Recently I've noticed this very obvious fact, that the things you see, the things you watch and things you consume, really affect the way you think and the way you see the world. This is of course really obvious, but I think that people should remember this.
From the facts that films like "Dirty Harry" made the .44 Magnum really popular gun in USA, to the decrease of sales of Merlot-wine connected to the film Sideways, one could draw a conclusion, that films at least affect our consuming habits.
But I think it does not stop there. Eisenstein at his time believed that he could make the audience think in a certain way, by showing images in a certain way. Leni Riefenstahl tried this out by glorifying the nazi regime and I think we all know what commercials are trying to do, but actually, I am not talking about this, cause you know, when you see a commercial, that it tries to effect you in a really concrete way.
However, where a single film won't effect the way you think about the world, at least no too much usually, but the mass media, the mainstream culture, the films, books, tv-series and music which, even tough from time to time really good, interesting and special, seem to be quite uniformed. It is this uniformity that is the problem.
Watching a film is learning a language, usually you don't have to learn it again, and good films use a familiar language in a new way. But there is no reason, why films shouldn't use really different methods for storytelling, and no reason why people shouldn't watch films like this.
I am not only saying that the modern film style is in need of improvement, there are some good films no doubt. I am saying, that the modern culture by which films are distributed and sometimes criticized and categorized and marketed is evil and regressive.
Latest example of this terrible tendency to keep the majority of people from expanding their cinematic experiences was the fact that a film called Synecdoche New York was not distributed in Finland. WHY!? could one ask. It has the most famous screenwriter in america, a cast that is full of famous faces. But it is not distributed, cause it did not make enough money in the USA...
When I saw this film, the fact that it is so modestly distributed around the world almost feels like censorship. That the film is a danger in some way. Of course you can argue if the film works or not, I don't disagree with that, but that again is not the point. The point is that this film is clearly an attempt to make something new, to improve us, the viewer and only for that, these kinds of films really, really should be distribudet. Instead they are showing yet another comedy about some couple having some funny incidents, and the film follows the 3 acts and has a happy ending, and after that you feel numb, like you´ve taken some painpills.
The only thing I can say is, what ever you do, try to do it differently. Eat differently, watch films that you don't like. Listen to music that sounds irritating for you and read books that you feel like are really boring and too long. Cause otherwise..I don't know what will happen, but it does not look good.
5 kommenttia:
Yeah, we are what we consume, especially if we consume uncritically.
Synecdoche was a popular flop and didn't win over many critics either. If there is no prestige to balance meager earnings, nobody is going to take the risk.
I remember in the late nineties there was buzz that indie films were becoming cheaper and there would be a big boom of personal films. Then Miramax comes along, milking "artsy" projects for box-office returns and prestige, and paving the way for indie films to be co-opted by major studios (remember when the studios started to make "bold" movies like American Beauty, Being John Malkovich, and Magnolia). Eventually this lead to the marginalization of anything with real original content. After all the studios are only interested in profit, and once they are in they eat up the market.
There's a lot of good stuff coming out, but I don't think anything quite as shocking as new wave was in the sixties. Nothing to jolt you out of the comfort zone created by the new form of what Mark Cousins calls "closed romantic realism." I think the fact that we often see a "style over content" type of critique is emblematic of the fact that style (even when experimental) has become so transparent it becomes disconnected from content in some sense. I think people are actually Really Good at reading the visual language of film nowadays, but they have gotten so used to it that both filmmakers and audiences get stuck in a rut.
I'm exaggerating. I think a lot of good films still get made, maybe even more than in the nineties. But it makes you wonder when you hear all these old geezers from the seventies bitching that they can't get their more original projects financed even with a shoestring budget. If they can't do it...
I watched Wim Wender's Alice in the City recently (finally the old Wender's films are available on DVD, highly recommended stuff) and loved the way in which he tries to escape narrative at all costs. Here you couldn't possibly talk of style over content, they are inseparable.
Anyway...I really liked your comment about watching films that you don't like, I'm all for it. Watch all kinds of films. Even bad ones. Of course, what we mostly get is bad films so finding films that can teach you something new about how a film can be bad takes some work.
Soundin sivuilta:
Provinssirockia tähdittävä Nick Cave teki alustavan käsikirjoituksen Gladiator 2 -leffaan, päätähti Russell Crowen henkilökohtaisesta pyynnöstä. Kirjoitusurakan lähtökohta ei sinänsä ollut kovin herkullinen, sillä Crowen näyttelemä gladiaattori Maximushan kuolee ensimmäisen elokuvan lopussa. Cave ei tietenkään hätkähtänyt tällaisesta "pikkuseikasta" vaan päätyi kirjoittamaan melkoisen korkealentoisen tarinan leffan kakkososan pohjaksi. Crowe olisikin hyväksynyt brittiläistyneen australialaislaulajan ehdotuksen, mutta tarina ei kuitenkaan läpäissyt taustavoimien ja rahoittajien siivilää. Caven käsikijoitukseen voi tutustua esimerkiksi täällä:
http://goneelsewhere.wordpress.com/2008/04/15/gladiator-2-script-review/
Tarinan mukaan Maximus herää henkiin tavattuaan tuonpuoleisessa roomalaisia jumalia. Hän saa samalla ikuisen elämän ja päätyy taistelemaan muun muassa toiseen maailmansotaan ja Vietnamiin. Elokuva olisi päättynyt nykyaikaan ja Maximuksen pestiin Pentagonissa.
But I actually think, that there might be something to it that it is not that Synecdoche New York is a bad film, but it is seen like that cause films like that are not presented to the audience. You know, the reason why films like "My Bloody Valentine" or "He's Just Not That Into You" are now on the screens is not because they are good films or even that people would actually like them.
Films that are shown to us aren't the way films need to be and I think people are willing to see different stuff. It is just that some marketing agent somewhere does not want to risk anything. So that leads to the chain of thinking that certain kind of stuff appeals to certain kind of audience and always brings the money back, when in reality, the audiences of these films have no other choice actually.
Terrence Malick's film The New World was a great exception of this trend. It was marketed as a "traditional" epoch drama or something. The audience was full of teenage girls waiting to see Colin Farrels chest hair, but they got something totally different. And I think that most of these people did not like the film, but atleast they were tricked to see it!
Ja siis hhuh! Aika kiinnostava artikkeli, menisin kyllä katsomaan jos Cave kirjoittais jatko-osan Gladiatorin :D
It's the old question of whether people get the movies they deserve or is it just that the overcautious money hungry business side imposes crap on them. I think people are certainly ready for more sophisticated stuff, but they are also brainwashed into thinking the lowest common denominator crud is what they want. Otherwise why would sequels to Scary Movie make more money than films like There Will Be Blood and No Country for Old Men.
It's like with junk food. People start believing it's better tasting and more convenient than something that doesn't make you sick. People need to be pushed a bit so they can get into what's good for them, especially since films are thought of mostly as fluffy entertainment not something that is supposed to push you out of your comfort zone.
Uh, that's such an elitist comment...
Joo, en tieda olisko Caven Gladiaattori II varsinaisesti hyva, mutta ainakin erilainen!
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