I think it’s all exaggerated. I’m 24, my friends all know who James Dean is. I think everyone has different taste and that’s fine, but know the big names should be a given. It’s like not knowing her Marilyn Monroe is. It’s not that someone needs to have gone and seen all her movies and be able to argue whether or not she was any good or just a pretty face who died young. But to think that you would believe that this entire generation wouldn’t even know the name of James Dean seems a little off.
Most of the people I know have never heard of
Clint Eastwood
John Ford
JAMES DEAN
Roman Polanski
Lee Marvin
“Chinatown”
“The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”
“the Searchers”
“Dirty Harry”
Buster Keaton
anything related to Buster Keaton
The Marx Brothers
anything related to the Marx Brothers
“The Shining”
Stanley Kubrick
Peter Weir
Peter Sellers
Monty Python
anything related to Monty Python
Errol Morris
“Soylent Green”
“the Third Man”
“Eraserhead”
John Woo
anything related to John Woo
“Apocalypse Now”
MARTIN SCORSESE
anything related to Martin Scorsese
lots of things related to Robert De Niro
Robert Redford
Warren Beatty
I feel your disappointment, Drew.
hey your right about the younger generation they are the reason that all of these go unnoticed and will dissapear
i am 16 years old and when i talk with my friends about movies all they know about are recent films that are remakes on films that did not need to be remade but they dont know they are remakes
the dont know the people everyone should like:
Clint Eastwood
John Wayne
etc.
kinda makes me sad that these films are geting noses turnd up to
I believe you Corey, but I am astounded that they don’t at least know who Clint Eastwood is.
We have to educate our peers and fellow men; we all must become teachers. It’s the burden of knowledge. Sometimes it’s too much and you just want to say Fuck it, and a lot of times they will shrug you off. But I do believe that we are here to teach each other especially if we care enough to get outraged by the ignorance in the first place.
Look at it as a good thing, that you can show them movies with people they don’t know. Somehow, your heroes were introduced to you in a way so take advantage of that and YOU be the one to show them all of the films you like. If they end up not digging it, then fine, let it go. You can’t really fault someone for their tastes. Even if you think they have “bad taste” in film/arts/whatever, they are who they are and all you can do is try to help expose them to films that you think they would like.
And try not to classify “the majority of a younger generation”, it may just be where you live at. I stay in Nashville and most of the people my age are into classic foriegn films along with other great pieces of art. These people do exist out there, it’s just a matter of meeting them. See if there is a classic film meetup group in your area (at meetups.com). You may be able to talk to some people there.
In my life I try yo be optimistic..but in situations like these I give up…A film can change your way of living…And a good director gives you perspectives that you couldn’t even imagine.Today it is too easy to get lost in translation but there are always and everywhere people who can appreciate a good movie..If I meet someone who doesn;t know Bergman it’s OK I move on .It is sad I know but every other way hurts… I study at school of fine arts and every time I paint something that is inspired from a film or a great director they think of me as crazy…and they like to be called artists…figure out..! I’m glad though to know that there are people all over the world feeligg exactly just like me…
Well, of course younger people are bound to be caught up more with things from their own generation, and obsession with current celebrity and pop culture are hardly new, but i do think there has been a dumbing down of the media. So many “channels of shit on the TV to choose from”, so much information available with the internet, but it seems to be too often going to waste. So many quiz programmes but these hardly represent a great increase in general knowledge. As a simple example of dumbing down:in the UK, the BBC used to show “foreign language” films quite often on its terrestrial channels- a time when there was only BBC1, 2, ITV and Channel 4, and no satellite. But i used to think the number was far too small, and pressed the beeb for more. Channel 4 was good too, i remember when Channel 4 started in the early 80s and they had whole season of things Japanese including classic films- such as the epic Human condition. Now that all appears a relative cultural paradise. The (relative) heyday really came to an end with the season of 100 classic films in 1995 to celebrate the centenary of cinema; this season included lots of the world cinema classics, (Mizoguchi represented by The Life of Oharu). On the Beeb’s flagship Film programme the presenter Barry Norman was replaced by the entertainer Jonathon Ross, whose very first programme, on the Oscars, included howler errors which showed both his ignorance and unwillingness to do his homework properly. He may have built up experience since but world cinema barely gets a mention; coverage of Cannes is all about Anglo-American films and stars, and often the “foreign” winner is ignored.
All power to young people with open minds, an interest in the wider world- if only there were more (and among moaning old fogeys like me, too)
A lot of this is due to the destructive hegemony of pop music’s control of the culture. Pop culture is “product”. It is also a wasteland.
There was a time when film could be transformative, absolutely. But that’s pretty much gone.
I remember as a young teenager PBS aired a series of films. Real eclectic mix, “Ivan the Terrible”, “M”, “Our Daily Bread”, “La Jetee”, “Rashomon”, “Jules and Jim” and several others. It was a revelation.
Now we have largely ceded film to CGI and attention deficit disorder editing. It’s true of the arts in general in America. It’s just a business.
