The Cole Smithey Thread

[Tragi-Chan]

http://www.colesmithey.com/reviews/2014/02/the-lego-movie.html

What the hell is the point of that review? It's a movie designed to sell plastic bricks to small children. Nobody who is going to see that review is going to give two shits about that kind of wanky analysis, and nobody who would go to see a movie on the basis of that kind of review would demean themselves by going to see something so commercial. They'd be too busy pretending to enjoy some fucking three-hour Albanian drama about goat herders or something.

 

[BatNapalm]

Speaking of, when Chris went to see that movie, he actually brought all of his Legos with him.

I so badly want to believe that Chris walked into a crowded or semi-crowded theater with an armful/purseful of toys and loudly played with them during the movie, while simultaneously smelling like and ruining it for at least several families. And everyone was too afraid to say anything because they assumed he was retarded.

 

[Henry Bemis]

Taken from Coleslaw's official "fan page":

View attachment 4674

Wife = [CONFIRMED]

So it's either his wife, or a day job that he doesn't want to admit to because day jobs contradict with his totally jet-setting lifestyle.

 

[DrChristianTroy]

Now now he could be getting money from his reviews being published by.... ummmmm....... that kid magazine with the dragon?

 

[ChurchOfGodBear]

IIRC, his wife is a bartender. In some places, they can pull in a major coin per night. If she has a day job on top of that, she could easily be the main breadwinner.

Speculation, of course, but it's far more believable than Cole is living off her income than the other way around.

Either way, it was a dick response to give to someone on your fan page.

 

[Artard]

I couched it earlier but it's painfully obvious that Cole bought thousands of likes for his Facebook page.

Yet if he's concerned about appearances -- this looks really bad. His actual level of popularity, in one screenshot:

Spoiler

It's something of a perverse accomplishment to take a popular movie title, put it in the title of your youtube video and get numbers this low.

 

[DrChristianTroy]

My little movie blog has gotten better hits than some of these. Legit. My Raid 2/Captain America review has had more hits than his Cesar Chavez review, his Godzilla review and just a bit less than his Spider-man 2 review. My Robocop 3 review has more views than all but one of his videos.

This isn't to brag or some shit. But it's sad when my hobby does better than his "career."

 

[exball]

We still talk about Cole?

 

[DrChristianTroy]

We still talk about Cole?

As a movie guy I find it fun to talk about his shittiness.

 

[Cid Highwind]

My little movie blog has gotten better hits than some of these. Legit. My Raid 2/Captain America review has had more hits than his Cesar Chavez review, his Godzilla review and just a bit less than his Spider-man 2 review. My Robocop 3 review has more views than all but one of his videos.

This isn't to brag or some shit. But it's sad when my hobby does better than his "career."

This just confirms what everyone here already knows, there are no winners to emerge from 14BC. Set foot in that house once and you're fucking tainted for life. I hope SkyRaider has taken appropriate precautions. One wrong footstep and you'll be mooching and lying for life.

 

[Artard]

As a movie guy I find it fun to talk about his shittiness.

I keep missing the news alerts on what's cool & uncool to post about on the Chris Chan forum.

 

[DrChristianTroy]

This just confirms what everyone here already knows, there are no winners to emerge from 14BC. Set foot in that house once and you're fucking tainted for life. I hope SkyRaider has taken appropriate precautions. One wrong footstep and you'll be mooching and lying for life.

When Skyraider starts saying he'll get pictures of 14BC for Legos we'll know it's past the point of no return.

 

[Henry Bemis]

For the record, we're not ripping on Cole because he has a day job to support himself and/or his wife is the chief breadwinner. We're ripping on how much he doesn't like taking about having a day job and/or not being the breadwinner.

 

[ChurchOfGodBear]

We still talk about Cole?

Sure. As long as this thread gets two bumps per week, Cole's CWCki traffic will always be more than quadruple his blog traffic.

 

[timtommy]

Awesome. Assuming Cole would need to make $40,000/year to get by (a ludicrously lowball figure by NYC standards) there's no way his reviews would be pulling in that kind of money. He's either lying (which shouldn't be ruled out, he's a Weston after all) or he's riding his Sugar Mama's gravy train.

The tone of the question was likely to offend and elicit a prickly response unless he has another job that he is very stoked about.

