Either The Fountain is the worst movie ever made, or Italian moviegoers are genuine pricks. At a recent screening of the new movie at the Venice Film Festival, audience reaction was so negative that they apparently broke out in boos.

Considering the overwhelmingly positive reaction the movie recieved at this summer’s San Diego Comic-Con, there’s gotta be something weird going on here. Well, overwhelmingly positive save for Variety, and C.H.U.D.’s Devin Faraci has words for that reviewer as well.

Variety’s Leslie Felperin runs a review that seriously reads like it was written by an anti-intellectual 12 year old, or at least by a half-witted critic who spent most of the screening in the bathroom or IMing on a Sidekick. I know people who have seen The Fountain who didn’t care for it, but even they have admitted that the movie is a beautiful and well-made piece of work. Felperin’s review, which essentially boils The Fountain down to a chick flick with good effects, is about the most ignorant I have read this year, and I read Peter Travers’ reviews often.

Whatever the deal is, it’s kind of interesting to see a movie that’s been plaqued by so many problems over the course of it’s creation continuing to have such odd things happen around it now that it’s done and ready to be released.

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