teenagers and movies
oy
Half the kids I try to talk about taxi driver with say “Oh you mean the one with Queen Latifah. The ending isn’t violent in that.”
LOL this has happened to me about 7 or 8 times. :D
No not all teenagers, just a lot. Same thing with people of all ages.
Oh and please don’t use the word retarded in that way.
They know other things that you may not know about. Not everyone chows down on film all day.
It ain’t just the teenagers. Ask the average non-movie buff in their 30’s who Robert Altman is and you’ll get a blank stare.
It’s a matter of exposure, which sometimes ranges in different areas/schools. I’ve met plenty of well-exposed (generally) people at my high school, yet I was in a school of about 3,600 kids, a lot of whom were pretty liberal. It was close by major metropolitan areas (30 minutes from Philadelphia, and an hour from New York City), meaning that culture wasn’t limited to television exposure. I’m not saying that this applies to all well-populated areas, but I think general access to cultural centers has a bit to do with it.
Yes, many teens do have limited liking when it comes to movies, but, as Brad pointed out, so do many, many others. Like my Dad. I love the guy, but man, he loves his Steven Segal. :(
Savvy
I guess it’s not just movies, alot of teenagers don’t know about culture in general. I mean people at my school don’t even know who thomas edison was.
Moderated
I think it depends on the person. A lot of people aren’t as exposed to culture as they should be, which is ridiculous considering how much information is readily available through books or the Internet.
I do think it’s a problem, partly the fault of the mainstream media. I can’t talk to anyone in school about movies!
Nadia said it all really. but your also forgetting our driving force, “Capitalism”.
Drew humbly requested:
“Oh and please don’t use the word retarded in that way.”
Well…it’s how you say…“linguistically correct.”
Thanks, Coach McGrath.
Dequinix stated:
“They know other things that you may not know about. Not everyone chows down on film all day.”
I seriously doubt the cultural capacity and social skills of ANYBODY who would bother with Queen Latifah vehicles such as “Taxi” these days (Ha! Get it? “Taxi”…vehicle? Thank you, I’ll be here all week). I saw her in “House Party 2”…or was it “3”? That was enough.
Zachary:
Does your father own Steven’s music and list “On Deadly Ground” as a favourite film?
Nadia:
I was exposed to the same “mainstream media” as anyone else, but for some reason, I turned out differently from many others. Having a pair of Hoffman lenses helped…
Also, I decided to just put on the damn glasses without enduring extreme brutality from an angry Scottish-Canadian wrestler. It was easier that way.
Mark, it doesn’t necessarily have to do with cultural capacity. All people live their lives in some different manner, and not everyone is seeking cultural or intellectual fulfillment. Those who don’t know much about film may know more about sports or dance or chemistry. Judging anyone, much less a whole age group, for their inability to name Taxi Driver or Robert Altman is as ignorant on our part as we may assume them to be. (This comment is a bit more generalized based on the theme of this thread, not just your post.)
HEY!
I’m a teenager and I have at least half-way respectable tastes in film!
don’t believe me?
check my favorite films
I agree, not all teenagers are like that. I may not be an expert on movies, but i know quite a few. hahaha although i have to admit, it’s really hard finding people who like classic cinema, (I imitated Dr. Strangelove once and no one got it but the teacher )
you should also realize that your average high school doesn’t exactly teach Kubrick and Hitchcock as a need to know thing. generally , i think, people become more cultured in college, if they choose to go.
“Culture is the rule and art is the exception… The rule is to want the death of the exception.”
Dequinix, I agree with what you’re saying in essence. Honestly, if someone’s not interested in films, I won’t bust their chops over not knowing Robert Altman from Robert Aldrich. However, I don’t want anybody telling me Queen Latifah is some sort of brilliant actress and role model. She’s just a big fat sellout, period. Let’s keep some perspective here.
I guess it all depends on what you’re exposed to. And don’t forget that we teenagers haven’t been around long and are still mentally developing, we have a long way to go even when it comes to general knowledge :-/ A teacher I had once tried to start a film analysis class, but I think the board rejected it because they thought it was more so college material.
But yeah, I’m in high school and I can never talk to anybody about films D:
I grew up exposed to Adam Sandler, Some how I went from that to François Truffaut in about ten years, so maybe it’s not exposure. Screw trying to talk with my friends about the 400 blows, last time I talked about kubrick they couldn’t stop talking about potential porn titles. (A Cockwork Orange)
I would guess that the odds are in favor of Edwin N having better taste in film than anyone else in this thread.
Mark, no disagreement there. Everyone is allowed to have their opinions, but I tend to recommend films to others who are more well-versed in mainstream fare instead of writing them off as ignorant or uneducated. Everyone has to start somewhere, and if we know more about the world of cinema than them, we can surely help.
I know plenty of highly intelligent people who have what I consider to be poor taste in film. The issue I believe is that many of them do not take film as a serious art form. Thus, they only perceive films as entertainment and nothing more.
The film as entertainment dilemma applies to the younger people I know who are highly intelligent whereas intelligent people of older generations have a tendency to rely on oscar buzz for determining what to watch. Also, to them a good film consists of a great well-acted story but not much else.
This does not apply to everyone of course but to many people I know.
I think good movies requires a goog taste plus mature people.Most of the teens aren’t mature enough.At least me, I was into movies first when I was 18.
Well, sure people who don’t know stuff about film may be experts in other fields of knowledge, them being teenagers or not. I for example (hell, no, I have not been a teenager for a long time!) know absolutely nothing about the economy or about sports (which would be soccer here in Germany). But then, I simply do not watch soccer games and do not read the sports section in the paper. But teenagers go to the movies all the time, so they must have some curiosity for films, no? With this in mind, one might considder it odd that there is so little desire to dig deeper into the stuff beyond the blockbusters your regular cinema chain chooses to offer the kids. Sure, beeing knowledgeable about something is easier when you are older. But, I mean, if a teenager is into soccer (or baseball or whatever) he sure as hell has an opinion, and a founded one, too, about anything from tactics to history to the skillfulness of certain players. But movies he/she just watches?
Why is it that film art is neglected and just taken as superfluous entertainment nowadays?
^ MODERATE IT! MODERATE IT!
I am a teenager ¬¬
But it’s true, the youngest film buff I know that’s not myself is 19 years old; Transformers and Twilight sucked the souls from millions of poor young boys. What a shame..
“Also, to them a good film consists of a great well-acted story but not much else.”
Not only for teenagers, most film critics base their ratings and reviews on achievements of the movie on film festivals and not on artistic achievements. I wonder if they do that so the most of the people don’t feel cheated when they see a wonderfully directed movie, with a great script and cinematography and no gunshots or sex scenes that had a good rating on the newpaper, or because they cannot appreciate these things on film.
Erik Villasenor
is it just me, or are teenagers retarded when it comes to movies? Half the kids I try to talk about taxi driver with say “Oh you mean the one with Queen Latifah. The ending isn’t violent in that.”