The Harvard Film Archives is screening “Cleo from 5 to 7” this weekend and Agnes Varda will be in attendance. I guarantee its going to be an older crowd and that’s really unfortunate.
Attention deficit disorder editing; you hit the nail on the head there- it drives me mad. Even the should-be simplest scene has to be cut up from all angles for ever shorter bursts, and for no real reason except riveting “pacing” to keep viewers bred on pop videos and 30 sec adverts from nodding off. David Bordwell is the best authority on Hollywood’s “intensified continuity” (a polite term)- The Way Hollywood Tells It, and Figures Traced in Light (the latter concentrates on 4 genuine masters of staging). But it seems to just keep getting worse, this rollercoaster fairground obsession.
I think your sadly mistaken. I’m 19 going on 20 and when I was in my high school film class everyone had there own taste in the movies they liked. Some liked the action packed Hollywood faire while others opted for the quieter more thoughtful american and foreign independents. They always had extremely good reasons for why they liked those types of movies. I think your really selling the younger set short. We were never around to here about these films and in this society that stresses moving forward the children never seem to look back. I agree its unfortunate, but thats the way things happen, things will be forgotten and you have to suck it up. I also find it kind of offensive that you think this way about our generation. I think your exagerrating a little too much.
Corey: Where do you go to school? No one knows Who Clint Eastwood is?! thats a little to oblivious to be true.
Well, of course there are different tastes but the average number of shots per film has certainly intensified.
Its’ all style. It may drive you crazy but its a style, Scorsese employs that technique.
If there’s a sensible purpose behind the style fine- i admire Eisenstein- but often there simply isn’t. That is probably more a judgment on the Hollywood money-making machine than the yoiunger generation, but i suppose as with so many things in capitalist consumer societies do we get what we deserve (or are we fed what those in power expect us to want?)
good point.
Aside from this relentless pacing in so many films, and in defence of the younger generation: it wasn’t today’s youngsters who’ve brought the world to the point of economic and environmental collapse- although they may often seem or are accused of being a touch more materialistic and lacking the political idealism of previous times (this is not a given), that would be the result of the dominant ideology of selfish free-market laissez-faire capitalism that’s held sway since the beginning of the 80s in most of the West. And look at how so many people once filled with youthful idealism and rebellion have over the years ended up becoming part of the very establishment and its exploitation that they once opposed. Then attribute it to maturing! We (relatively) older folks can hardly complain of youth when the faults, real or imagined, have been of our own making.
Let’s start by saying J Dean was a voice of another time. He really was not a good actor to begin with. I say so what if they don’t know who was. I’d be more worried if they can’t name the last five presidents.
i agree with Kenji about who started it, but i look at my generation (x? y?..Mtv? whatever) and the choices we made in popular culture and art, which shapes alot of young peoples ideas and culture. when i was going through adolescence, we had an explosion of Indepdendent Films and Mtv was playing Public Enemy, Nirvana, and we had a saxaphone playing President. Kids in high school were going to see movies like Trainspotting and Pulp Fiction. whether you like those examples or not, compare them to what we have now…Teen-Scream movies and Sex comedies. Yin Yang Twins and The Jonas Brothers, and we just got out of eight years of “Duh-bya”. we made our choices on what albums to buy, what movies to see, and what President to vote for (those of us who did vote). anyone who is in between the age of 26 and 35: WE GOT LAZY as a generation. i mean shit, Larry the Cable Guy is being roasted by Comedy Central…HOW THE HELL DOES THAT HAPPEN? i mean, what’s next? Dane Cook getting a talk show? who thinks thses people are funny? lots of people, and that’s part of the problem. no one wants to sit through anything or figure anything out. if it doesn’t smack you in the face, whose got time for it? people would rather look good (relatively) than be good. they’d rather be right than smart.
Godard started using jump-cuts to edit his films, and now if a movie doesn’t OVER-use it, it won’t make any money. when the revolution becomes the mainstream, everyone gets bored and makes things too easy. quite simply, its about money. we choose what to buy, so we can only blame society or the system so much before we have to start looking in the mirror.
i work with alot of teenagers at the resaurtant i manage (i’m 28, they’re pretty much all between 17-19) and though i sometimes get a kick out of making fun of their youthful ignorance, i know sometimes its painful for both of us. they see me as an asshole who thinks he’s better than them, and i see them as blissfully ignorant and don’t see the joy in trying or learning new things. if anything, i’m distancing myself from them and they’ll never care to catch up. oops…its a lose-lose situation.
I’m not inclined to believe this kind of observation at all. I’m 21 and I know many people even younger than me who are as knowledgeable and cultured as you can expect anyone of a limited lifespan to be (and often moreso). I’ve lived all around the world, spoken to all kinds of people and the only thing I’ve learnt is that Theodore Sturgeon was insightful beyond words. If 90% of everything is crud, then you can refine that to a more human-orientated formula that specifies 90% of people are ignorant and/or stupid.
