Precious - I thought this was gonna drain me emotionally but several people said I should really see it. And I'm really glad I did. It wasn't the Holocaust movie style drag you through the mud kind of emotional trainwreck I expected it to be. It was actually... entertaining. Entertaining the way "Requiem For A Dream" is wholly reprehensible yet still entertaining. So "Precious" isn't as monumental as RFaD, but it certainly has its parallels, particularly in the fact that they both share imaginative dream sequences that by their sheer exuberance shows how deep their delusions are. What I love most is the directing and the acting. Lee Daniels takes your typical black-girl-down-on-her-luck story and makes it imaginative and original (by mainstream standards) as well as intense and entertaining. The acting is stellar. This year's "Doubt" (though again, maybe not to the exact same caliber). I hate to say it, but i think Mo'nique deserves an Oscar for her performance as Precious' mother. I also was surprised to enjoy Mariah Carey's solemn performance (and there's one line in particular that sheds light on why she got the role). Precious wants to know what race Mariah Carey's character is but can't pinpoint it. "What are you? Black? Mexican? What?" Carey never gives her an answer, "What color do you think I am?" It hits Precious pretty hard in context. Best Pic shoo-in? With ten slots open, of course. But I say it deserves it on an indie-level sort of little-movie-that-could. Expect to see some acting noms somewhere. The leading 4 characters deserve recognition. I expect to see a nom for Best Adapted Screenplay as well. I would argue not much happens in the story, but the emotional story being told is phenomenal. Also, the original material makes it particularly difficult to adapt, so congrats to the screenwriter (and director) who pulled it off so well.
500 Days of Summer - This year's "Juno" or "Once". My 2nd favorite movie of the year (seriously, I had a LOT of fun watching "Avatar"). 500DoS is an indie film of my favorite kind in that it's fun and takes different approaches to typical boy-meets-girl fare. It has several stand-out, original pieces including a musical number and some other moments I dare not spoil. This is the movie that I watch a dozen mediocre to bad to highly-acclaimed-but-I-don't-get-it movies for. To find hidden gems such as this. It was so bittersweet when it was over because I know it'll be awhile till I find a movie I like this much again. Complaints against it I can see are maybe, like "Juno", it tries pretty hard to be inventive/original/hip. But I loved "Juno" and I don't think either of these movies reach beyond their grasp.
Paranormal Activity - "Blair Witch" does the same thing only better (btw, I love BWP so take that for what it's worth). Too much set-up, and there's a ripped-from-The-Exorcist moment that had my eyes rolling. However, the bump-in-the-night moments (the scenes where the couple lay in bed each night) really had me peeking through my fingers. I literally had to shut my eyes for the whole last 5-10mins. When it was over, I rewound it and watched the ending without sound just to see what I missed. I have never come close to ever doing that at a movie. Scariest movie of all time? Not hardly. "The Descent" left me unsettled for days. "Blair Witch" had better acting (now what does that tell you). But I'll admit, I wasn't happy lying down to sleep that night because my mind kept wandering back to the movie. ::shudder:: (I should note also that I'm not a fan of horror movies).
Friday, January 15, 2010
Monday, January 4, 2010
A Movie-Goers' Open Mind
This is a brilliantly succinct NPR article about (I think) snobbery:
Let's Resolve Together To Make 2010 The Year We Leave The Window Open
by Linda Holmes
"Familiarity breeds contempt."
Perhaps it is this little saying, or some variation of it, that convinces people that disdain and discernment are the same thing: that the more things you roll your eyes at, the smarter you must be. After all, you have the most contempt, so you must have the most familiarity. Under this model, to enjoy art or entertainment is to be conquered, but to dismiss it is to defeat it. And the more other people have been conquered by something, the more it distinguishes you to dismiss it.
After all, when you enjoy or respect or are affected by a movie, you are usually responding to it at least in part as its creators intended. In a sense, you've been, for that period of time, obedient. The director and the screenwriters and the actors and the crew, they led you, and you followed. They set a trap -- of suspense, or romantic tension, or comedic payoff -- and you fell right into it. The director said, "Hey, that's a mighty nice henway," and you said, "What's a henway?" and the director said, "About three pounds." Sucker.
The problem is that if you watch something and you don't enjoy it, then you may still have been taken. They got you to go, to watch, to read -- they got you to try it, because you didn't know enough not to.
Sucker.
The only way, under this rather bizarre up-is-down model of critical thinking, to defeat something is to proclaim that not only are you not enough of a sucker to enjoy it; you are not enough of a sucker to even watch it -- or to listen to it, or to read it. "I wouldn't waste my money." "I wouldn't waste my time." "I wouldn't waste the effort." And, of course, the natural follow-up: "And I don't think much of people who would."
Toward a different way, after the jump.
For those with this approach, it is literally the very fact that they have no direct knowledge of the topic at hand that makes their reactions a sign of especially discerning tastes. They have proved their independence, in short, by being too clever to be fooled into obtaining any independent knowledge. As to things they expect not to like, they have removed the part of the critical process where you experience the thing, moving directly from preconception to evaluation, so the only things they even experience are the things they already think they're going to like.
