The question you ask reduces to, I think, “does a director lose ambition with age?” And that is a question without a complete answer.
For example, Luis Bunuel started out his career with the experimental film of L’Age D’Or, an interesting film in its own right, but it lacked the thematic aspirations and brilliance (at least in my own opinion) of say The Phantom of Liberty.L’Age D’Or was more of a wild, bravura-infused sort of film, that bravura being relinquished over time. Perhaps I should not have said “ambition” in my restatement of the question, rather my question might better be “does a director’s attitude and approach to film change over time?” or even “does a director relinquish flair of youth to later embrace the seriousness of control?” These are questions that still have no complete answer.
My attempt to answer them is thus: I am inclined to believe that a director loses raw talent that s/he had in youth, in exchange employing what the director as a person has learned (whether or not it’s about how to direct film).
I don’t like Spike Lee.
Not because I don’t think he has talent; not because I dislike the subject matter of his films; and certainly not because I’m racist.
I don’t like Spike Lee because he always feels the need to moralize and preach in his films, regardless of whether or not it fits. Take, for example, Inside Man which could have otherwise been a (for the most part) interesting crime/heist film, but instead that Spike Lee in all of his wisdom saw fit to tell us something that films for the past 60 years have: Nazis are BAD! It’s not that it completely destroyed the film, rather that it’s a testament to the man’s self-righteousness and need to evince that in all of his works.
And above all, I think this clouds what Spike (should) really wants to do: For someone who dislikes prejudice, he calls attention it, and the issue of race so often. The ultimate reason I don’t like Spike Lee is that he’s done more to fan the flames of racial hatred than he really has to ameliorate it, and whether or not it’s intentional, I find it to be hypocritical.
But hey, that could all just be me. Maybe I’m the hypocrite, and (I’m being serious when I say this) it could just be me who’s the man who can’t see past the issue. And maybe Spike really has done more than I give him credit for to help people be more color blind. In either case, approach my post, like you should approach Spike Lee, with a TON of salt.
As a fan of Michael Mann, Collateral is a great film on the subject, albeit one that doesn’t explore the solitude inherent to profession. However, it prods the nature of the hitman in a more dramatic way than Le Samourai, both of which make a point of the observation that the hitman must inherently have sociopathic tendencies (in the case of Le Samourai the character of Jef Costello being a schizophrenic).
Also Ghost Dog is a character study more along the lines of Le Samourai albeit with less of a criminal and overtly existentialist bite.
I do.
I usually show them to a few friends, not usually with the intention of doing anything with them. They are/would be interesting curios for a personal reassessment of style and content. I don’t storyboard as I don’t have the gift, but I try to be aware of the shots that I think would be ideal for any one place in the film.
Unless you are averse, would you be willing to share the loglines of your would-be screenplays? [Or perhaps sending a private message? Any sort of other creative direction/opinion I find useful to myself as it forces me to reassess my own perspective]
Joe
Oh, I agree with your point that there is the reference to the hitman character in Collateral does to a certain extent explore the nature of his solitude; the dramatic crux of the film hinges on that character’s essential loneliness. However, the film’s main preoccupation is in two things about the hitman: his doing his job (which includes police evasion in addition to killing people), and his interaction with others. The majority of time is spent with the hitman and someone else onscreen. It references the solitude, yes, but doesn’t directly explore it as say, Le Samourai does.
While the ending seems to be a marked change to supernaturalism from the drained realism that had come before it, that assessment is not complete upon closer inspection. By the use of abstraction through minimalism, sustained single shots, and the directly religious/spiritual dialogue, Dreyer is not working in realism. He uses these elements to create a “creepy and ominous” tone, but this could also be interpreted as the presence of something, something that cannot be seen, felt, or identified. It is through this that Dreyer is showing his mastery: he is suggesting God.
