I received this e-mail the other day from a fellow by the name of Seth Miller:

Just bumped into this site. I was at BYU when you wrote for the Universe. I was a fan. I’ve never written a letter to an editor or mad a complaint to anyone but I guess it’s never too late to start. I think you’ve sold out. [Shouldn't I have money, then?] I never really knew what your standards were but I guess I just assumed they were similar to mine. It’s odd to me that only R-rated movies gets your highest honor “A.” Have more respect for yourself and stop trying to please others. I won’t be visiting you site again.
No response needed or wanted.

I wish I’d been keeping track of how many angry letters I’ve gotten over the years in which the writer indicated he or she did not want a reply. I suppose it’s all the bravery they can muster to even send the letter. If they had to read a response, and perhaps even DISCUSS the matter in greater detail — well, that would be unthinkable.

Anyway, though forbidden, I sent this response:

Well, actually, a response IS needed, because you have your facts wrong.

You wrote:

“It’s odd to me that only R-rated movies gets your highest honor ‘A.’”

That would indeed be odd, if it were even remotely true. But here are some non R-rated movies that I gave an A to this year alone:

Anchorman
Spider-Man 2
The Triplets of Belleville

That’s three A’s for PG-13 films, compared to only two for R-rated ones. A- grades are much more plentiful: 11 for PG-13 or PG films, and 9 for R-rated ones.

So your statement that I only give A’s to R-rated films is patently false.

But this is all beside the point anyway. When I grade films, I am grading them based on their artistic and entertainment value, not on how much “objectionable content” they have. That’s not what film critics are for.

Also, I find it disturbing that you equate my not having the same standards as you (if that’s true) with “selling out.” Can’t a person have different standards from you and NOT sell out?

You wrote:

“Have more respect for yourself and stop trying to please others.”

But if I stopped reviewing R-rated films, I would only be doing so in order to please you. So I can’t win here, I guess.

Good luck in your new-found career as a self-righteous person.

Sincerely,
Eric D. Snider

If I receive a reply, I will post it here, of course.

Today I learned that if you get a speeding ticket, and when you mail in the check you sign it “Up Yours” instead of your actual name, a few weeks later you’ll get a letter from the court saying they can’t process the check due to an “invalid maker’s signature” and you’ll need to send another check. Good to know.

It does get so tiring being right all the time, but here I am again.

When Utah millionaire Larry H. Miller announced last year that he would put $7 million into the production of a movie based on the first volume in the “Work and the Glory” historical-fiction series, I thought, “He’s insane. There is no way he will ever get that money back.”

If you’re not familiar with it, “The Work and the Glory” is a nine-part series of novels set in the early days of the LDS Church. It follows the fictional Steed family as they interact with various real-life people connected with early church history — Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, folks like that. The books are enormously popular among the LDS faithful and have sold more than 2 million copies all together (many of those were bought by the same people, of course, since there are nine books in the series, but still).

Turning the books into films was a no-brainer, but apparently deciding how much to spend on the movie was a no-brainer, too. Look at the facts: The highest-grossing Mormon-themed film so far was “The Other Side of Heaven,” which topped out at $4.7 million and which contained very little LDS-specific doctrine or cultural material, which means it stood a chance of being watched by non-Mormons, too.

For “The Work and the Glory” to turn a profit, it would need to make almost twice as much money as “The Other Side of Heaven” did. Is such a thing possible? Sure. It may happen someday that a movie from the LDS Cinema movement is good enough, non-inclusive enough and marketed well enough to gain an audience wider than just Mormons. But there was NO WAY “The Work and the Glory” was going to be it. The story is too specifically Mormon, dealing with Joseph Smith and his heavenly visions, and with the other characters’ crises of faith. We like to pretend that regular people have at least a passing interest in early American history and might be curious to see a film in which Joseph Smith is a character, but we’re kidding ourselves. The only people who want to see a movie about early-19th-century Mormons — if indeed anyone does — are Mormons.