Suckers.
People who have written off all Hollywood movies, or all television, or all popular music (or all rap, or all thrillers, or all romantic comedies), on the basis of a presupposition about quality that blankets an entire medium or genre are regrettable for their corrosive attitudes, yes. But they're even more regrettable for what they're missing. Rare indeed is the enormous vat of nothing but bathwater; there's almost always a baby in there somewhere.
Most of all, however, they are regrettable for their contributions to a giant cultural conversation increasingly polluted by detached, uninformed disdain. If familiarity breeds your contempt, that's fine. That's essential. If you saw the movie and you hated it, or you read the book and you hated it, or you watched the show and you hated it, get out there and holler. Holler. Argue vigorously, refuse to settle. That's part of how vibrant cultures are built. But if unfamiliarity breeds your contempt, then it contributes little to the discussion.
In short, this year, let's not do this. Let's not prize the things we don't know anything about and show them off like a bottle-cap collection. "I can't believe anyone reads John Grusham or whatever his name is." "I can't believe you're talking about Britney Spears, whose music I have never heard." "I haven't watched anything on television in 20 years, and everything I haven't seen has been absolutely worthless."
That's my resolution for 2010: Let's hope everything is good, even though we know much of it won't be. Let's hope to be pleasantly surprised instead of making sure we're never disappointed. Let's leave the window open, just in case there's a breeze.
[[Original article can be found here: http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2009/12/lets_resolve_together_to_make_1.html]]
Let's Resolve Together To Make 2010 The Year We Leave The Window Open
by Linda Holmes
"Familiarity breeds contempt."
Perhaps it is this little saying, or some variation of it, that convinces people that disdain and discernment are the same thing: that the more things you roll your eyes at, the smarter you must be. After all, you have the most contempt, so you must have the most familiarity. Under this model, to enjoy art or entertainment is to be conquered, but to dismiss it is to defeat it. And the more other people have been conquered by something, the more it distinguishes you to dismiss it.
After all, when you enjoy or respect or are affected by a movie, you are usually responding to it at least in part as its creators intended. In a sense, you've been, for that period of time, obedient. The director and the screenwriters and the actors and the crew, they led you, and you followed. They set a trap -- of suspense, or romantic tension, or comedic payoff -- and you fell right into it. The director said, "Hey, that's a mighty nice henway," and you said, "What's a henway?" and the director said, "About three pounds." Sucker.
The problem is that if you watch something and you don't enjoy it, then you may still have been taken. They got you to go, to watch, to read -- they got you to try it, because you didn't know enough not to.
Sucker.
The only way, under this rather bizarre up-is-down model of critical thinking, to defeat something is to proclaim that not only are you not enough of a sucker to enjoy it; you are not enough of a sucker to even watch it -- or to listen to it, or to read it. "I wouldn't waste my money." "I wouldn't waste my time." "I wouldn't waste the effort." And, of course, the natural follow-up: "And I don't think much of people who would."
Toward a different way, after the jump.
For those with this approach, it is literally the very fact that they have no direct knowledge of the topic at hand that makes their reactions a sign of especially discerning tastes. They have proved their independence, in short, by being too clever to be fooled into obtaining any independent knowledge. As to things they expect not to like, they have removed the part of the critical process where you experience the thing, moving directly from preconception to evaluation, so the only things they even experience are the things they already think they're going to like.
Suckers.
People who have written off all Hollywood movies, or all television, or all popular music (or all rap, or all thrillers, or all romantic comedies), on the basis of a presupposition about quality that blankets an entire medium or genre are regrettable for their corrosive attitudes, yes. But they're even more regrettable for what they're missing. Rare indeed is the enormous vat of nothing but bathwater; there's almost always a baby in there somewhere.
Most of all, however, they are regrettable for their contributions to a giant cultural conversation increasingly polluted by detached, uninformed disdain. If familiarity breeds your contempt, that's fine. That's essential. If you saw the movie and you hated it, or you read the book and you hated it, or you watched the show and you hated it, get out there and holler. Holler. Argue vigorously, refuse to settle. That's part of how vibrant cultures are built. But if unfamiliarity breeds your contempt, then it contributes little to the discussion.
In short, this year, let's not do this. Let's not prize the things we don't know anything about and show them off like a bottle-cap collection. "I can't believe anyone reads John Grusham or whatever his name is." "I can't believe you're talking about Britney Spears, whose music I have never heard." "I haven't watched anything on television in 20 years, and everything I haven't seen has been absolutely worthless."
That's my resolution for 2010: Let's hope everything is good, even though we know much of it won't be. Let's hope to be pleasantly surprised instead of making sure we're never disappointed. Let's leave the window open, just in case there's a breeze.
[[Original article can be found here: http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2009/12/lets_resolve_together_to_make_1.html]]
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