What makes the ending work is that God is always present, but nobody allows Him to work in their lives, except for two characters: Peter and Morten both claim to be men of the cloth, but are both ultimately ungodly men, each as intolerant as the other; if God is Love, Anders and Anne are kept from it by institutions beyond their control; and Mikkel has no professed faith at all. The two figures who do let God work in their lives the the two most central to the film: Inger and Johannes. Johannes, odd as he may be, is one representation of God in the lives of these people: he (like God is, really) is constantly reminding those around him to place trust of themselves in God, but nobody listens. Inger is herself a figure of God, also Christlike. As Peter and Morten are two men who claim to be of God, but really aren’t, so are Inger and Johannes not claiming to be of God (indeed the latter claims to be ), but really are. On the same day both Johannes and Inger leave to places “wither [they] go [others] cannot come”, and both return on the same day, each resurrected in their own way.
What bridges Johannes and Inger directly is Inger’s older daughter Maren. She is a loving daughter to her mother, and the only person to truly take Johannes at his word. A child herself, she practices the instruction of Paul in Ephesians 5:1 by being “a [follower] of God, as [a] dear [child]”. It is her childlike Faith that frees her to ask Johannes (who is now, no longer “crazy”) can invoke God to bring her mother back to life. Dreyer (like the Apostles) is saying that raw, unblinded belief is the only kind of faith that can unchain the goodness of Christianity. He is saying that the rigidity of each sect (be it one way or the other) is the ultimate barrier of faith, more than the aetheism of Mikkel or the doctor. Dreyer’s attitude seems directly lifted from Matthew 7:16 :“Beware of false prophets…”
I myself was deeply affected by this film (as you can see), because I myself am a Christian, and if I sound pretentious or self-important, I apologize; it is the result of how personal my perspective is on this film. The ideas Dreyer posits on what the Faith should be are nothing new, but things which, over time, have found themselves divorced from what the Faith is on earth. Most criticism I have read consider Robert Bresson the most spiritual filmmaker, including David Thomson. I myself feel that, on the merit of this film alone, that distinction belongs to Carl Theodor Dreyer.
To direct the discussion towards a general attempt at why a videogame film usually won’t work…
On the primary level, the usual trend is such that films adapted from videogames are usually helmed by people who have never played said videogame, in addition to usually being hacks. Far be it for a mere commentator like myself to say, but Andrzej Bartkowiak, Paul W.S. Anderson, Alexander Witt, or Russell Mulcahy never has and never will make a good film (if it it happens, it will be by accident). Usually it’s producers attempting to make buckets of money by cashing in on mental real estate usually held by males aged 18-25.
On a second (more theoretical, as a good videogame adaptation has not yet been made) level, a translation from the medium of videogames to film results in a high loss for the active involvement of the user. While it’s mainly an illusion in a videogame, there is no choice or input from the viewer in a film; the ability to captivate the audience is necessarily more difficult as there isn’t the same potential for personal investment in a film like there is in a videogame. Tied to this is the idea that all forms of media are some attempt at the representation of conscious human thought (e.g. written language: somebody had to write it in such a way that somebody else can read it), and the extreme of this is the entrance into the individual’s mind. Videogames have the ability to provide this in a way that films can’t. First person shots can be the primary basis for a visual style in a film (the best exponent of this, I think is Jonathan Demme), even taking this to various extremes ( Being John Malkovich and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly are good examples), but the camera’s attempt at the subsumation of the individual’s perspective (thus experiences, and to a lesser extent, inner workings of the mind) is limited in a way that videogames are not. Granted most videogames don’t truly employ this power to explore the really interesting aspects of the videogame form of storytelling, but for ones that do (especially the ones who do so in such a way that makes them more… videogamatic [?]) the translation of that to the film screen doesn’t entirely work. Videogame critic Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw hints at this (as cited here) when he describes the footsteps, and the psychological toll it took on him before any action had yet taken place. While this is conceiveable for a film, the user’s participation makes it much more effective and investgative than would work in a film. For it to work in a film, the user has to choose to suspend disbelief and give themself to the film; the effect works so well in a videogame because it already has it.
