Fact or Fiction? Truth or Lies? Read all about it HERE!!! (Total Film)

Member Name: hollerme

Product:	Total Film
Date:	07/08/07 (129 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Used to be good, amusing freebies, good website

Disadvantages: Reviews are a letdown, more expensive, forum is awful

I figured I should write a review on the magazine I had been reading for the past few years (since 2001) but have now quit.


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My history and experience

The magazine first caught my attention in 2001 when I saw The Lord Of The Rings on the cover. Bored that afternoon with nothing to do I bought the magazine and started reading it. Immediately hooked, the magazine stayed informative and entertaining until the penultimate pages (the ultimate pages were porn ads) where I put the mag down, satisfied that I had learned everything that was going on in the industry that month.

Over the next few years I continued to read it, learning more and more, being the first to find that Sean Bean would be the villain in National Treasure or The Hobbit was being optioned to be made into a film or Bill & Ted III was being made... Wait a minute, that didn't happen! Yes, in the world of Total Film Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter were reprising their roles as Bill Esquire and Ted Theodore Logan AKA WILD STALLYNS!!!! *Cue air guitar music* with Laurence Fishburne cameoing as God and Ozzy Osbourne coming along for the ride. Pity that never happened...

Yes, Total Film brings out facts but in its earlier days mixed it with fiction to the point that you would only take what they said with a grain of salt... very different to Empire where you believed what they said no matter how idiotic the concept. Today, though, Total Film has a new section called Buzz that thankfully puts rumours down in its own section and restores some dignity to the mag.

So the years progressed and the magazine became more and more expensive, going up from £2.90 to £3.70. But as the prices increased so did the pages, becoming more fleshed out and intriguing so that you felt that it was worth the price you paid. Total Film was now a major rival with Empire.

But perhaps that was a bad thing for Total Film was now at the peak of its popularity with buyers, myself included, lapping up everything they had to say and loving them for their free posters they used to give.

Total Film felt it was invincible and started to have more fun with its words, making fun of everybody and publishing the most pathetic letters in their mags (which meant that people who wrote 20 silly words received prizes but those who had genuinely interesting things to say had their words deleted by the staff). Along with that their forum was moved and made bigger (and better).

Now I must say a little about the forum: At that time run by the lovely Liz Hawkins its administrators were two men(?) who were not part of the Total Film staff but simply film fans who loved the magazine. One was a fan who loved all film, one was a cinephile who snubbed almost everything. The two worked together and helped build a small community where users acted courteously towards each other and were always interested in what everyone had to say. But that's not a good thing.

The forum was a small community for a reason. The members of that magazine who belonged to the old forum (which included me) knew each other well enough to get along in the new one as did a few members who joined earlier, but sadly that meant that some users felt that their words were more important than others and so they downright bashed any new member who had a thing or two to say about movies. This meant that many members left the forum to join others. I myself had made many friends there (both old existing members and new ones) and when I saw one administrator (who I to this day believe was between the ages of 17 to 20) breaking his own rules and attacking a user I and other members stood up for him.

Big mistake.

But I'll talk about what happened later.

So which year are now at? Oh yes, 2005.

The magazine looked great, it probably even smelled great, and its issues were more rich and informative than ever before. Every aspect of film productions were mentioned and interviews were given with all the main players on the set of the film. But the magazine somehow didn't go in-depth with them and simply was used as a way of promoting the film. Yes, that is true, that's what magazines do, but unlike Sight & Sound or Empire, Total Film was beginning to resemble Heat magazine with its lavish poems of love towards the celebrities and no getting down and dirty into the truth of it all, making a hellish production seem like a walk in the clouds. It's reviews also grew more and more outlandish, giving positive reviews to universally panned films and spoiling movies for the masses (28 Weeks Later gave two HUGE pictures of one of the biggest twists in the film). It also didn't want to appear like it loved everything so gave lame excuses for why it gave 4 stars and not 5; Zodiac, for example, lost a star because its camera shots were too perfectly composed.

If Stanley Kubrick had made it, the film would have gotten 5.

My respect for the mag had dropped drastically and no matter what freebies they gave, from DVDs featuring movie trailers to more posters, many customers decided to stop buying the magazine. But I stood on, hoping that this was just a bad patch in a great decade.

Then it happened. The realization. The truth. This magazine may be writing its reviews based on what it gets from the studios. Why else does the magazine promote everything Eli Roth does, always talking about his upcoming projects as if he's the next Scorsese of our generation. Always giving him rave reviews for the worst of his work, always praising what others condemn, giving Hostel: Part II 4 stars when every other mag gives him 1 (even fans of the genre hated the movie). Their love for this man put me off so much that I have now quit reading the mag.

