Well, Parham, I’d say no one is saying he’s the “next big thing.” He’s the “present big thing”—no one is predicting anything about him, only praising the great work he’s doing now.
I think that this is kind of a referendum on how many movies the responders see. I think it’s a good rule of thumb that people who watch a lot of movies are less likely to walk out of them; a person who goes to the movie theater, say, once a month, has more invested (it’s the only movie they’ll see in April) and are more likely to be offended if they dislike it—much the same way that people who don’t read much are more likely to dislike a book (whereas a heavy reader might think it was "passable) or a person who frequently eats at restaurants is less likely to start a scene if something is wrong with their food.
But, all in all, I support a person’s right to leave the theater—in fact, I think it reminds all of us that we’re there by choice, and makes you less passive as a viewer. I remember a screening of COLOSSAL YOUTH programmed as part of a general Latino festival; the description had made it sound like a fairly run-of-the-mill “immigrant family drama.” Half of the audience abruptly walked out halfway through the movie, which meant that everyone who stayed, myself included was forced to face our act of watching the film head-on. The mood lightened. People started to laugh at the film’s little jokes and get wrapped up in the beauty of Ventura’s letter. What had begun as an incredibly tense viewing had become calm, almost graceful.
I’ve never seen THE TELEPHONE but I know there’s a little bit of a cult around it nowadays. Did you see it during the original run (I assume that’s the only time it’s been in theatres—no Whoopi Golberg revival runs I can think of)?
The Red, it seems, presents a revolution in decoupage and not images. It’s like the Arriflex. Under good lighting conditions, it creates a traditional (i.e. celluloid-like) filmic image, though it still has that color palette specific to HD—those gradient pastels that make it look like a little like Gevacolor, the old Belgian color process. It doesn’t create a discontinuity in the look of a movie, just in that invisible but invasive aspect—production. So it’s inoffensive—it “looks like a movie,” the only difference is that you can work differently.
The CineAlta, by comparison, seems somehow more offensive—it doesn’t “look like cinema.” Video has this strange aspect, which Mann has talked about extensively in interviews, that causes it to pick up the background movement hyper-realistically—the swaying of trees, that sort of thing. It seems to negate traditional notions about the importance of camera movement: the video image doesn’t sit still.
KJ is right—the Red has somehow already become the camera of reactionaries, because it’s praised for its ability to mimic more than for its versatility. But despite that versatility, I still prefer movies shot on the CineAlta—because there’s nothing else that looks quite like it.
That copy has circulated as a bootleg in the US for years. The German-dubbed bootleg is significantly better in quality, and you can find .srt subs around.
The difference is noticeable:
You can mentally adjust the colors of the YouTube copy.
Stars in the Crown is great! It’s bizarre to see someone associated with shadows, the occult, and noirs doing a warm story about a small town (Western) preacher, but this is a lovely, oft-ambiguous film.
Strange but, for Tourneur, completely personal. He took a pay cut to make and apparently the pay cut stuck for the rest of his career. He wanted to make it so badly that he didn’t care. I think it might be his best film.
I agree with Peter on recent Hill — I really like Last Man Standing, and I was struck by Broken Trail when I caught up with it (those wide shots he cuts in!). But I think the 1980s were his richest period; they’d still be his richest if all he’d made was Johnny Handsome.
The Keep is very interesting, though undoubtedly a failure. I haven’t seen Pin, but a friend who knows these sorts of things describes it similarly: “Very interesting, though not a very good movie. A lot of good ideas.” (His vote is on Pin between the two).
“I’ll never forget the experience I had escorting the late Samuel Fuller, the much-decorated World War II hero and maverick filmmaker, to a multiplex screening of Full Metal Jacket, along with fellow critic Bill Krohn, in Santa Barbara 13 years ago. Though Fuller courteously stayed with us to the end, he declared afterward that as far as he was concerned, it was another goddamn recruiting film — that teenage boys who went to see Kubrick’s picture with their girlfriends would come out thinking that wartime combat was neat.”
— Jonathan Rosenbaum, Movie Wars
""There’s no such thing as an anti-war film."