My guess is that he pieces together a living from a bunch of things like movie reviews, music lessons, freelance editing, bartending or waitering, who knows what else. It is a pretty common thing to do. I know a lot of semi-professional actors, musicians, writers, etc. who get by doing a series of short-term jobs to pay the bills. Like Cole, they take their semi-professional hobby a lot more seriously than their job, and are decent, but not world-class at it. If I run into one of them and ask them about their life, they are going to tell me about the play they are in, or how have a new regular gig at a bar, or how they just got a story accepted in some magazine. They are not going to spend much time telling me about how they left their dishwashing job and are now busing tables at a different restaurant.

Cole is entirely unremarkable as a person.

 

[ChurchOfGodBear]

The tone of the question was likely to offend and elicit a prickly response unless he has another job that he is very stoked about.

My guess is that he pieces together a living from a bunch of things like movie reviews, music lessons, freelance editing, bartending or waitering, who knows what else. It is a pretty common thing to do. I know a lot of semi-professional actors, musicians, writers, etc. who get by doing a series of short-term jobs to pay the bills. Like Cole, they take their semi-professional hobby a lot more seriously than their job, and are decent, but not world-class at it. If I run into one of them and ask them about their life, they are going to tell me about the play they are in, or how have a new regular gig at a bar, or how they just got a story accepted in some magazine. They are not going to spend much time telling me about how they left their dishwashing job and are now busing tables at a different restaurant.

Whether or not Cole has a day job, there were a number of other ways he could have handled the question. He could have said he considers film criticism to be his main career. He could have said he's a freelancer. He could have ignored the question. He could have lied. But to end with "...in case you hadn't guessed" is just being a prick for the sake of being a prick. Cole doesn't have enough followers that he can afford to be an asshole to the six people on the planet giving him attention. When you're trying to build an audience in the entertainment industry, you need to embrace any contact that other people initiate. Not only was Cole's response needlessly rude, from a PR standpoint, it was stupid.

But then, he's Barb's kid. Being abrasive and choosing the worst possible option just runs in his blood.

Cole is entirely unremarkable as a person.

Hilarious, isn't it? He's a walking illustration for mediocre.

 

[timtommy]

Whether or not Cole has a day job, there were a number of other ways he could have handled the question. He could have said he considers film criticism to be his main career. He could have said he's a freelancer. He could have ignored the question. He could have lied. But to end with "...in case you hadn't guessed" is just being a prick for the sake of being a prick. Cole doesn't have enough followers that he can afford to be an asshole to the six people on the planet giving him attention. When you're trying to build an audience in the entertainment industry, you need to embrace any contact that other people initiate. Not only was Cole's response needlessly rude, from a PR standpoint, it was stupid.

Meh. It was a bit of a prick question. Semi-professional artistic types get a lot of comments like "don't quit your day job" and shit like that. Sometimes it is light-hearted, sometimes it is intended to denigrate them. I think this was the second type.
Also Cole's "persona" is to be a bit of a prick. I don't know how many fans he has, but if he has any they probably expect/enjoy him being a bit of a superior asshole. That is his only distinguishing feature, from the public's perspective. He probably shouldn't break character.
So he answered with a bit of a prick answer. NBD, IMHO.

 

[ChurchOfGodBear]

Meh. It was a bit of a prick question. Semi-professional artistic types get a lot of comments like "don't quit your day job" and shit like that. Sometimes it is light-hearted, sometimes it is intended to denigrate them. I think this was the second type.

Them's the fuckin' breaks. If you have an artistic hobby and it's not paying the bills, well, people are going to notice your artistic hobby isn't paying the bills. If that fact is upsetting to you, maybe you shouldn't be taking your hobby public. Art, by it's very nature, invites criticism. Cole, being a critic, should understand this. His one-line response really paints him as a defensive and thin-skinned person, and those aren't qualities you'd want to see in someone who markets their opinion as content.

When someone posts a prick question, you can either handle it with class and show yourself to be above the stupidity of the question, or you can be Cole.

Frankly, I don't think the question was out of line at all, least of all for someone who's as unknown as Cole.

 

[Henry Bemis]

Also Cole's "persona" is to be a bit of a prick. I don't know how many fans he has, but if he has any they probably expect/enjoy him being a bit of a superior asshole. That is his only distinguishing feature, from the public's perspective. He probably shouldn't break character.

Brad Jones manages to rake it in as both the asshole-ish Cinema Snob and as himself.

Cole, on the other hand, has no known separation between his public and private personas, and it impacts his personal and professional life.

 

[DrChristianTroy]

Brad Jones manages to rake it in as both the asshole-ish Cinema Snob and as himself.

Cole, on the other hand, has no known separation between his public and private personas, and it impacts his personal and professional life.

Cinema Snob is also a comedic character. Cole takes it super serious. I also doubt he has a sense of humor.