The Filmspotting Madness Thread, In Which We All Become Abhorrent Monsters

[megladon8]

I'm inclined to agree with Irish here - if a person has an opinion and can make a cohesive and well supported argument to back it, then it is warranted.

Persuasiveness matters little. If your goal in any discussion is simply to change the other person's mind, you are going to beat your head against the wall more often than not.

For example I doubt baby doll is going to appreciate something like say, Thor Ragnarok in the way that I do. But my arguments as to why it is special are meant to show why my opinion is valid and has weight, not as "this will make you love it like I do"

[Irish]

Making a coherent argument isn't the same thing as making a persuasive argument.

The other day I read an essay by a well-known critic in a major publication who likened the ending of "Diehard" to the ending of "Casablanca."

I'd love persuasive. But given the state of criticism, I'll take coherent --- the reasonable over the ridiculous.

I can't say whether Ebert's reasons for disliking The Thing are valid as I haven't seen the film, but on paper at least, it sounds like a perfectly reasonable argument: The effects are gory and cool but the film would be more effective if he felt a stronger emotional attachment to the characters (as was the case in Alien, itself an uncredited remake of The Thing from Another World). The underlying assumption here is that Carpenter wanted the spectator to care about what happens to the characters, which is not an unreasonable assumption for this kind of film, although one could theoretically make the counter-argument that the pleasure spectators take in watching the film's gross-out effects as a series of attractions or show-stoppers would be impaired if the spectator felt too much sympathy for the figures onscreen dying in agony.

I'd love to have this conversation or read about it or see it or eavesdrop on it but nobody is interested in having it.

As an example: Can you imagine someone today publishing "Raising Kane" in a major magazine? A negative career retrospective on a major filmmaker? I can't.

Nevermind the controversy Kael caused, or the rebuttals it generated across the media landscape. Today, nobody would pitch it, write it, or dare publish it. Certainly nobody would read it. The conversation ends before begins.

(Meanwhile, 90% top critics think "Mank" is fresh, and the closest we get to a contemporary career retrospective is some potato on YouTube yammering about how "Spider-man 2" is really that good.)

On the other hand, if someone were to argue that The Shining is a failure because they couldn't sympathize with the characters (in contrast with King's novel, where even Jack remains largely sympathetic as a good but weak man under the influence of evil spirits), the validity of this argument is not self-evident as there's considerable internal evidence in the film--not least of all in the performances--that Kubrick was aiming for a kind of Brechtian estrangement effect. In other words, the validity of a criticism is not dependent on one's ability to argue it (one could make a coherent argument for all sorts of absurd positions: e.g., The Shining fails as a musical because it lacks musical numbers), but on whether one is justified in attributing a specific intention to the film's makers, and since those intentions are ultimately unknowable to the spectator, it's often difficult to decide whether a particular criticism is valid or invalid.

This sounds as if you're suggesting film criticism is impossible because we can never be sure of every possible condition --- the filmmaker's intentions, for one.

But I think we're safe making reasonable assumptions and starting from there.

PS: I like the Brechtian angle; it made me think of "Texas Chain Saw," Cronenberg's work in the late 70s, "The Hills Have Eyes," etc, and how that works fits into Kubrick's work.

[transmogrifier]

See trans' reply. I was more referencing a viewer attitude that brooks no criticism toward their favorites, warranted or not.

Yes, that was my point too. You even see it in this thread. Annoying people liking a movie is fine. Hell, I like a bunch of stuff that has a rather tiresome fanbase at times (Rick and Morty?) What I can’t stand is people (a) refusing to listen to criticism of a film once it has reached a certain critical mass of acceptance (see the downvotes on Reddit r/movies for any comment that criticizes one of their feted movies, like Whiplash, Parasite etc. )or (b) defending a film by attacking the character of the people criticizing it (e.g calling them snobs, disaffected fanboys, SJWs, neckbeards, or just too dumb to get it etc.)

[baby doll]

I'm inclined to agree with Irish here - if a person has an opinion and can make a cohesive and well supported argument to back it, then it is warranted.

Persuasiveness matters little. If your goal in any discussion is simply to change the other person's mind, you are going to beat your head against the wall more often than not.

For example I doubt baby doll is going to appreciate something like say, Thor Ragnarok in the way that I do. But my arguments as to why it is special are meant to show why my opinion is valid and has weight, not as "this will make you love it like I do"

Whether or not one changes the other person's mind, you still have to demonstrate that the film does what you claim it's doing. If I wanted to argue, for instance, that Shelley Duvall gives a brilliant performance in The Shining (and I think she does), I would have to demonstrate that her performance estranges the spectator from her character (in contrast with the novel, where Wendy is arguably the single most sympathetic character) and that this has positive consequences (see my earlier comments about the film's unusual tone).

[baby doll]

The other day I read an essay by a well-known critic in a major publication who likened the ending of "Diehard" to the ending of "Casablanca."