— Francois Truffaut
I’ll add that I don’t agree with Truffaut’s statement, and that though I know the truth of Fuller’s assessment, I think it overlooks certain other qualities of the film, which is really more of a horror film (a better one than The Shining) than a war movie. Most films are anti-war films; the few that aren’t are about war and its “horrors.”
In the standard conception, an auteur is a person who makes films for a purpose without reducing cinema to that purpose, who cares about something more than making good movies and whose style is a reflection of their worldview. Everyone has a style, even if that style is just an imitation of someone else; style is an outgrowth of human expression. The concept of the auteur is that they are compelled: they cannot make movies any other way. In some ways, the auteur is by definition damned.
Our dear Uncle here is right. All cinema is equally pure and all cinema is equally impure. The term “pure cinema” is a waste of four letters; just write “cinema” and it means the same thing.
I normally make a point of not venturing into the Forum, but — like Bloody Mary — I appear when a short piece of mine is critiqued more than three times.
I realize that this is more a discussion of Rossi’s essentialist interpretation of what I wrote than what I actually wrote, but let me point out that nowhere did I write / imply that there’s something wrong with “trying too hard.” Art / cinema / culture / whatehaveyou is hard work, and should be. And as I, uh, mention several times in the piece, I happen to rather like both Black Swan and The Wrestler (though I like the former more) — and there is, frankly, nothing wrong with Aronofsky, or with Nolan’s manufactured ambiguity (for one, I’m a fan of The Prestige).
A couple of asides:
In another article this would have been used as proof that Aronofsky is an auteur! – the repetitive themes, stylistic signature and strong personal aesthetic, the consistent worldview that unifies all of his films. This author just does not like D.A and is trying to prove why no one else should either but it is a weak argument.
Just because someone is an “auteur” (whatever that means post-1980) doesn’t mean that they’re any good, — but that’s beside the point, because I’m not out trying to prove that D.A. (a director I don’t dislike) isn’t worth your time. “Not great” does not equal “bad.”
Awesome, glad to see a director who has a keen eye for every little detail. It sounds like a movie that I can find something different in every time I watch it. Those are the films that I like.
I’m sure Aronofsky is a smart, affable guy; he gives that impression. But I think this is the position Aronofsky sets himself up for: he has a very particular idea about art (which is his own, and which I don’t agree with) — that it is something which articulates personal suffering in a certain abstract way — and I think he realizes that he is incapable of fulfilling that definition for himself. Hence the scaling back of his own ambitions post-The Fountain in favor of the ambitions of the characters; if he can’t satisfy himself as an artist — and I think The Fountain is a deeply frustrated film, the film of a man trying to save face even as he realizes that he’s failing to reach his goal — then he can satisfy himself by making films about artists. Ultimately any discussion of “art” in the context of Aronofsky depends on his own definition (as it does with, for example, Minnelli, who has a very specific definition of his own); and when you mention that my “usage of the term ‘art’ is so amorphous that it seems to be turned into some sort of entity which Aronofsky will forever strive for but never reach,” you’re hitting the nail right on the head — the term is used in the exact same way that I think Aronofsky thinks of it.
A comment from Mac (of all people!) from the post itself sums it up pretty simply (that is, better than I could) without getting into the plot: “Have to agree with Iggy that Aronofsky’s pretensions to madness are undercut by the clarity of meaning and structure in his films. His obsessiveness is apparent, but there is nothing below the surface of his films that would lead me to believe that he has lived the song he sings about. And in no way do I mean to diminish Aronofsky’s craft; he is obviously very talented. But in order for the form of his films to equal the content (if that’s what he really wants, and I get the feeling that’s exactly what he wants based on the material he chooses to film) he’s going to have to loosen up a little bit and stop being such a watchmaker.”
Miasma,
There are similarities.
Incidentally, Aronofsky has owned the remake rights to Perfect Blue since 2001, but doesn’t intend to actually remake it; supposedly, it’s save his ass in the event that he feels like borrowing elements from the film (the rights were purchased as a legal safeguard during the making of Requiem for a Dream).
1) Actually I give my take on Aronofsky’s definition of art — that it is whatever articulates personal suffering in a way that’s abstract enough — within that response above.
2) Not sure where you get the idea that I’m a journalist. Or the idea that every statement includes a judgement.
