A CRITICAL MASS

It’s becoming a craze among movie folk not to pre-screen those films that they suspect will meet with critical attack. This year alone, nearly 40 movies have opened without advance reviewing.

Ah, but that doesn’t stop the studios from snatching a few superlatives from any positive critical blurbs for its hype ads--even if they’re from the same scribes who weren’t allowed pre-looks.

Is that like having your cake--and eating it too?

“Hey, freedom of the press works on both sides,” said Rob Friedman, a Warner Bros. marketing/publicity exec. “As long as we’re not misquoting anybody, we have the right to run good reviews.”

Warners kept critics away from “Who’s That Girl” but is running ads highlighted with a tout from the New York Times’ Vincent Canby--who dubs Madonna “a very engaging comedian.” (Warners missed Canby’s line that the film “might have achieved its fairly modest goals had the people making it spent just 15 more minutes thinking about what they were doing.”).

Cannon Films, which wouldn’t screen “Masters of the Universe,” is now running a rapturous squib from a Her-Ex review (“It’s like something out of Lucas-Spielberg heaven”) in its ads. “We didn’t grab the only positive review we could find--we just picked the one that said it best,” said Cannon national pub director Randall Barton. “Actually, we got good notices from all across the country.”

So why not let the critics see the picture ahead of time? “I think The Times’ (negative) review supports our (no-screening) decision,” Barton said. “Cannon isn’t a federal agency--we aren’t required to show movies in advance to anyone. Now if we could pick the reviewer, maybe it would be different. That might even up the odds.”