Patrick
Much of what you say isn’t quite fair to the nature of videogames. I agree that in the current trends of popular videogames there is lots of unncessary violence, killing, and luridity. Isn’t that the case in movies today as well? Whether or not, the generalization that a videogame is presumably all about “moving your thumbs” or “[getting] golden coins” or that they “thrive on… violence” isn’t entirely true. Yes there are plenty of examples that show this to be true. However, (to use a favorite phrase), there are exemplary examples of videogames that are to the contrary. If you haven’t already heard of it, the videogame Myst is an example of interesting, non-patronizing, intelligent storytelling, one without any “golden coins” or “kinetic violence”.
However, you do raise an excellent point about the idea of gameplay and its translation to cinema; because the user controls the narrative flow, the story through which s/he is navigating is to a large extent secondary. Because content transcends style, a story can exist as a story whether or not it’s in a videogame, a film, or a book, etc… Which means that what a makes a great videogame great necessarily cannot directly translate to what would make the film great as well. What would make a good videogame would (like any form of media) be the employment of ideas and aspects that are inherently more “videogamatic,” especially when bound to the story. A great videogame (not something like Grand Theft Auto IV or Halo 3 both of which are meaninless violent spectacles [as are the vast majority of videogames]) is something that binds the gameplay style (i.e. how the user is able to progress in the game) with the content. Isn’t that definition (unity of style and narrative) something that is a qualifier for a great film?
As far as videogames and art, I think that it’s an open question, but has some parallels in the same question that was being asked of cinema anywhere from 100 to 50-60 years ago. If I may speak for all of you (I’m sorry if my following statement is a misrepresentaion), we all believe cinema can be art, an artform as it were. Pauline Kael, one of the most perceptive and influential film critics of all time, didn’t. She saw the cinema as only a vehicle for entertainment (but can be a dashing good one at that!). Unfortunately, I can’t single out a single videogame (as I myself am not a habitual player) that I could nominate for being true art in the same way The Rules of the Game,Last Year at Marienbad,Citizen Kane, or Memento are in my eyes, but I don’t think it’s fair to completely preclude it altogether.
Dusty B
The Forum doesn’t display the film that you chose and this thread is listed under, so you’re going to have to tell us what film it is for us to know.
As someone who is unfamiliar with the work of Bela Tarr, was this meant to be watched in a single viewing? Or, like say Out 1 was it meant to be seen in partitions?
While I can’t really say anything definitive (as my theoretical and practical film knowledge is much more limited than the average user’s), for me what stands out is its minor form of codification of various kinds of film grammar, style, and technique that had developed to 1941. That being said, little that Welles does is really anything new. Rather, in the words of Andrew Sarris in “You Ain’t Heard Nothin’ Yet” , it just wasn’t done so relentlessly. Renoir did deep focus (with more diegetic meaning and precise timing) in La Grande Illusion and especially The Rules of the Game and some of the best, most creative art direction goes all the way back to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari but Welles just came along and incorporated all of these elements into one big package (amply aided by the genius structural/writing mind of Herman J. Mankiewicz).
What makes it such a darling for enthusiasts, critics, and filmmakers is (to quote another critical heavyweight) that it’s a “shallow masterpiece”; it doesn’t demand the same sort of attention and repetition that say Last Year at Marienbad or The Rules of the Game (in my opinion) in order to discover its brilliance. Compounded upon this is that Welles doesn’t really hide especially deep meanings in the film, in favor of doing things that look really cool (at which he succeeds most admirably!), and he did them in a very unique and creative way. This approachability is what gives Citizen Kane a sort of unique ability to be seen as something really great without ever bothering the viewer with such stupid questions like “why?”: The reasons are all out there on the surface. The second component is that there is just so much technique (that, it should be added, is not for the sake of technique, but for narrative service) and visually and emotionally striking that it became the cultural standard film-to-rip-off. To be honest, I couldn’t enumerate the reasons why just that it was a confluence of things that ultimately weren’t the film on its own merits that elevate Citizen Kane to the level it has acquired.
