Cinemarati adieu

Those readers who only know me from this blog probably don't know that I wrote online movie reviews for seven years prior to taking on the task of speaking truth to power. OK, I exaggerate. I started blogging because I was getting my rant on every morning and driving Mr. Brilliant crazy. I don't rant any less, but this way he knows what I'm ranting about.

It started in early 1998. Later that year, I was invited to join the Online Film Critics Society. Like most organizations of its type, it became intensely political and crazy, and when the craziness of involvement in a group for which you do not get paid outweighs any pleasure you get out of it, it's time to quit. Other online critics I knew through the OFCS, like Mary Ann and Gabriel, soon followed. Gabriel and I decided to merge our web sites together and created Mixed Reviews, the archive of which is still here.

In 2000, a bunch of OFCS alumni, led by Mary Ann, cobbled together a new organization, the mission of which was to elevate online film criticism above the level of sites like Ain't It Cool News and be taken seriously as film journalists -- on a par with print critics. I always thought that "Cinemarati" sounded like a pasta dish, but after much back-and-forth e-mail, Mary Ann, Brian Webster, Gabriel, Dan Jardine, Jeff Huston, Scott Renshaw, myself, and a few others had managed to put something together that over the next five years clawed and scratched its way to credibility. The initial vision of a portal site similar to Rotten Tomatoes combined with a messageboard proved too ambitious to maintain on a volunteer basis, so over time the site evolved to a messageboard with some original articles by and links to articles by members.

And what members they were, too. Over the years, people like the Oscar®-obsessed Nathaniel, the cerebral Nick Davis, the great and wondrous Stephen Himes, the lovable and bizarro Low IQ Canadian/Martin Scribbs, the incomparable Catherine Cantieri, Mark Ruffalo's BFF the prolific Michael Dequina, the still amazing and tireless gentle tough guy Vern, and so many others, combined with the various lunatics who both challenged the discussion and laid verbal turds in the punchbowl, made Cinemarati the fascinating Web destination it was.

I left the group in 2005, when this blog became MY obsession and when reviewing movies became a chore instead of a joy. The site moved from a static site with a Snitz forum messageboard over to a new, sleek design at Wordpress, and with new blood, carried on for two more years.

It is a mark of how far I left it behind that I didn't even know until checking in today that the remaining members had decided that Cinemarati has outlived its usefulness, and it was time to give it a dignified burial.

If you want to read what those who stayed on have to say about their experiences, it's still there. Just move fast, because soon it'll be gone forever...lost to the vapors and the Wayback Machine.