Several critics commented on the film's wry depiction of Hollywood as an oppressive industry, such as Maslin, who felt that "the best parts of the film are those that pit Valentino against Hollywood, which both he and Mr. Russell seem to see as the biggest affront of them all." Richard Schnickel of "Time" magazine alternately excoriated the film for its "relentless anti-Americanism, implying that the unfortunate inhabitants of these shores are the only citizens of the world capable of materialism or vulgarity." Russell himself responded to the criticisms suggesting the film had an anti-American or anti-Hollywood tone: "I don't hate Hollywood. I am passionately dispassionate of my treatment of it in "Valentino". Some studio executives like Jesse Lasky were hard on Valentino, so I show them being hard on him. Commenting on claims that Russell's depictions blended fact with fiction, he said: "I only want to be accurate up to a point. I can be as inaccurate as I want—it makes no difference to me. I'm writing a novel. My films are novels, based on a person's life, and a novel has a point of view."