[On a personal note: I myself would most likely prefer The Magnificent Ambersons which, while not as technically dazzling, has moments of really great direction that Citizen Kane doesn’t quite live up to {the whole ballroom sequence is brilliantly directed and photographed}, but I have reservations because of both its length and its scope; it has more meaning, yes, but I’m hesitant because there could be so much more to the film if we ever saw the entire thing].
Manohla Dargis – her taste is the closest to my own of all critics I read. Also beautifully caustic and scathing at times.
Andrew Sarris – master critical heavyweight.
A.O. Scott – perceptive and lucid prose.
David Denby – perceptive and always very funny.
Jonathan Rosenbaum – shares my enthusiasm for Dreyer
J. Hoberman – shares my enthusiasm for Mann
The Effect of Age on Skill or Talent? over 4 years ago
The question you ask reduces to, I think, “does a director lose ambition with age?” And that is a question without a complete answer.
For example, Luis Bunuel started out his career with the experimental film of L’Age D’Or, an interesting film in its own right, but it lacked the thematic aspirations and brilliance (at least in my own opinion) of say The Phantom of Liberty. L’Age D’Or was more of a wild, bravura-infused sort of film, that bravura being relinquished over time. Perhaps I should not have said “ambition” in my restatement of the question, rather my question might better be “does a director’s attitude and approach to film change over time?” or even “does a director relinquish flair of youth to later embrace the seriousness of control?” These are questions that still have no complete answer.
My attempt to answer them is thus: I am inclined to believe that a director loses raw talent that s/he had in youth, in exchange employing what the director as a person has learned (whether or not it’s about how to direct film).
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Seven Samurai Remake, anyone? over 4 years ago
1959 called, they want their rage back.
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Spike Lee over 4 years ago
I don’t like Spike Lee.
Not because I don’t think he has talent; not because I dislike the subject matter of his films; and certainly not because I’m racist.
I don’t like Spike Lee because he always feels the need to moralize and preach in his films, regardless of whether or not it fits. Take, for example, Inside Man which could have otherwise been a (for the most part) interesting crime/heist film, but instead that Spike Lee in all of his wisdom saw fit to tell us something that films for the past 60 years have: Nazis are BAD! It’s not that it completely destroyed the film, rather that it’s a testament to the man’s self-righteousness and need to evince that in all of his works.
And above all, I think this clouds what Spike (should) really wants to do: For someone who dislikes prejudice, he calls attention it, and the issue of race so often. The ultimate reason I don’t like Spike Lee is that he’s done more to fan the flames of racial hatred than he really has to ameliorate it, and whether or not it’s intentional, I find it to be hypocritical.
But hey, that could all just be me. Maybe I’m the hypocrite, and (I’m being serious when I say this) it could just be me who’s the man who can’t see past the issue. And maybe Spike really has done more than I give him credit for to help people be more color blind. In either case, approach my post, like you should approach Spike Lee, with a TON of salt.
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Slow MOTION in films. over 4 years ago
The shot of Jeffrey Wigand (Russell Crowe) leaving the office in The Insider.
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Slow MOTION in films. over 4 years ago
I read that without the slow motion, Watchmen will actually be roughly 17 minutes long.
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Who Was/Is The Most Beautiful Film Actor Ever? over 4 years ago
To answer JP Belmondo:
Vincent Price.
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Crispin Glover, really? over 4 years ago
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALapHYNSmoA
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Coming soon... over 4 years ago
Public Enemies by Michael Mann
Duplicity by Tony Gilroy
There’s a third, but I can’t recall.
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MOVIES ABOUT HITMEN over 4 years ago
As a fan of Michael Mann, Collateral is a great film on the subject, albeit one that doesn’t explore the solitude inherent to profession. However, it prods the nature of the hitman in a more dramatic way than Le Samourai, both of which make a point of the observation that the hitman must inherently have sociopathic tendencies (in the case of Le Samourai the character of Jef Costello being a schizophrenic).
Also Ghost Dog is a character study more along the lines of Le Samourai albeit with less of a criminal and overtly existentialist bite.
Go to Comment
screenplays over 4 years ago
I do.