I excluded the second half of Mac’s response. I don’t completely agree with his take on Friedkin (though he’s spot-on about Sorceror ), but it might be helpful to further explain his interpretation: “To me, that’s the difference between Aronofsky and someone like Friedkin, whose films are drenched with chaos and malevolence (Sorcerer, Cruising, To Live and Die in L.A., and Rampage just to name a few) most notably at the level of structure, which makes the films themselves seem unstable and borderline, not just the characters. With Aronofsky I feel like we’re started to get to the point of diminishing returns. There were parts of Black Swan that reminded me of Stayin’ Alive.”
1) Actually, I don’t write “whatever I please.” Though it looks like one, The Notebook is not a blog, and it functions as / is edited like a magazine.
2) Exactly how is it a “Grade A hack piece?” Also, have you noticed that your responses contain many more personal attacks (against me), than my piece did (against D.A.)?
Ramin Bahrani about 3 years ago
Well, Parham, I’d say no one is saying he’s the “next big thing.” He’s the “present big thing”—no one is predicting anything about him, only praising the great work he’s doing now.
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What films have you walked out on and why ? about 3 years ago
I think that this is kind of a referendum on how many movies the responders see. I think it’s a good rule of thumb that people who watch a lot of movies are less likely to walk out of them; a person who goes to the movie theater, say, once a month, has more invested (it’s the only movie they’ll see in April) and are more likely to be offended if they dislike it—much the same way that people who don’t read much are more likely to dislike a book (whereas a heavy reader might think it was "passable) or a person who frequently eats at restaurants is less likely to start a scene if something is wrong with their food.
But, all in all, I support a person’s right to leave the theater—in fact, I think it reminds all of us that we’re there by choice, and makes you less passive as a viewer. I remember a screening of COLOSSAL YOUTH programmed as part of a general Latino festival; the description had made it sound like a fairly run-of-the-mill “immigrant family drama.” Half of the audience abruptly walked out halfway through the movie, which meant that everyone who stayed, myself included was forced to face our act of watching the film head-on. The mood lightened. People started to laugh at the film’s little jokes and get wrapped up in the beauty of Ventura’s letter. What had begun as an incredibly tense viewing had become calm, almost graceful.
Go to Comment
What films have you walked out on and why ? about 3 years ago
Matt,
I’ve never seen THE TELEPHONE but I know there’s a little bit of a cult around it nowadays. Did you see it during the original run (I assume that’s the only time it’s been in theatres—no Whoopi Golberg revival runs I can think of)?
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Soderbergh on Red Camera about 3 years ago
The Red, it seems, presents a revolution in decoupage and not images. It’s like the Arriflex. Under good lighting conditions, it creates a traditional (i.e. celluloid-like) filmic image, though it still has that color palette specific to HD—those gradient pastels that make it look like a little like Gevacolor, the old Belgian color process. It doesn’t create a discontinuity in the look of a movie, just in that invisible but invasive aspect—production. So it’s inoffensive—it “looks like a movie,” the only difference is that you can work differently.
The CineAlta, by comparison, seems somehow more offensive—it doesn’t “look like cinema.” Video has this strange aspect, which Mann has talked about extensively in interviews, that causes it to pick up the background movement hyper-realistically—the swaying of trees, that sort of thing. It seems to negate traditional notions about the importance of camera movement: the video image doesn’t sit still.
KJ is right—the Red has somehow already become the camera of reactionaries, because it’s praised for its ability to mimic more than for its versatility. But despite that versatility, I still prefer movies shot on the CineAlta—because there’s nothing else that looks quite like it.
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Is there an athletic bias in the film community? about 3 years ago
More importantly, is these an anesthetic bias in the film community?
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Visconti's The Stranger almost 3 years ago
Thanks for the link, Lou.
That copy has circulated as a bootleg in the US for years. The German-dubbed bootleg is significantly better in quality, and you can find .srt subs around.
The difference is noticeable:
You can mentally adjust the colors of the YouTube copy.
Go to Comment
Public Enemies almost 3 years ago
Cesar & Prudence,
How can camerawork be “distracting?” Distracting from what?
