28 Film Discussion Threads Later

[Dead & Messed Up]

One thing I have definitely learned (finally!) is that if a bunch of people on Rotten Tomatoes or Letterboxd describe something as "silly but fun" or similar, I'm staying far, far away. Hence no Aquaman for me.

Glad I saved you a couple of hours.

[Skitch]

One thing I have definitely learned (finally!) is that if a bunch of people on Rotten Tomatoes or Letterboxd describe something as "silly but fun" or similar, I'm staying far, far away. Hence no Aquaman for me.

I don't think I'd recommend you any superhero film. And thats not a dig at you, just doesn't seem like a thing you like, which is totally fine.

[Dukefrukem]

I mean, I'm more judicious with what I watch, but of the sub-20 flicks I saw this year, I enjoyed most of them. I tend to think every year is a great year for movies, just in different ways-- what a precious little Pollyanna this boy can be.

My criteria of a good year in cinema are films I would want to watch again. For me the last great year was 2012.

[Dukefrukem]

2018 was the year blockbuster fatigue finally set in for me. Skipped Fantastic Beasts 2, not interested in Aquaman or Bumblebee, I'm going to skip Captain Marvel unless my wife drags me to it even though I know it will probably have a bearing on The Avengers 4, which will be my last Marvel movie I think, outside of an interesting director taking one of the movies.

One of the most frustrating things is seeing stupid and hollow things like The Meg/Venom make a tonne of money and have a lot of people defend them on the basis of "check your brain at the door, they are made to be fun" and then a lot of the same people will turn around and criticize the hell out of something that is competently made and trying something different like Hereditary for having a kind of silly ending.

I just get the feeling that more and more we are excusing lazy filmmaking because (a) we just want fun! and/or (b) it's part of a unified universe and thus it is okay for an individual movie to be lacking because it is crammed with references to other films and acts as a stepping stone to the next commercial play date.

Of course, there are exceptions (the animated Spider-man apparently, though I haven't seen it) but I truly believe that critical groups (e.g., Rotten Tomatoes/Metacritic) are becoming softer and softer on mainstream films and genuine film criticism has been jettisoned for a focus on how a film will play with a general audience.

I really like this theory.

[Dukefrukem]

One thing I have definitely learned (finally!) is that if a bunch of people on Rotten Tomatoes or Letterboxd describe something as "silly but fun" or similar, I'm staying far, far away. Hence no Aquaman for me.

I dunno, There's some really neat horror elements that you can tell Jams Wan had fun with. That stuff is fun. The stuff that isn't is the villain stuff, but I would not put this movie in the same category as Meg or Venom. It's the best DCEC film by far.

[transmogrifier]

I don't think I'd recommend you any superhero film. And thats not a dig at you, just doesn't seem like a thing you like, which is totally fine.

I'm interested in the animated Spider-man, and if Waititi comes back for one, I'll support that for sure. But, yeah, Logan is the best "superhero" film I've ever seen, and that is like, a 73/100, with Batman Returns at around 70.

[transmogrifier]

I really like this theory.

I don't, because it leads to samey films and no-one around to hold their feet to the fire

[transmogrifier]

I dunno, There's some really neat horror elements that you can tell Jams Wan had fun with. That stuff is fun. The stuff that isn't is the villain stuff, but I would not put this movie in the same category as Meg or Venom. It's the best DCEC film by far.

I've been burnt too many times in the past. The Meg and Venom were breaking points because they earned so much money. It means, more is on the way.

It doesn't help that I thought Aquaman was boring in Justice League.

[Dukefrukem]

I've been burnt too many times in the past. The Meg and Venom were breaking points because they earned so much money. It means, more is on the way.

It doesn't help that I thought Aquaman was boring in Justice League.

That's because Jason Momoa is not a charismatic lead.

[MadMan]

I liked The Meg. It was solid. Meanwhile the animated Spider-Man movie was pretty awesome and gave me mostly everything I could want in a superhero movie. Comparing the two is odd, obvious blockbuster appeal aside.

So far 2017 is better, although I still have much to view from 2018.

[Spinal]

That's because Jason Momoa is not a charismatic lead.

He really is more compelling performing in his native language: Dothraki.

[baby doll]

Is it possible that some of that culture has shifted in general? While pop-mainstream movies can be a barometer of a certain kind of media viewer/reader, the explosion of television and streaming has created new opportunities for more adult-targeted material, to the point that Scorsese and the Coens, among others, have migrated to those mediums. Certainly Netflix and Amazon Prime, among others, are blurring the boundaries of where and how films can be distributed.

Just as an example of the shifting landscape of "what we watch," my primary source of media the past however-many months has been YouTube, largely due to the philosophy/analysis/comedy videos put out by channels like Contrapoints, Collative Learning, Monster Factory (just some examples). I wouldn't say for a second that those are the next iteration of films, but they have widened my definition of what visual media is and how it can function.