I'd love persuasive. But given the state of criticism, I'll take coherent --- the reasonable over the ridiculous.

I'd love to have this conversation or read about it or see it or eavesdrop on it but nobody is interested in having it.

As an example: Can you imagine someone today publishing "Raising Kane" in a major magazine? A negative career retrospective on a major filmmaker? I can't.

Nevermind the controversy Kael caused, or the rebuttals it generated across the media landscape. Today, nobody would pitch it, write it, or dare publish it. Certainly nobody would read it. The conversation ends before begins.

(Meanwhile, 90% top critics think "Mank" is fresh, and the closest we get to a contemporary career retrospective is some potato on YouTube yammering about how "Spider-man 2" is really that good.)

I don't know if things are quite as grim as you make them out to be. After all, James Naremore is still alive, and I've never been a huge fan of Pauline Kael. One consequence of the internet is that there's a lot more criticism than there used to be, which means there's a lot more bad criticism (talent is rare in any era), but I don't see how that justifies lowering one's standards.

This sounds as if you're suggesting film criticism is impossible because we can never be sure of every possible condition --- the filmmaker's intentions, for one.

But I think we're safe making reasonable assumptions and starting from there.

PS: I like the Brechtian angle; it made me think of "Texas Chain Saw," Cronenberg's work in the late 70s, "The Hills Have Eyes," etc, and how that works fits into Kubrick's work.

I wouldn't say it's impossible, only that it's not always self-evident what criteria is most appropriate for a given film. As Stanley Cavell puts it, "Nothing could be commoner among critics of art than to ask why the thing is as it is, and characteristically to put this question, for example, in the form 'Why does Shakespeare follow the murder of Duncan with a scene which begins with the sound of knocking?', or 'Why does Beethoven put in a bar of rest in the last line of the fourth Bagatelle (Op. 126)?'" In other words, before one can judge whether a given film is a success or a failure, one has to have some working hypothesis as to what the filmmakers were trying to do, but I'm not aware of any foolproof method for arriving at such a hypothesis, especially with a film as unusual as The Shining. I have a general intuition that Kubrick intended to produce a contradictory response in the spectator (at one point, a jokey shot of a pin-up poster on the wall of Scatman Crothers' hotel room is contradicted by an unsettling Michael Snow whistle on the soundtrack), and that we're not supposed to sympathize deeply with any of the characters, because that's what I feel when I watch the film, but it's often hard to tell whether Kubrick is totally in control over the tone of the film--which I think is what Naremore is getting at in his remarks on Nicholson's performance. If we can't say why Kubrick has Nicholson act the way he does, how can we know if he gives a successful performance?

[Irish]

I don't know if things are quite as grim as you make them out to be. After all, James Naremore is still alive, and I've never been a huge fan of Pauline Kael. One consequence of the internet is that there's a lot more criticism than there used to be, which means there's a lot more bad criticism (talent is rare in any era), but I don't see how that justifies lowering one's standards.

^ I mean .. literally from today's New York Times. One can find similar listicles across the culture beat, from Sight & Sound to the dumbest movieblog. I sorta get the appeal, but this isn't film criticism. It's advertising copy.

Naremore is an aging academic. I sorta put him in the same category as Bordwell and Rosenbaum --- well and good they're still with us, but what happens when they're not?

We'll be stuck with Lindsay Ellis, Patrick H. Willems, and Cinema Robert, who peddle malformed theory and wholly embrace the idea of televised criticism-as-entertainment, introduced by Siskel & Ebert, but much, much dumber. (A selection of their recent vids: "Why is Cats?," "Do Kevin Smith Movies Hold Up?," and my personal favorite, "Adam Sandler: Really That Good.")

I wouldn't say it's impossible, only that it's not always self-evident what criteria is most appropriate for a given film. As Stanley Cavell puts it, "Nothing could be commoner among critics of art than to ask why the thing is as it is, and characteristically to put this question, for example, in the form 'Why does Shakespeare follow the murder of Duncan with a scene which begins with the sound of knocking?', or 'Why does Beethoven put in a bar of rest in the last line of the fourth Bagatelle (Op. 126)?'" In other words, before one can judge whether a given film is a success or a failure, one has to have some working hypothesis as to what the filmmakers were trying to do, but I'm not aware of any foolproof method for arriving at such a hypothesis, especially with a film as unusual as The Shining.

To be a little fussy: I'm stumbling over the use of the word "foolproof," tbh. We're still talking about arts criticism, right? Not about building bridges or launching rockets or performing surgery or any endeavor that actually needs to be foolproof. Good criticism is hard but let's not pretend it's harder than it is.

Stephen King isn't William Shakespeare. We're not talking about work 400 years removed from the current day, one that largely exists in the imagination and outside our own time, politics, journalism, and culture. We're talking about a studio movie, produced within living memory, with a $60 million (adj.) budget, starring internationally famous actors, and based on a best selling novel. We're not completely in the dark here.