So by and large, only Mormons will see “The Work and the Glory.” Fair enough. Are there enough Mormons in the potential viewing audience, then, for it to make $7 million at the box office? No. They would need to be Mormons a) of movie-going age (no very young children, no absurdly old adults); b) who ever, ever go to the movies anyway; c) who live in an area where the film is playing; and d) who have any interest whatsoever in seeing “The Work and the Glory” when they could be seeing “The Incredibles” or “National Treasure” or whatever.

To make $7 million, the movie would have to be seen by 1,000,000 people. I don’t think there ARE a million people who fit the criteria I just mentioned. Only about 670,000 people saw “The Other Side of Heaven”; why would 50 percent MORE people watch this movie? About 350,000 people saw “God’s Army,” which was well-reviewed and had the benefit of being the first film in the modern LDS Cinema movement. Why would three times as many people watch “The Work and the Glory”? Why would so many people who DIDN’T watch those other films come watch this one?

Because it was a popular book? Maybe. A source tells me the FIRST volume in the series (which is the basis for this movie) has sold 338,000 copies. Even if every single one of those people sees the movie — heck, even if they each bring a friend, too — we’re still only in “Other Side of Heaven” territory, financially speaking.

I’m harping on this because I don’t understand why no one harped on it to Larry H. Miller before he embarked on his noble but foolhardy endeavor. It’s not like I have any inside information or magic knowledge of the workings of LDS movies. It’s all pretty obvious.

The problem is that everyone keeps thinking THEIR movie will finally be the one to have major cross-over appeal, to get non-Mormons as well as Mormons into the theater. But the only ones that have done it — “The Other Side of Heaven” and “Saints and Soldiers” — have been the ones that have downplayed the Mormon content. A film that is obviously, undeniably, inherently saturated with Mormonism — a film like, say, “The Work and the Glory” — will only be of interest to Mormons. To overcome that, it would have to be SUCH a good movie that EVERY critic who saw it raved and raved about it in the newspapers, urging everyone, regardless of religion, to run out and see it. And while I admire each filmmakers’ optimism in thinking their film might be the one to get such a reception, again, let’s not kid ourselves.

After three weekends in theaters, “The Work and the Glory” has grossed $765,381 — highly respectable for its genre, but not even close to indicating it will go on to gross $7 million. Each weekend its box office has dropped off precipitously: $251,145 the first weekend, then $106,702, then $68,956 — and that’s despite adding two or three more theaters every week. I suspect that within a few weeks, all the people who want to see it will have done so, and it will max out at maybe $1.5 million. Larry H. Miller will have lost $5.5 million. I’m not crying for him; the guy can afford it. But it’s sad to think such a tragedy could have been averted. Larry, the next time you want to throw $5.5 million away, CALL ME. I have so many ideas.

I heard something amusing on the radio the other day. The song was “Teenage Dirtbag” by Wheatus, about a high school student who loves this girl secretly but knows she would never love him because, after all, he’s just a teenage dirtbag who listens to Iron Maiden. Surely you can agree that such a tool should not be loved by the prettiest girl in school.

The second verse goes like this:

Her boyfriend’s a d***
And he brings a gun to school
And he’d simply kick
My a** if he knew the truth.

What amused me was the way it was edited for the radio. The words “d***” and “a**” remained intact, but “gun” was bleeped out. The semi-swear words are OK, but anything even remotely suggesting the possibility of violence is not — even when, in context, the act of bringing a gun to school is described as being a BAD thing to do (i.e., if you do it, you’re a d***).

I remembered the song “Semi-Charmed Life” by Third Eye Blind from a few years back. A reference to oral sex survived the cut, but the words “crystal meth” were bleeped for radio and MTV.

This is consistent with the way radio and MTV arbitrarily and senselessly edit music aimed at young people. The reasoning seems to be this: Kids hear swearing all the time, and even if they take it up themselves, it’s not going to ruin them. Violence and drugs, however, WILL harm them, and so we must eliminate all references to such things. Look how concerned we are for young people!

Actually, they’re terrified of being blamed every time a kid O.D.’s on drugs or kills his classmates. They figure if they just bleep out the drug and gun references, they’re doing their part. It has a germ of a good idea to it, but it’s administered so blindly as to give us silly examples like the ones cited.