I'm not arguing anyone's points here, just wondering aloud if the "degradation" of USA filmmaking is in some ways a response to the overall widening of media itself.

When I refer to the overall degradation of American cinema, I'm not just referring to a shift away from adult-targeted material toward more childish story lines (although that's certainly part of it), but also an aesthetic degradation that's been accelerating since the 1960s. When it comes to what David Bordwell has termed intensified continuity, directors like Scorsese and the Coens have demonstrated that this style isn't altogether artistically bankrupt, but when you compare their work with that of studio-era directors like Ford, Lang, Ophüls, Preminger, Sirk, Sternberg, et al., you get a sense of how much, and how quickly, American cinema has declined aesthetically since 1960. Indeed, if Scorsese and the Coens appear to us today as relative giants, it's in large part because they seemed until recently to be among the few contemporary US directors who still composed their images for the big screen; now that they've moved into television, it's less likely that they will improve the quality of streaming content than that streaming will degrade them.

[Dead & Messed Up]

When I refer to the overall degradation of American cinema, I'm not just referring to a shift away from adult-targeted material toward more childish story lines (although that's certainly part of it), but also an aesthetic degradation that's been accelerating since the 1960s.

Got it, thanks for the clarification!

[MadMan]

So the 1970s wasn't a great decade for American cinema?

[Skitch]

So the 1970s wasn't a great decade for American cinema?

Heh. *makes popcorn*

[Dukefrukem]

So the 1970s wasn't a great decade for American cinema?

It's my least favorite decade by far.

[baby doll]

So the 1970s wasn't a great decade for American cinema?

In terms of the number of great movies it produced, it was more impressive than the 1960s, or any decade after, but far less so than the 1930s, '40s, or '50s.

[Skitch]

Don't get hooked, MM.

[MadMan]

All he had to say was "I think the 70s are overrated." Which I think is wrong, but ok.

[MadMan]

My favorite decade for film is the 1980s, anyways.

[Skitch]

Probably me too. Probably whatever decade you were a kid. So baby doll is likely 112.

[transmogrifier]

70s > 60s > 90s > 00s > 80s > 10s

[baby doll]

The conversation seems to have veered from American cinema in the '70s to cinema in the '70s, which are clearly not the same thing. My point was that American cinema has declined steadily since the end of the 1950s with the collapse of the old studio system and the advent of a découpage style increasingly aligned with the aesthetics of television, particularly in mainstream filmmaking. There were of course great films made after 1960, but with each decade, the share of great films made in Hollywood diminishes. At the same time, however, there was a huge explosion in the number of films being produced in smaller countries, particularly in the global south, but the most impressive third world filmmakers that I'm aware of--people like Ousmane Sembène, Abbas Kiarostami, Abderrahmane Sissako, Lav Diaz, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, and Carlos Reygadas--are all festival directors. Personally, I love Straub/Huillet and late Godard and Pedro Costa, but I also like to see good Hollywood films as well. Yet we never seem to have both at the same time.

Incidentally, I would argue that the influence of Hollywood filmmakers who considered themselves artists (Altman, Coppola, Cimino, De Palma, Scorsese, et al.) was largely negative, as it led to a conception of style as something extrinsic to the narrative that is the private property of a single filmmaker and is applied to a story like a coat of paint. (This also accounts, I think, for the unevenness of a lot of festival directors, notably Reygadas, who by necessity had to assert himself as an auteur from day one in order to have a career at all.)

And for the record, I was born in the '80s.

[MadMan]

Eh my favorite decade for film changes a lot. When I was a kid, it was the 90s. High school, the 70s. College, the 60s. I think the 1950s is the best decade for film currently but that could also change.

[Lazlo]

Some of my Letterboxd stats from 2018:

412 diary entries (viewings; 401 total films)
7.9 movies per week

First Film: The Running Man
Last Film: Kill Bill: Vol. 1

Most Watched Actors:
Tom Cruise - 30
Anthony Daniels - 11
Denzel Washington, Frank Oz, Samuel L. Jackson - 9
Alec Baldwin, Matt Damon, Andy Serkis, Simon Pegg, Kenny Baker, Ving Rhames - 8
Mark Hamill, Chris Evans, Don Cheadle, Meryl Streep, Willem Dafoe, Nicole Kidman, Debi Derryberry, John Ratzenberger - 7
Robert Englund - 6

Most Watched Directors:
Wolfgang Reitherman - 6
Steven Spielberg - 5
Steven Soderbergh, George Lucas - 4
John McTiernan, Paul Thomas Anderson, Brad Bird, Ron Howard, Christopher McQuarrie, Alfred Hitchcock, Stanley Kubrick, Oliver Stone, Christopher Nolan, Robert Zemeckis - 3
Henri-Georges Clouzot, Jon Turteltaub, Lee Chang-dong, Ethan Coen, James Foley, Jason Reitman - 2

Highest Average Letterboxd Score - Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (4.5/5)
Lowest Average Letterboxd Score - Catwoman (1.3/5)