I usually show them to a few friends, not usually with the intention of doing anything with them. They are/would be interesting curios for a personal reassessment of style and content. I don’t storyboard as I don’t have the gift, but I try to be aware of the shots that I think would be ideal for any one place in the film.
Unless you are averse, would you be willing to share the loglines of your would-be screenplays? [Or perhaps sending a private message? Any sort of other creative direction/opinion I find useful to myself as it forces me to reassess my own perspective]
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Best Adapted Screenplay 2008 over 4 years ago
Best SPAM STOP THIS
sage
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I need help over 4 years ago
Press the button ONCE. And then WAIT.
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MOVIES ABOUT HITMEN over 4 years ago
Joe
Oh, I agree with your point that there is the reference to the hitman character in Collateral does to a certain extent explore the nature of his solitude; the dramatic crux of the film hinges on that character’s essential loneliness. However, the film’s main preoccupation is in two things about the hitman: his doing his job (which includes police evasion in addition to killing people), and his interaction with others. The majority of time is spent with the hitman and someone else onscreen. It references the solitude, yes, but doesn’t directly explore it as say, Le Samourai does.
Go to Comment
Just a treat for V-Day. over 4 years ago
Posting in awesome thread.
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The ending of Order (spoilers) over 4 years ago
While the ending seems to be a marked change to supernaturalism from the drained realism that had come before it, that assessment is not complete upon closer inspection. By the use of abstraction through minimalism, sustained single shots, and the directly religious/spiritual dialogue, Dreyer is not working in realism. He uses these elements to create a “creepy and ominous” tone, but this could also be interpreted as the presence of something, something that cannot be seen, felt, or identified. It is through this that Dreyer is showing his mastery: he is suggesting God.
What makes the ending work is that God is always present, but nobody allows Him to work in their lives, except for two characters: Peter and Morten both claim to be men of the cloth, but are both ultimately ungodly men, each as intolerant as the other; if God is Love, Anders and Anne are kept from it by institutions beyond their control; and Mikkel has no professed faith at all. The two figures who do let God work in their lives the the two most central to the film: Inger and Johannes. Johannes, odd as he may be, is one representation of God in the lives of these people: he (like God is, really) is constantly reminding those around him to place trust of themselves in God, but nobody listens. Inger is herself a figure of God, also Christlike. As Peter and Morten are two men who claim to be of God, but really aren’t, so are Inger and Johannes not claiming to be of God (indeed the latter claims to be ), but really are. On the same day both Johannes and Inger leave to places “wither [they] go [others] cannot come”, and both return on the same day, each resurrected in their own way.
What bridges Johannes and Inger directly is Inger’s older daughter Maren. She is a loving daughter to her mother, and the only person to truly take Johannes at his word. A child herself, she practices the instruction of Paul in Ephesians 5:1 by being “a [follower] of God, as [a] dear [child]”. It is her childlike Faith that frees her to ask Johannes (who is now, no longer “crazy”) can invoke God to bring her mother back to life. Dreyer (like the Apostles) is saying that raw, unblinded belief is the only kind of faith that can unchain the goodness of Christianity. He is saying that the rigidity of each sect (be it one way or the other) is the ultimate barrier of faith, more than the aetheism of Mikkel or the doctor. Dreyer’s attitude seems directly lifted from Matthew 7:16 :“Beware of false prophets…”
I myself was deeply affected by this film (as you can see), because I myself am a Christian, and if I sound pretentious or self-important, I apologize; it is the result of how personal my perspective is on this film. The ideas Dreyer posits on what the Faith should be are nothing new, but things which, over time, have found themselves divorced from what the Faith is on earth. Most criticism I have read consider Robert Bresson the most spiritual filmmaker, including David Thomson. I myself feel that, on the merit of this film alone, that distinction belongs to Carl Theodor Dreyer.
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What Film Are You Most Looking Forward To In 2009? over 4 years ago
Public Enemies by Michael Mann
Duplicity by Tony Gilroy
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Other films in need of Criterion? over 4 years ago
Menilmontant and any other works by Kirsanoff
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Metropolis or Blade Runner. over 4 years ago
Blade Runner
Metropolis is seminal and brilliant, but it’s the noir-infused milieu that makes me prefer to see Blade Runner.
