Fox bullying the press on "Avatar"? It appears so.

A week ago, the press got a chance to see "Avatar". As I'm not officially part of the press, I didn't go. But I do know many a person who did attend the press screening in Boston back on the afternoon of December 10th. I've told you how my friend Brett felt about it, and he wasn't alone in his negative point of view on the 3-D sci-fi film. Another reviewer who lives in the Boston area but writes for a newspaper outside the city, was planning on giving James Cameron's film a star and a half, which is what my friend Brett would give it if he wrote a review for it. This reviewer didn't post his review in advance of the film's opening, but he did indicate what he was going to give the film via a post on Facebook. That shouldn't be any big deal, I put my .02 on films in advance (when I see them in advance) on Facebook all the time. Last Friday, I was taking a healthy -and justified- critical dump on Peter Jackson's dire adaptation of "The Lovely Bones", which doesn't open in the Boston area until Christmas Day (o lucky us!).

Well, apparently when a novice reviewer does this, the studios and their local reps couldn't give a shit. But when an actual journalist does, they go ballistic. The 20th Century Fox rep from Allied Advertising apparently got in touch with the journalist and told them that if they posted a negative review of "Avatar", they would henceforth be banned from future 20th Century Fox press screenings. Now, I can understand the studio being nervous about negative word-of-mouth. After all, they've poured how much money into this film? But to agressively threaten members of the press for merely expressing their opinion is pretty draconian if you ask me (that or the local rep was PMS'ing up a storm and needed to vent on someone). One has to wonder if they threatened the other reviewers who had actually written up and posted a negative review in adavnce as well.