Cavell (or you? I may be misreading) sounds as if he's getting close to Goethe's 3 questions. I think that's always a good place to start, but lemme turn it around and ask you directly then: What makes criticism possible, when it can never be foolproof?

[megladon8]

I don't see what's problematic about that Michael Mann article.

[Ezee E]

Taking nothing away from Danny Aiello's acting ability, hes great in everything...I will never understand how any white actor can say the N-word. I couldn't do it. I'm not suggesting it be removed from "actor playing a role" necessarily (I will leave that judgement up to POC), but I personally couldn't do it.

Leo DiCaprio apparently had a rough time with it at first on Django Unchained, and Samuel L. Jackson was able to connect with him on it and explain why it was important that his character had that dialog.

[Skitch]

Leo DiCaprio apparently had a rough time with it at first on Django Unchained, and Samuel L. Jackson was able to connect with him on it and explain why it was important that his character had that dialog.

I'll bet the hand cutting thing was cathartic

[Idioteque Stalker]

As for the characters being forced to be alone, yeh I can see that.

The one and only thing I don't like about Alien is how this keeps happening (two times to find the cat, no less). Ebert is right though -- it's more egregious in The Thing.

[baby doll]

^ I mean .. literally from today's New York Times. One can find similar listicles across the culture beat, from Sight & Sound to the dumbest movieblog. I sorta get the appeal, but this isn't film criticism. It's advertising copy.

Naremore is an aging academic. I sorta put him in the same category as Bordwell and Rosenbaum --- well and good they're still with us, but what happens when they're not?

We'll be stuck with Lindsay Ellis, Patrick H. Willems, and Cinema Robert, who peddle malformed theory and wholly embrace the idea of televised criticism-as-entertainment, introduced by Siskel & Ebert, but much, much dumber. (A selection of their recent vids: "Why is Cats?," "Do Kevin Smith Movies Hold Up?," and my personal favorite, "Adam Sandler: Really That Good.")

Of course, I could produce a list of talented, intelligent reviewers under seventy who are currently at work (to start with, Manohla Dargis, Glenn Kenny, and A.O. Scott's actual reviews for the Times--as opposed to puff pieces designed to generate clicks for the website--mark a clear improvement on the bad old days of Vincent Canby and Bosley Crowther), but what would be the point? Even if film criticism (or more precisely, film criticism in English) were in as dire shape as you claim it is, I believe my point stands: It's not enough to mount a coherent argument if you can't demonstrate that the film in question is doing what you claim it does.

To be a little fussy: I'm stumbling over the use of the word "foolproof," tbh. We're still talking about arts criticism, right? Not about building bridges or launching rockets or performing surgery or any endeavor that actually needs to be foolproof. Good criticism is hard but let's not pretend it's harder than it is.

Stephen King isn't William Shakespeare. We're not talking about work 400 years removed from the current day, one that largely exists in the imagination and outside our own time, politics, journalism, and culture. We're talking about a studio movie, produced within living memory, with a $60 million (adj.) budget, starring internationally famous actors, and based on a best selling novel. We're not completely in the dark here.

Cavell (or you? I may be misreading) sounds as if he's getting close to Goethe's 3 questions. I think that's always a good place to start, but lemme turn it around and ask you directly then: What makes criticism possible, when it can never be foolproof?

Perhaps "foolproof" was a poor choice of words; I just meant that criticism is, or should be, tentative rather than absolute (which is one reason I tend to prefer Manny Farber's criticism to Pauline Kael's). In most cases, it's not hard to figure out what a film is trying to do and how well it does it, but every so often I do come across a film so strange it makes me think, "Just what the hell was that?" I think part of what makes it difficult to get a read on The Shining is that the commercial context suggested by the source material, budget, and stars raises certain generic expectations that the movie itself systematically frustrates; reviewers might've been more receptive to the film at the time of its release if it were unambiguously an art movie like Godard's Sauve qui peut (la vie) (released the same year to largely favourable reviews) or more of a straightforward genre film like Cassavetes' Gloria (also about a woman protecting a boy from a man who wants to kill him). That Kubrick's film is neither just one or the other but both simultaneously makes it an uncommonly difficult film to evaluate by any generic criteria.

[Ezee E]

I'll bet the hand cutting thing was cathartic

It's funny reading youtube comments on that scene, with people thinking that everything is one take, and that an accident couldn't inspire how the rest of the scene would be shot later on.

[StuSmallz]

We'll be stuck with Lindsay Ellis, Patrick H. Willems, and Cinema Robert, who peddle malformed theory and wholly embrace the idea of televised criticism-as-entertainment, introduced by Siskel & Ebert, but much, much dumber. (A selection of their recent vids: "Why is Cats?," "Do Kevin Smith Movies Hold Up?," and my personal favorite, "Adam Sandler: Really That Good.")

Those were all good videos, though.