For all the people out there who have a passion for movies and at least halfway consider themselves to be a critic of some sort, I have some advice for you: Stay exactly the way you are now. Never become a real critic, never let yourself pick apart a movie. Love every movie for what it is, what it wants to be and, most of all, for everything it isn’t.

I can remember a time when I loved films for all those things. With hope, even after a semester of being highly critical of every film I saw, I’ll slowly be able to get that back. This job shifted my love for movies out of my heart and into my head.

And that is not a good thing. My job made me an opinionated robot; the kind of person who looks at Hollywood as business rather than a surreal environment where movies are made and dreams come true.

It’s kind of a corny viewpoint, but that’s the way I used to be and that seems to be the best way for movie-lovers to be. I watched movies knowing they were fake, but I consistently lied to myself, swearing that they were real life.

This is, more or less, a plea to you to remember why movies enchant us, why even films such as “Charlie’s Angels” and “The 6th Day” can give us a special kind of rush that we can’t get anywhere else, why certain directors and actors and even producers have a special hand in making movies and why we love them for it.

Remember that feeling of light, excited tingles rolling down your spine when Rocky Balboa ran up the steps and realized he was a winner. Always keep in mind why films exist and always appreciate the filmmaker, no matter how horrible a movie can be. Even the filmmakers behind “Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2” deserve some respect. Well, then again, maybe not.

But anyway, there were times this semester when I could feel the excitement I used to while watching a blockbuster flicker on the silver screen or pressing play on my VCR to watch a new rental. But unfortunately, that feeling soon rolled off the screen with the credits. Watching movies became my job, and even though I loved every second of it, it still seemed like a job.

I found myself nit-picking each and every quality of each movie I saw: the dialogue, the actors, the music, the sets, the direction, the story and even the camera motion. I got very picky and I couldn’t help it.

Around this time last year, I practically prided myself on my love for nearly every movie. Very few times have I ever said I hated a film, and I have never even thought of walking out of a theater midway through the feature presentation. But now I’m different.

For example, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s “The 6th Day,” which is reminiscent of a film I loved as a young teenager, “Total Recall,” caught a bad rap in my review. I almost couldn’t recognize my own opinion when I read it later. I knew what my points were and I backed them up perfectly, but did I really need to make so many?

Now that I’m almost done, I can stand here clearheaded and look back on the films I reviewed and consequently disliked, knowing for certain that just a year ago I would have loved those movies so much more.

Like many of you, I grew up on “Back to the Future,” “Stand by Me,” “Star Wars” and the “Indiana Jones” movies. I grew up never knowing who Rob Reiner was. Never seeing or hearing or recognizing the fact that John Hughes was the man behind the scenes. To me, Steven Spielberg was just some guy I would never know.

I loved being ignorant of those facts. At times, I wish I could go back to that. I guess, in a way, I just want to feel the same about movies as I did then. And because I know I can’t go back, I’m praying the movies will change. This generation needs “The Goonies,” or another movie with that same innocent and fun excitement.

However, movies probably won’t change any time soon. And this week, as I leave this job, waving goodbye to all the information-packed press kits and promo photos that I regularly receive in the mail from film companies, I can say now that I am proud to know who Steven Spielberg is.

Cory Vowell, State News film reporter, can be reached at vowellco@msu.edu.