused some backlash by calling the film’s haters “utterly ridiculous” and adding: “If you don’t have at least a small ember of anxiety about the climate collapsing (or the U.S. teetering) I’m not sure ‘Don’t Look Up’ makes any sense.”
That’s right, McKay claimed that critics who didn’t like “Don’t Look Up” must also be careless about climate change. This is the same guy who, just a few weeks ago, believed that “Wicked” would be banned under the Trump administration in “3-5 years.”
“Don’t Look Up” had two scientists, played by Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence. touring the country in order to warn Americans about an approaching comet that will destroy the planet. Although Best Picture nominated, the disaster dramedy was ill received by critics; the reviews were mediocre (56% Rotten Tomatoes), and it’s clear Sirota and McKay haven’t forgotten about that.