Film Critics

Started by ono, July 17, 2003, 02:17:28 PM

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Gold Trumpet

#90
October 03, 2003, 09:58:22 PM
Quote from: SydneyI agree that a critic is suppose to give insight into a movie, but there is more to it than that. Almost every ordinary citizen I have talked to has said that film critics are nothing more than snobs or stuck-up. Now, I disagree with that but a lot of people feel that way because critics seem to have become addicted to their ego. Think of it this way, if critics were really making people understand movies better and people thought about them in a different way...then Punch Drunk Love would have been number 1 at the box office instead of something like Jackass the movie. I rest my case.

Woah woah, now you're getting into much larger arguments that goes beyond this one, the current state of film as it is and how art films are so secluded in the general public. The film critic Stanley Kauffmann argues that ultimately, film schools destroyed general American appetite for better films. His reasoning is that film schools made films into another school subject for kids in college and took it away from the film fans as  something closer to private property. He also cites lack of quality films from abroad to continue sparking interest and money only getting bigger in film production to serve general entertainment and how that ate up breathing room for smaller films to get any big notice. The film studios were dishing out more money for each film to just advertise. I always thought him speaking of how films schools helped destroyed it the most interesting because I actually agree. Appreciation of film is now jostled as school work like any other lame subject and how exciting is it when something so special and fun for people is made into work on just to appreciate as a fan? He argues films in the 70s and on started to lose the youth intelligence to rock n roll.

But to get to the argument at hand, what you said with people's reactions to critics now is much deeper than the answers you are giving.

~rougerum

godardian

#91
October 03, 2003, 09:59:02 PM
Quote from: SydneyI agree that a critic is suppose to give insight into a movie, but there is more to it than that. Almost every ordinary citizen I have talked to has said that film critics are nothing more than snobs or stuck-up. Now, I disagree with that but a lot of people feel that way because critics seem to have become addicted to their ego. Think of it this way, if critics were really making people understand movies better and people thought about them in a different way...then Punch Drunk Love would have been number 1 at the box office instead of something like Jackass the movie. I rest my case.

What comes into play here is that too many people are not discerning enough to know that a film can be a creative success without being a financial one. Sure, it would've been nice for Punch-Drunk Love to have been number one, but it is frankly a film better enjoyed if you really love film. And really loving film is something that too many moviegoers don't understand.

Most good film critics don't think their opinion is inherently more valuable than anyone else's. The really, truly good ones are trying to discover and articulate their own feelings about the film(s) they've seen, and hope that someone else gets some enjoyment/enlightenment out of that expression. Reading a really good film review is like being part of a lively conversation, one between someone who loves film and the film they're engaging with.

Usually, when people have complexes about other people being "snobs" or "stuck-up," they're really just insecure and preventing themselves from learning something. The obvious attitude behind it is, "That person seems to know more than I do about something and isn't ashamed to show it and utilize their capacities to the utmost. They must be a snob!" Me, when someone seems to have something interesting to say and an interesting way to say it, that's when I know it's time to shut up and do some listening/attention-paying.
""Money doesn't come into it. It never has. I do what I do because it's all that I am." - Morrissey

"Lacan stressed more and more in his work the power and organizing principle of the symbolic, understood as the networks, social, cultural, and linguistic, into which a child is born. These precede the birth of a child, which is why Lacan can say that language is there from before the actual moment of birth. It is there in the social structures which are at play in the family and, of course, in the ideals, goals, and histories of the parents. This world of language can hardly be grasped by the newborn and yet it will act on the whole of the child's existence."

Stay informed on protecting your freedom of speech and civil rights.

pookiethecat

#92
October 03, 2003, 10:00:05 PM
David Thomson's opinions can be soo...caustic.  The more he lambasts people the more I want to read on.

I agree with Godardian and Gold Trumpet. Though I have to admit, this conversation is kind of confusing me.  I'm having trouble making sense of Sydney's argument.
i wanna lick 'em.

SoNowThen

#93
October 03, 2003, 10:41:53 PM
Quote from: The Gold TrumpetGodardian reading Stanley Kauffmann? Great idea because he is the  symbol of movies for me but also ironic, considering Kauffmann's harsh criticisms of a lot of Godard's films. He dismissed My Life to Live as pretensious.

Too bad that Kauffmann's writing is the very definition of pretention, so that actually nullifies any "pretentious" catcalls he can make.  :wink:
Those who say that the totalitarian state of the Soviet Union was not "real" Marxism also cannot admit that one simple feature of Marxism makes totalitarianism necessary:  the rejection of civil society. Since civil society is the sphere of private activity, its abolition and replacement by political society means that nothing private remains. That is already the essence of totalitarianism; and the moralistic practice of the trendy Left, which regards everything as political and sometimes reveals its hostility to free speech, does nothing to contradict this implication.

When those who hated capital and consumption (and Jews) in the 20th century murdered some hundred million people, and the poster children for the struggle against international capitalism and America are now fanatical Islamic terrorists, this puts recent enthusiasts in an awkward position. Most of them are too dense and shameless to appreciate it, and far too many are taken in by the moralistic and paternalistic rhetoric of the Left.

pookiethecat

#94
October 04, 2003, 07:55:09 AM
i think the overuse of the word "pretentious" is pretentious.
i wanna lick 'em.

Sigur Rós

#95
October 04, 2003, 07:59:03 AM
Quote from: pookiethecati think the overuse of the word "pretentious" is pretentious.

hehe, I think your right!

godardian

#96
October 05, 2003, 09:32:19 PM
Quote from: pookiethecatDavid Thomson's opinions can be soo...caustic.  The more he lambasts people the more I want to read on.

I agree with Godardian and Gold Trumpet. Though I have to admit, this conversation is kind of confusing me.  I'm having trouble making sense of Sydney's argument.

Speaking of David Thomson, I finally watched my DVD of Victim today. A fine film- check out my avatar- and the DVD includes a nice liner essay by Thomson.
""Money doesn't come into it. It never has. I do what I do because it's all that I am." - Morrissey

"Lacan stressed more and more in his work the power and organizing principle of the symbolic, understood as the networks, social, cultural, and linguistic, into which a child is born. These precede the birth of a child, which is why Lacan can say that language is there from before the actual moment of birth. It is there in the social structures which are at play in the family and, of course, in the ideals, goals, and histories of the parents. This world of language can hardly be grasped by the newborn and yet it will act on the whole of the child's existence."

Stay informed on protecting your freedom of speech and civil rights.

pookiethecat

#97
October 05, 2003, 10:00:21 PM
cool, as always.
i wanna lick 'em.
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