Scathing Reviews of Junkets. Even apart from Sony Pictures’ fabrication of critics’ and viewers’ comments, many film viewers have little use for reviews and especially ‘pull quotes’ splayed all over movie ads. Self-conscious film journalists face the daunting task of defending the merit of the industry-sponsored press junkets they go on; even Hollywood itself has turned a scathing eye on the practice recently, with the cynical America’s Sweethearts, which

“drips with cynicism about junkets:

The celebrities depicted in the movie, who are portrayed by Catherine

Zeta-Jones and John Cusack, lie straight-faced and unabashedly to the

press. The journalists, meanwhile, are presented as simpering and feckless,

the sniveling, unctuous lackeys of the harried studio publicity head, played

by Crystal.”

A group of filmgoers are now bringing suit for redress of the fraudulent nature of the favorable reviews that result. LA Times