And now back to the forum:

Before I go on, let me just say that the opinions of the administrators and members in no way reflect Total Film's beliefs, and what I say is based on my own personal experiences.

So we stood up for the member. And this administrator turned his horns on me, attacking me in every post no matter what was written. It could have been a stated fact in the press and I still would have been insulted (the usual attacks were that I knew nothing of film or had no taste in movies simply because I felt that Kingdom Of Heaven was an underrated picture).

I no longer went to the forum to enjoy a conversation about film with other filmlovers; I now went there to defend my words against an administrator who broke his own rules, who harrassed me every day like a bully who had found its prey.

But in those dark days there was one good one. This came last Summer at the time that I was at my peak of message boards (by the way that was only a phase; today I have life, work, and relationships which take time out of the lesser points of life) and was the administrator of another messageboard that houses over 7000 members (the members who were brutally attacked by this administrator, whether it be because they liked a film he loathed or defended another user's opinion to like that film, joined this forum when they asked me if I was part of anything else). At that time Ms. Hawkins wanted to break the record for: Most users online on their forum. I had a friend with me that day (who I had introduced to this forum) and together we went to the site and logged on to increase the numbers. The record sadly wasn't broken (in fact one of the administrators wasn't on at the time) but the admin whose eye was fixed squarely on me immediately created a thread making the horrendous accusation that my friend and I were the same person. Forced to defend myself for the rest of the day (and thankfully other members believed my words) it finally ended with the administrator withdrawing his horrible remarks, my friend quitting the boards, and the other administrator sending me a private message giving me a reluctant apology for all the trouble they had caused.

VICTORY! I screamed like Kevin Dillon's character in Entourage.

But that was not to last.

For 6 months later the admins would have their revenge. After yet more horrendous posts attacking me I finally stood up for myself, unafraid of this person's position. He could have been the President of Futurenet (the publication company) but that does not give him the right to abuse his rights as an admin.

I said what I thought of him, what he did, how I felt, everything...

And the next day I could not log on. Was I banned? No. Apparently one of my pieces of info was changed (I'm guessing password or e-mail address) and this could only have been done by the admins.

So I asked my friend if I could use his account? He kindly agreed and I sent a message to the nicer of the two admins. No reply to it. So I posted on the forum that I was using my friend's account and couldn't log onto mine. The administrator then replied to my message telling me that it would be sorted out immediately and I could go online.

THAT WAS A LIE.

For the very next day my friend's account was banned. And I still could not log on.

Those two admins finally removed their scapegoat, but what goes around comes around and after so many members who have joined their forum have realized that it is a close-knit village where new people are not welcome, I am sure that they will realize their mistakes and make the forum a better place.

Do I regret ever joining it? No. I made friends there who knew so much about film and whose opinions I truly respect. I had my good times in the forum too talking about the hot Summer and the beautiful days. And perhaps me being shut out of their community was a blessing for I would no longer have to be insulted in that forum and could go out and resume my life, going to exotic locations, seeing the most breathtaking films, and seeing them with the most breathtking women. So no, perhaps it does have a happy ending. :-)



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The sections:


The Total Film mag is divided into the following sections:


1. Letters

Past: Good letters that had interesting questions, some fun polls, and were always a good read.

Present: Most of them are stupid with the occasional interesting one.

Movie news:

Arguably the best part of the mag, the news is always interesting to read with fun facts and trivia and great anecdotes to mention at work. It also features some good movie stills.

Reviews:

I've already mentioned them as I have mentioned:

The Buzz: AKA Rumours

We then have features on upcoming movies which is a simple promotion for the film, followed by DVD reviews (amazing how a magazine can rate a movie 5 stars, find that the public hated it, and then give it 1 star when its time to review the DVD) and lastly, US DVD, replicas and porno ads.


It also however features the fabulous Abridged Script, arguably the best part of the mag. Hilarious spoofs of new releases, it's always great to see someone rip the script apart. Do read it after you've seen the film of course, unless you like laughing at things you don't understand or read spoilers.

By the way you don't need the mag to read the abridged script, you can read it right here:

http://www.the-editing-room.com/


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Lastly we have the website itself, which sadly posts rumors as facts only to the next day quickly retract their statements (this had happened quite a few times hence why I mention it). But it is also a great way of promoting the mag, the truthful news are always interesting, you can read their reviews online, and you even get links to the newest trailers on the web. A fantastic job, then, with every aspect of it apart from the forum.


Summary: A great magazine that has peaked and is now dragging itself to the end, Total Film's best parts can now easily be found on the web. Let's hope it picks up before people stop subscribing.

Summary: A perfect example of great things gone bad: Total Film, RIP