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Greatest movie villain. over 4 years ago
http://www.theauteurs.com/topics/786/comments
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Mindfuck Films over 4 years ago
Missing Last Year at Marienbad.
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What Film Are You Most Looking Forward To In 2009? over 4 years ago
A stage musical (a ______ musical! ) travesty of 8 1/2 is bad enough, but to make it a film?
Edit: Yes Jake, it bothers me. It bothers me in more than one way….
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Why don't videogame adaptations ever work? over 4 years ago
To direct the discussion towards a general attempt at why a videogame film usually won’t work…
On the primary level, the usual trend is such that films adapted from videogames are usually helmed by people who have never played said videogame, in addition to usually being hacks. Far be it for a mere commentator like myself to say, but Andrzej Bartkowiak, Paul W.S. Anderson, Alexander Witt, or Russell Mulcahy never has and never will make a good film (if it it happens, it will be by accident). Usually it’s producers attempting to make buckets of money by cashing in on mental real estate usually held by males aged 18-25.
On a second (more theoretical, as a good videogame adaptation has not yet been made) level, a translation from the medium of videogames to film results in a high loss for the active involvement of the user. While it’s mainly an illusion in a videogame, there is no choice or input from the viewer in a film; the ability to captivate the audience is necessarily more difficult as there isn’t the same potential for personal investment in a film like there is in a videogame. Tied to this is the idea that all forms of media are some attempt at the representation of conscious human thought (e.g. written language: somebody had to write it in such a way that somebody else can read it), and the extreme of this is the entrance into the individual’s mind. Videogames have the ability to provide this in a way that films can’t. First person shots can be the primary basis for a visual style in a film (the best exponent of this, I think is Jonathan Demme), even taking this to various extremes ( Being John Malkovich and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly are good examples), but the camera’s attempt at the subsumation of the individual’s perspective (thus experiences, and to a lesser extent, inner workings of the mind) is limited in a way that videogames are not. Granted most videogames don’t truly employ this power to explore the really interesting aspects of the videogame form of storytelling, but for ones that do (especially the ones who do so in such a way that makes them more… videogamatic [?]) the translation of that to the film screen doesn’t entirely work. Videogame critic Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw hints at this (as cited here) when he describes the footsteps, and the psychological toll it took on him before any action had yet taken place. While this is conceiveable for a film, the user’s participation makes it much more effective and investgative than would work in a film. For it to work in a film, the user has to choose to suspend disbelief and give themself to the film; the effect works so well in a videogame because it already has it.
Go to Comment
Why don't videogame adaptations ever work? over 4 years ago
Patrick
Much of what you say isn’t quite fair to the nature of videogames. I agree that in the current trends of popular videogames there is lots of unncessary violence, killing, and luridity. Isn’t that the case in movies today as well? Whether or not, the generalization that a videogame is presumably all about “moving your thumbs” or “[getting] golden coins” or that they “thrive on… violence” isn’t entirely true. Yes there are plenty of examples that show this to be true. However, (to use a favorite phrase), there are exemplary examples of videogames that are to the contrary. If you haven’t already heard of it, the videogame Myst is an example of interesting, non-patronizing, intelligent storytelling, one without any “golden coins” or “kinetic violence”.
However, you do raise an excellent point about the idea of gameplay and its translation to cinema; because the user controls the narrative flow, the story through which s/he is navigating is to a large extent secondary. Because content transcends style, a story can exist as a story whether or not it’s in a videogame, a film, or a book, etc… Which means that what a makes a great videogame great necessarily cannot directly translate to what would make the film great as well. What would make a good videogame would (like any form of media) be the employment of ideas and aspects that are inherently more “videogamatic,” especially when bound to the story. A great videogame (not something like Grand Theft Auto IV or Halo 3 both of which are meaninless violent spectacles [as are the vast majority of videogames]) is something that binds the gameplay style (i.e. how the user is able to progress in the game) with the content. Isn’t that definition (unity of style and narrative) something that is a qualifier for a great film?