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Unless you watch TCM regularly,,another rather obscure film Stars in the Crown by Auteur Tourneur almost 3 years ago
Stars in the Crown is great! It’s bizarre to see someone associated with shadows, the occult, and noirs doing a warm story about a small town (Western) preacher, but this is a lovely, oft-ambiguous film.
Strange but, for Tourneur, completely personal. He took a pay cut to make and apparently the pay cut stuck for the rest of his career. He wanted to make it so badly that he didn’t care. I think it might be his best film.
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Is Walter Hill the most under rated director of the 1970s? almost 3 years ago
I agree with Peter on recent Hill — I really like Last Man Standing, and I was struck by Broken Trail when I caught up with it (those wide shots he cuts in!). But I think the 1980s were his richest period; they’d still be his richest if all he’d made was Johnny Handsome.
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Should I Watch Pin Or The Keep Tonight? almost 3 years ago
The Keep is very interesting, though undoubtedly a failure. I haven’t seen Pin, but a friend who knows these sorts of things describes it similarly: “Very interesting, though not a very good movie. A lot of good ideas.” (His vote is on Pin between the two).
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A True Anti-War Movie almost 3 years ago
“I’ll never forget the experience I had escorting the late Samuel Fuller, the much-decorated World War II hero and maverick filmmaker, to a multiplex screening of Full Metal Jacket, along with fellow critic Bill Krohn, in Santa Barbara 13 years ago. Though Fuller courteously stayed with us to the end, he declared afterward that as far as he was concerned, it was another goddamn recruiting film — that teenage boys who went to see Kubrick’s picture with their girlfriends would come out thinking that wartime combat was neat.”
— Jonathan Rosenbaum, Movie Wars
""There’s no such thing as an anti-war film."
— Francois Truffaut
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A True Anti-War Movie almost 3 years ago
Deckard,
There’s a difference between intentions and images — chiefly that intentions count for nothing.
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A True Anti-War Movie almost 3 years ago
I’ll add that I don’t agree with Truffaut’s statement, and that though I know the truth of Fuller’s assessment, I think it overlooks certain other qualities of the film, which is really more of a horror film (a better one than The Shining) than a war movie. Most films are anti-war films; the few that aren’t are about war and its “horrors.”
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These films are not in production, except in my imagination almost 3 years ago
Greenaway worked on an Infero movie for television: A TV Dante.
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These films are not in production, except in my imagination almost 3 years ago
*_Inferno_. Yes, it’s late.
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James Gray: The Auteur Who Got Away? almost 3 years ago
James Gray = cinema.
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Auteur, am I right? almost 3 years ago
In the standard conception, an auteur is a person who makes films for a purpose without reducing cinema to that purpose, who cares about something more than making good movies and whose style is a reflection of their worldview. Everyone has a style, even if that style is just an imitation of someone else; style is an outgrowth of human expression. The concept of the auteur is that they are compelled: they cannot make movies any other way. In some ways, the auteur is by definition damned.
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Did I miss something almost 3 years ago
Gran Torino is the greatest Western of the last two decades.
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Did I miss something almost 3 years ago
Bobby,
Might as well call Winchester ’73 a rifle commercial.
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Just Criterion Collection? almost 3 years ago
This site is not run by the Criterion Collection.
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Questions on pure cinema almost 3 years ago
Our dear Uncle here is right. All cinema is equally pure and all cinema is equally impure. The term “pure cinema” is a waste of four letters; just write “cinema” and it means the same thing.
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
Hello hello,
I normally make a point of not venturing into the Forum, but — like Bloody Mary — I appear when a short piece of mine is critiqued more than three times.
I realize that this is more a discussion of Rossi’s essentialist interpretation of what I wrote than what I actually wrote, but let me point out that nowhere did I write / imply that there’s something wrong with “trying too hard.” Art / cinema / culture / whatehaveyou is hard work, and should be. And as I, uh, mention several times in the piece, I happen to rather like both Black Swan and The Wrestler (though I like the former more) — and there is, frankly, nothing wrong with Aronofsky, or with Nolan’s manufactured ambiguity (for one, I’m a fan of The Prestige).
