On the one hand I’m with Glemaud and have a boundless faith in the generality of humanity, but on the other hand, in a selfish way I’m with Drew. Sometimes, hearing young people talk film (as I assume was the original situation) I struggle not to think I’m going to see fewer and fewer film makers who can inspire me. That’s where my faith is challenged. Ah well. For fifty years everyone wanted to be a rock star. Picking up a guitar or a microphone was cheap and easy. But as we can see there aren’t millions of music artists. And here at the end of pop music history there are – from around the world – maybe, what, thirty truly influential artists? That youthful dream has been replaced by the cheapness and ease with which one can make a movie. Now, everybody wants to be a director. I have to accept the fact that I’m not going to see countless auteurs out there. James Dean was already long dead when I was a baby-stepping film maker in the eighties but my civilian friends all knew who he was. However, none of them knew who William Wellman was. And while they all knew the name Mary Pickford, none of them could have identified her from a photograph. It never bothered me. When is the cut-off date for pop-cult awareness? Is it stuff everyone is supposed to know or stuff only you know that everyone is supposed to know? And never mind your friends. What about your film directors? Young directors like Godard (back in the day) and Paul Thomas Anderson (now, sort of) were thirtyish when they bent and stretched the rules of cinema. But Jean Luc had an awareness of people and politics and life and history that added levels. Anderson’s movies are about as thin as tissue. Isn’t that another side of your coin? “My friends don’t want to know more than they need. Most of my film directors don’t want to know more than they need.” But then, maybe we’re talking about a very specific, very small, very parochial group of North American young. Because there are kids and film makers from elsewhere who are the gang you could have faith in. So once again we find ourselves at the fringe of the discussion about Industrial culture. Better to let it go and not act old before your time. I’m guessing that attitude is what allows Eric Rohmer (you know him, right? He’s old.) to make astonishing movies.
My two cents?
Back in the 1950s when the American critical establishment ignored HItchcock and the makers of Westerns, the Cahiers gang was rating them highly. Time has proven that one of the groups was wrong. And that they were both right. In the 1960s Andrew Sarris had a Less Than Meets The Eye category. John Huston is in it. he shouldn’t have been in it. He should have been in it. I believe ratings lists of directors (of any kind) say more about the times and the culture and the people writing the lists.
My two cents?
Back in the 1950s when the American critical establishment ignored HItchcock and the makers of Westerns, the Cahiers gang was rating them highly. Time has proven that one of the groups was wrong. And that they were both right. In the 1960s Andrew Sarris had a Less Than Meets The Eye category. John Huston is in it. he shouldn’t have been in it. He should have been in it. I believe ratings lists of directors (of any kind) say more about the times and the culture and the people writing the lists.
I’ll always remember Anthony Lane’s review about “Lady and the The Duke”, written when it was released against “Star Wars: Attack of the Clones”: I never thought I’d ever write that the new Eric Rohmer movie just came out and has more and better special effects than the new Star Wars (paraphrased).
Lane’s wit extoles and makes clear Rohmer’s art, craft, longevity and place in the order of all things cinema. It also makes clear that guys like ER and their work pretty well crush most movies.
And ER took part of his name from Sax Rohmer! If that isn’t proof that every art house film-maker is a grindhouse film-maker at heart, then nothing is.
Whenever I am working and start to feel scared by the task ahead, there are a few names and faces I conjure to keep me moving forward. Eric Rohmer is one of them.
I have lost faith in the majority of the younger generation. over 2 years ago
On the one hand I’m with Glemaud and have a boundless faith in the generality of humanity, but on the other hand, in a selfish way I’m with Drew. Sometimes, hearing young people talk film (as I assume was the original situation) I struggle not to think I’m going to see fewer and fewer film makers who can inspire me. That’s where my faith is challenged. Ah well. For fifty years everyone wanted to be a rock star. Picking up a guitar or a microphone was cheap and easy. But as we can see there aren’t millions of music artists. And here at the end of pop music history there are – from around the world – maybe, what, thirty truly influential artists? That youthful dream has been replaced by the cheapness and ease with which one can make a movie. Now, everybody wants to be a director. I have to accept the fact that I’m not going to see countless auteurs out there. James Dean was already long dead when I was a baby-stepping film maker in the eighties but my civilian friends all knew who he was. However, none of them knew who William Wellman was. And while they all knew the name Mary Pickford, none of them could have identified her from a photograph. It never bothered me. When is the cut-off date for pop-cult awareness? Is it stuff everyone is supposed to know or stuff only you know that everyone is supposed to know? And never mind your friends. What about your film directors? Young directors like Godard (back in the day) and Paul Thomas Anderson (now, sort of) were thirtyish when they bent and stretched the rules of cinema. But Jean Luc had an awareness of people and politics and life and history that added levels. Anderson’s movies are about as thin as tissue. Isn’t that another side of your coin? “My friends don’t want to know more than they need. Most of my film directors don’t want to know more than they need.” But then, maybe we’re talking about a very specific, very small, very parochial group of North American young. Because there are kids and film makers from elsewhere who are the gang you could have faith in. So once again we find ourselves at the fringe of the discussion about Industrial culture. Better to let it go and not act old before your time. I’m guessing that attitude is what allows Eric Rohmer (you know him, right? He’s old.) to make astonishing movies.
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Worst movie to watch on a first date over 2 years ago
All great titles. If you’re on a date just to have a mutual good time, maybe not so much. If it’s a test – and the person passes – never let them go.
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Who do you think the most overrated director is? over 2 years ago
My two cents?
Back in the 1950s when the American critical establishment ignored HItchcock and the makers of Westerns, the Cahiers gang was rating them highly. Time has proven that one of the groups was wrong. And that they were both right. In the 1960s Andrew Sarris had a Less Than Meets The Eye category. John Huston is in it. he shouldn’t have been in it. He should have been in it. I believe ratings lists of directors (of any kind) say more about the times and the culture and the people writing the lists.
Go to Comment
Who do you think the most overrated director is? over 2 years ago
My two cents?
Back in the 1950s when the American critical establishment ignored HItchcock and the makers of Westerns, the Cahiers gang was rating them highly. Time has proven that one of the groups was wrong. And that they were both right. In the 1960s Andrew Sarris had a Less Than Meets The Eye category. John Huston is in it. he shouldn’t have been in it. He should have been in it. I believe ratings lists of directors (of any kind) say more about the times and the culture and the people writing the lists.
Go to Comment
Rohmer is dead! over 2 years ago
I’ll always remember Anthony Lane’s review about “Lady and the The Duke”, written when it was released against “Star Wars: Attack of the Clones”: I never thought I’d ever write that the new Eric Rohmer movie just came out and has more and better special effects than the new Star Wars (paraphrased).
Lane’s wit extoles and makes clear Rohmer’s art, craft, longevity and place in the order of all things cinema. It also makes clear that guys like ER and their work pretty well crush most movies.
And ER took part of his name from Sax Rohmer! If that isn’t proof that every art house film-maker is a grindhouse film-maker at heart, then nothing is.
Whenever I am working and start to feel scared by the task ahead, there are a few names and faces I conjure to keep me moving forward. Eric Rohmer is one of them.
Go to Comment