Help me unravel it

Question

Perhaps there is a shortcoming in the script, but the film's poor reviews may also be a function of one or two ______ casting decisions in an otherwise ______ production.
A. fitting . . magnificent
B. faulty . . solid
C. deliberate . . cautious
D. hasty . . mediocre
E. confusing . . perplexing

The answer is B. But I don’t get what the sentence says.

Does “cast” here mean “to assign roles to actors”? If it does, will “reviews” of critics have anything to do with the “casting decisions” by director? And what exactly is the “solid production”?

Thank you so much for your time.

Julielai · Accepted Answer

I think what it is saying is that the quality of production is good, but one or two bad castings may have something to do with the poor reviews. Just my two cents.

CalifJim · Answer

Maybe the script of the film is not so good, but the fact that critics wrote that they didn't like it very much may also be because one or two mistakes were made in choosing the people to play the parts in the film. Other than these things, the film is produced by people who are very competent and know very well how to make a good film.

That's pretty much what the sentence says. Let us know if that doesn't answer all your questions.

CJ

Jeff_999 · Answer

Thank you.

So "the film's poor reviews may also be a function of faulty casting decisions" means "poor reviews may also be the results of faulty casting decisions, not just of the scrip of film that may probably have certain shortcome"? I was confused with "function".

But I don't get "casting decisions in an otherwise solid production". Does it mean that these casting decisions did produce a good film, but were just wrong for critics, or that "the maker/director of the decisions is competent to make good films, but in this film s/he just made wrong casting decisions?

Hope you will understand what I say.

CalifJim · Answer

Yes. "is a function of" is like "is the result of" or "is caused by". It comes from mathematics. If y is a function of x, then the value of y depends on some calculation done on x; it's the result of some calculation using x.

No. The casting decisions did not produce a good film. The casting decisions were among the factors that made the film bad. Yes, it's the latter paraphrase that is correct. The producers of the film were competent at making good films, but they made mistakes when choosing the actors.

CJ

Jeff_999 · Answer

Thank you so much CJ. I got it.

So the sentence is kinda like defending for the producer of the film. The poor reveiws were just resulted from the possible shortcoming in script, and one or two faulty casting decisions. But the producer's competency is never ever deniable.

Help me unravel it

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