A couple of asides:
In another article this would have been used as proof that Aronofsky is an auteur! – the repetitive themes, stylistic signature and strong personal aesthetic, the consistent worldview that unifies all of his films. This author just does not like D.A and is trying to prove why no one else should either but it is a weak argument.
Just because someone is an “auteur” (whatever that means post-1980) doesn’t mean that they’re any good, — but that’s beside the point, because I’m not out trying to prove that D.A. (a director I don’t dislike) isn’t worth your time. “Not great” does not equal “bad.”
Awesome, glad to see a director who has a keen eye for every little detail. It sounds like a movie that I can find something different in every time I watch it. Those are the films that I like.
Great. You should, in fact, go see it.
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
Micky,
Completely agree, though (personally) I’d switch the places of Apocalypse Now and Heaven’s Gate in that equation of yours.
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
Leaves,
I’m sure Aronofsky is a smart, affable guy; he gives that impression. But I think this is the position Aronofsky sets himself up for: he has a very particular idea about art (which is his own, and which I don’t agree with) — that it is something which articulates personal suffering in a certain abstract way — and I think he realizes that he is incapable of fulfilling that definition for himself. Hence the scaling back of his own ambitions post-The Fountain in favor of the ambitions of the characters; if he can’t satisfy himself as an artist — and I think The Fountain is a deeply frustrated film, the film of a man trying to save face even as he realizes that he’s failing to reach his goal — then he can satisfy himself by making films about artists. Ultimately any discussion of “art” in the context of Aronofsky depends on his own definition (as it does with, for example, Minnelli, who has a very specific definition of his own); and when you mention that my “usage of the term ‘art’ is so amorphous that it seems to be turned into some sort of entity which Aronofsky will forever strive for but never reach,” you’re hitting the nail right on the head — the term is used in the exact same way that I think Aronofsky thinks of it.
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
Jazzaloha,
I have no notion of “trying too hard;” that’s Rossi’s invention.
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
Jazzahola,
A comment from Mac (of all people!) from the post itself sums it up pretty simply (that is, better than I could) without getting into the plot: “Have to agree with Iggy that Aronofsky’s pretensions to madness are undercut by the clarity of meaning and structure in his films. His obsessiveness is apparent, but there is nothing below the surface of his films that would lead me to believe that he has lived the song he sings about. And in no way do I mean to diminish Aronofsky’s craft; he is obviously very talented. But in order for the form of his films to equal the content (if that’s what he really wants, and I get the feeling that’s exactly what he wants based on the material he chooses to film) he’s going to have to loosen up a little bit and stop being such a watchmaker.”
Miasma,
There are similarities.
Incidentally, Aronofsky has owned the remake rights to Perfect Blue since 2001, but doesn’t intend to actually remake it; supposedly, it’s save his ass in the event that he feels like borrowing elements from the film (the rights were purchased as a legal safeguard during the making of Requiem for a Dream).
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
Leaves,
1) Actually I give my take on Aronofsky’s definition of art — that it is whatever articulates personal suffering in a way that’s abstract enough — within that response above.
2) Not sure where you get the idea that I’m a journalist. Or the idea that every statement includes a judgement.
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
Jazzaloha,
I excluded the second half of Mac’s response. I don’t completely agree with his take on Friedkin (though he’s spot-on about Sorceror ), but it might be helpful to further explain his interpretation: “To me, that’s the difference between Aronofsky and someone like Friedkin, whose films are drenched with chaos and malevolence (Sorcerer, Cruising, To Live and Die in L.A., and Rampage just to name a few) most notably at the level of structure, which makes the films themselves seem unstable and borderline, not just the characters. With Aronofsky I feel like we’re started to get to the point of diminishing returns. There were parts of Black Swan that reminded me of Stayin’ Alive.”
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
No standards, just sensation.
A critic is not a journalist (though journalism itself is often veiled criticism), and one does not have lower standards than the other.
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Directors who fail because they try too hard to be great over 1 year ago
Leaves,
1) Actually, I don’t write “whatever I please.” Though it looks like one, The Notebook is not a blog, and it functions as / is edited like a magazine.
2) Exactly how is it a “Grade A hack piece?” Also, have you noticed that your responses contain many more personal attacks (against me), than my piece did (against D.A.)?
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