The past two episodes of “Arrested Development” have been some of the show’s funniest, and thus some of the funniest half-hours of TV I’ve ever seen. And yet so many people who would probably enjoy it aren’t watching it.

The MVP two weeks ago (there was no episode last week) was Lucille, the bitter, haughty matriarch of the dysfunctional Bluth family. Her uncharacteristically giddy reaction every time private detective Gene Parmesan revealed himself was hysterical; we’ve finally found the one thing that can make Lucille Bluth happy. Also a riot was the close-up of her skeptical, withered face as she slowly closed the door on her son Gob. The banner she made for Buster’s joining-the-Army farewell party — “You’re killing me, Buster” — was sheer brilliance.

And let’s not forget Buster himself, dozing off in the trunk of a car bound for Mexico, getting out six minutes later in Santa Ana and, owing to the large number of Mexicans he encounters, believing himself to be in Mexico. And the fact that he begins speaking to them in a Mexican accent, as if that will help them understand him — it’s politically incorrect, I suppose, but Buster is so dumb (did you catch the Mexican woman referring to him, in Spanish, as “el retardo”?) that it’s just funny.

Last night’s episode, dealing with the funeral arrangements for the believed-to-be-dead George Sr., was simply packed with recurring jokes, silly references and generally outlandish behavior. The scene where the family learns of their patriarch’s death and everyone reacts with selfish hysteria was classic. And the ongoing Charlie Brown references — where saddened characters would shuffle around dejectedly as the C.B. theme music played — were funnier each time.

Basically, everyone’s been telling you for the past year that “Arrested Development” is a) the funniest show on TV or b) ONE of the funniest shows on TV. (Some commentators aren’t quite willing to commit to the first option.) I freely confess that it’s not for everyone. You have to pay attention, and the more often you watch, the funnier it is. (There are frequent throwbacks to previous episodes folded subtly into the mix.) If your current choice for Funniest Sitcom on TV is “According to Jim” or “The George Lopez Show,” then you probably will not find “Arrested Development” very entertaining.

But for everyone else, what’s the problem? The show has a better lead-in this year than it did last year, coming now immediately after “The Simpsons.” The style of humor in those shows is not exactly alike, but both are a wicked blend of the sophomoric and the sophisticated. I would think nearly anyone who loves one would love the other.

And yet, only about 70 percent of “Simpsons” viewers are staying tuned for “Arrested Development.” (That’s a guess, of course; there are probably some people who don’t watch “The Simpsons” but who tune in especially for “Arrested Development.”) Seventy percent might sound good, but it isn’t. Fully 95 percent of the people who watch CBS’ “Everybody Loves Raymond” stay tuned to watch “Two and a Half Men” afterward. In some pairings of half-hour sitcoms across the dial, the retention rate is almost 100 percent.

In case you’re curious, here are the ratings so far this season. The first number is the households watching “The Simpsons,” the second is the households watching “Arrested Development,” and then there’s the percent of “Simpsons” viewers who stay tuned for “Arrested Development.” Please note that this is the number of households; the actual number viewers will be higher, since most people don’t live alone.

Nov. 7 — 6.8 million; 5.0 million; 74 percent retention
Nov. 14 — 7.2 million; 4.9 million; 68.1 percent retention
Nov. 21 — 6.1 million; 4.2 million; 68.9 percent retention
Dec. 5 — 6.4 million; 4.5 million; 70.3 percent retention

Lots of “Simpsons” viewers gave “Arrested Development” a try the first week, but apparently a lot of them didn’t like it, because the next week that 74 percent retention had dropped to 68.1 percent, where it remains. I do think any “Simpsons” fan who watches “Arrested Development” for a few weeks would find it growing on them and becoming funnier each time. I promise, it just keeps getting better. Watch it for three weeks. If you don’t enjoy it, I’ll refund your money.

(By the way, if you wanted to buy the first season of “Arrested Development” on DVD, I’d be much obliged if you’d use the link you see here.)