As far as videogames and art, I think that it’s an open question, but has some parallels in the same question that was being asked of cinema anywhere from 100 to 50-60 years ago. If I may speak for all of you (I’m sorry if my following statement is a misrepresentaion), we all believe cinema can be art, an artform as it were. Pauline Kael, one of the most perceptive and influential film critics of all time, didn’t. She saw the cinema as only a vehicle for entertainment (but can be a dashing good one at that!). Unfortunately, I can’t single out a single videogame (as I myself am not a habitual player) that I could nominate for being true art in the same way The Rules of the Game, Last Year at Marienbad, Citizen Kane, or Memento are in my eyes, but I don’t think it’s fair to completely preclude it altogether.
Go to Comment
Greatest Movie of All Time over 4 years ago
Dusty B
The Forum doesn’t display the film that you chose and this thread is listed under, so you’re going to have to tell us what film it is for us to know.
Go to Comment
Greatest Movie of All Time over 4 years ago
As someone who is unfamiliar with the work of Bela Tarr, was this meant to be watched in a single viewing? Or, like say Out 1 was it meant to be seen in partitions?
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Your favorite title sequence over 4 years ago
Last Year at Marienbad
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Favorite score? about 4 years ago
Heat by Elliot Goldenthal
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Favorite Cinematographer about 4 years ago
Dante Spinotti.
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IS CITIZEN KANE THE GREATEST MOVIE EVER MADE OR JUST THE BEST HYPED? about 4 years ago
While I can’t really say anything definitive (as my theoretical and practical film knowledge is much more limited than the average user’s), for me what stands out is its minor form of codification of various kinds of film grammar, style, and technique that had developed to 1941. That being said, little that Welles does is really anything new. Rather, in the words of Andrew Sarris in “You Ain’t Heard Nothin’ Yet” , it just wasn’t done so relentlessly. Renoir did deep focus (with more diegetic meaning and precise timing) in La Grande Illusion and especially The Rules of the Game and some of the best, most creative art direction goes all the way back to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari but Welles just came along and incorporated all of these elements into one big package (amply aided by the genius structural/writing mind of Herman J. Mankiewicz).
What makes it such a darling for enthusiasts, critics, and filmmakers is (to quote another critical heavyweight) that it’s a “shallow masterpiece”; it doesn’t demand the same sort of attention and repetition that say Last Year at Marienbad or The Rules of the Game (in my opinion) in order to discover its brilliance. Compounded upon this is that Welles doesn’t really hide especially deep meanings in the film, in favor of doing things that look really cool (at which he succeeds most admirably!), and he did them in a very unique and creative way. This approachability is what gives Citizen Kane a sort of unique ability to be seen as something really great without ever bothering the viewer with such stupid questions like “why?”: The reasons are all out there on the surface. The second component is that there is just so much technique (that, it should be added, is not for the sake of technique, but for narrative service) and visually and emotionally striking that it became the cultural standard film-to-rip-off. To be honest, I couldn’t enumerate the reasons why just that it was a confluence of things that ultimately weren’t the film on its own merits that elevate Citizen Kane to the level it has acquired.
[On a personal note: I myself would most likely prefer The Magnificent Ambersons which, while not as technically dazzling, has moments of really great direction that Citizen Kane doesn’t quite live up to {the whole ballroom sequence is brilliantly directed and photographed}, but I have reservations because of both its length and its scope; it has more meaning, yes, but I’m hesitant because there could be so much more to the film if we ever saw the entire thing].
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Film critics about 4 years ago
Manohla Dargis – her taste is the closest to my own of all critics I read. Also beautifully caustic and scathing at times.
Andrew Sarris – master critical heavyweight.
A.O. Scott – perceptive and lucid prose.
David Denby – perceptive and always very funny.
Jonathan Rosenbaum – shares my enthusiasm for Dreyer
J. Hoberman – shares my enthusiasm for Mann
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