In more serious, less aphoristic way of putting it, a large fraction of any given demographic is always going to exhibit these kinds of aspects. And besides, we measure culture and knowledge in different ways. You might stumble across a music geek one day who doesn’t know who Godard is and go straight home and sound off about it on your favourite forum, then change your Facebook status to reflect your diminishing faith in the human race. Meanwhile, he goes home and blogs about some philistine he met who didn’t know who Verdi was and who thought “Bach and Son” referred to an accountancy firm.
It depresses me when Americans go on about how stupid everyone in their country is. Here’s a clue: the rest of the world is pretty stupid, too; we just don’t realise it because they’re being idiots in other languages.
meh, double post.
What’s even sadder is I met an English teacher who couldn’t name one Steinbeck novel.
“It depresses me when Americans go on about how stupid everyone in their country is. Here’s a clue: the rest of the world is pretty stupid, too; we just don’t realise it because they’re being idiots in other languages.”
LOL…that was awesome Deej…i love it.
i guess i am too cynical. and i don’t know much about the rest of the world, other than what i see in films. i guess what bugs me is that America is supposed to be the greatest country in the world, and people here are taking that for granted so much. we should have more educated people, but when i see so many people who have money and oppurtunity CHOOSE ignorance and stupidity because they can get along fine without it, it angers me. but then, i haven’t done much with my life in spite of my oppurtunities, so i have to admit that apart of it might just be that i’m angry at myself and hate when i see other, younger people making idiotic decisions, or just not use their heads at all.
>>Let’s start by saying J Dean was a voice of another time. He really was not a good actor to begin with. I say so what if they don’t know who was. I’d be more worried if they can’t name the last five presidents.<<
Excellent point. Being ignorant of history is worse than being uniformed about old movies.
And Robert, since I anticipate you might get shit forthat statement about Dean I’ll take some of the heat by noting that he made only 3 films – none of them very good.
>>What’s even sadder is I met an English teacher who couldn’t name one Steinbeck novel.<,
Now, THAT is tragic.
geez, how many kids in the ‘50s knew much of anything about popular culture around the turn of the century? We are talking a half century of time here, and could nearly fit 3 generations in the gap. I don’t think this is tragic at all. And remember, not 100% of the general population are cinemaphiliacs like us.
Prudence—they should be ;-)
Prudence nailed it, and no Marq they shouldn’t be….
Prudence is right, but it’s frustrating when no one knows what you’re talking about. I can’t talk about movies with anyone at school except for my French teacher, but she doesn’t always know the movies I’ve watched. I’m 16 and I always say my generation is wasted. The other day I was talking to my friend about our skits for French, and he was doing his based on Psycho. He only knows the remake, he’s never even heard of Hitchcock! I almost died. My generation is pretty ignorant and it’s sad.
@Eggman: I know a lot of people who don’t know most of the people on your list. They do know Clint Eastwood but that’s only because of Gran Torino.
at 16 Nessa, you shouldn’t feel to bad. Im out of college and still fin this problem with most everyone I meet.
I think it’s where you live that matters. I live in San Antonio and it doesn’t matter if I find someone 15 or 50 they still may not know who James Dean is, no joke. Film isn’t even in the equation here, no one cares about any film other than the biggest film of the moment (this week Watchmen, next week I Love You, Man, week after that who knows, but peoples memory is never over a few weeks). I could drive up to Austin, though, and just 45 minutes away (with good traffic) I could be talking about Kurosawa, and Godard, and (if I’m lucky) Bela Tarr, and Ozu with sixteen year olds who know as much, if not more, than I do. It’s not a matter of age, it’s a matter of where you’ve grown up, and what the people around you care about. If no one around you cares about great film then, more than likely, neither do you, but if you’ve grown up in a situation that fosters intellectual thought, and interest in all form of art, then you’ll genuinely care about those things.
Popular music was the healthiest it has ever been in this country and kids were all listening to the same variety. Broadcasting wasn’t as segregated as it is now.
In film it seemed that everyone but America was having a “new wave” while Hollywood was stuck trying to figure out how to compete with television.
It just seems pretty empty now. For me the nadir comes when Tarantino is held up as a great director.
This generation seems to be a victim of comfort. I just don’t get the feeling they think this is a rut.
cinemisfit
I don’t know. I’m 25. I still don’t really give a sh*t about anything. But I can (and always have) been able to appreciate great film. I’d say not so much in spite of not giving a sh*t, but rather because of it. It gives me something to care about beyond mundane pointlessness of daily existence, hormones or not. A bigger issue for me when young, was that I simply didn’t have enough exposure to what made film great art, and not mere entertainment. A lot has changed in the past 10-12 years, for better and worse. The internet is now mainstream, opening a whirlwind of info. Too much info, likely. It’d be hard not to drown in it all if you don’t get some focus, someone or thing to guide you to the good stuff. I don’t know where younger people are going to get that. I had a creative writing teacher help me out here immensely when I was 17.