So, I've been watching a lot of those classic 70s Hollywood films lately (the Hollywood Renaissance as a lot of people call it), movies from the period when all the big-hitter Hollywood auteurs were emerging. Its been making me think a lot about our current Hollywood directors and their films.
There's such a sense of political engagement in so many of the great films of the 70's, and it occured to me that - though we have many wonderful, fantastic auteurs of the 90s and 00s around at the moment, all of them with their own very interesting personal visions, there are so few fiction films with any kind of political or social ambitions coming out right now.
There might not be a huge number of movies that openly dealt with political topics in the Renaissance (though you've got ones like The Conversation, The Parralax View, Network, All The President's Men that clearly do), but so many of them have social issues just clearly bubbling under the surface. Think of The Godfather 1 + 2, Nashville, Dog Day Afternoon, MASH, Klute, The Last Detail, Chinatown, Targets, Apocalypse Now, The Deer Hunter, Bonnie and Clyde, Easy Rider, Reds, They Shoot Horses, Taxi Driver, Buffalo Bill and the Indians, The Graduate, and tons of other stuff. They might not be "issue films", but they seem so concerned about portraying American society in a really committed way.
What does Hollywood have now that really tries to engage with politics, or even society, to any great extent? The occasional film by Spike Lee or Oliver Stone (and even they seem to have lost their political drive recently). People say that the films of the 70s came about because of a national discontent with the established order - Vietnam was raging, Watergate caused its stink, the military was using violence against protesters... Well, much of a similar discontent seems to be going on now - 9/11 was one of the most shocking events in US history, there's a war going on that much of American people are against, Bush is doing things to the country (and others) that are making him more hated than maybe any president before him - so where are the films to show this? What are the country's most intelligent filmmakers doing with this stuff?
I love so much of the 'indie' Hollywood output. I love the small quirky stories, the Eternal Sunshines, the PDLs, The Sideways(s), the Before Sunsets, The Life Aquatics - they're fabulous. But sometimes I just wish there were more films that really tried to get to grips - or at least acknowledge - some of the very serious stuff thats going on right now. I'd love some films that tried to capture the mood of the world like the 70s directors did - in fact, I think its a necessity.
You're tackling an issue that I struggle with as well. It's the social denial of what is actually going on in our world.
I think that the American Government learned a lot from the Vietnam war. It learned that the public needed to be controlled, and information being fed to them needed to be filtered. It learned that society needs to be sedated with fear and arbitrary social causes (ahem, gay marriage during election time). Blah blah blah, nothing new here.
The point is, people are scared to be political now. Say the wrong thing and you are blacklisted. Long live McCarthyism.
A friend and I were recently talking about how many adaptations and remakes are in Hollywood right now. It's amazing how few totally original scripts get made into movies these days. We live in an America where the movie going public are still heavily comprised of the baby boomer generation. Unfortunately I don't see the landscape of film really changing dramatically for another ten years or so when baby boomers are close to retirement. We're just starting to see Generation X and a bit of Y involved in filmmaking. However, very few of them are given much freedom to write original material.
Quote from: MyxomatosisWe're just starting to see Generation X and a bit of Y involved in filmmaking. However, very few of them are given much freedom to write original material.
But we DO have filmmakers from these generations who have made it, are writing and directing their own stuff, but there's just nothing in their work that engages with social or political areas of life. I don't want to get all judgemental about what our current auteurs want to make films about (because I really love so much of it) but there generally really is NOTHING in them that makes you think America and the world is anything other than fine... I'm not talking about making angry rehetorical political films, just a reflection of the times. Maybe PTA, Wes Anderson, the Coens, Spike Jonze and everyone else really do think everything is fine - but probably not.
I think it has something to do with how many of our big 'indie' hopes primarily make comedies, no matter how dark or 'quirky' - and this is a genre that generally has a happy ending. Look at the films I mentioned in the first post: most of them end really pessimistically, and that reflected the society they grew out of.
I realise that maybe pessimism doesn't sell - but it did in the 70s. There's been a sea-change. With all the problems in the world now more obvious than ever, you'd think the public would be ready for some downbeat representations of life in the 21st century like they were when Easy Rider first came out...
I'm glad the current crop of filmmakers who are young and are booming aren't trying to force a political message in their film. I have no problem with any idea or opinion in a film that is political, but I can't sense much genuine interest in politics from any of them.
The only real attempt I know from this new wave group is David O. Russel's Three Kings. Its a minor accomplishment in my opinion. The film is more focused on creating a energy through filmmaking tricks that the story never rates beyond general humanitarian sympathies. It's an accomplishment of maybe catching the rythm of the novel Catch-22 but trying to relay that into a moral message at the end. Catch-22 kept its sentimentalities in check and realized it's strong suit wasn't so tidy.
Wim Wenders is still making political films. IMDB says that there will be a LA/NY release of "Land of Plenty" in April. But it didn't seem possible some time ago. Wenders said that producers considered his film as a left film because of his message about the homeless, but that the religious aspect was rather awarded to the right, what raised a problem. I personally think that the religous aspect was a trick to make right-wingers identify themselves with the Michelle Williams' character at the beginning of the film and maybe come out a little more tolerant at the end of the film. And a great trick it is, too.
I totally agree with Thrindle about the government controling/influencing hollywood's output.
It seems to me here that the films of, say, PTA, Wes Anderson, Kar-Wai etc are considered less important. While they don't deal with politics they do so with human drama, which I think is equally important. Maybe I'm the only one but I learn things about myself and the world through their films. I don't think humor automatically lessens the impact, it's all in how you deal with it.
For many relationships in the world is as important and interesting as the political agenda that runs it.
As I said, I don't want to suggest that I think these introspective or human-drama films are less important or less wonderful - Magnolia is still my favourite film of all time...
I've just been feeling recently, watching all those 70s movies, that our current cinema - that in many ways is just as exciting as this earlier period - is missing something of the broader view of society that made the Renaissance movies so vital, so significant, so of-their-time.
This first really struck me the other day when I had just watched Targets, and was so thrilled by it, then went to see The Aquatic Life. Wes Anderson forms an integral part of the intelligent cinema we have now similar to the way Bogdanovich did then. The same injustices are going on now as were then, maybe to a greater degree. The escape from reality that Life Aquatic so beautifully represents seemed to me, at that moment, really sad. Here is one of our best filmmakers and he has retreated from the real world so fully. It just got me thinking.
I know its probably unfair to compare the two time periods the way I am, but I can't shake the feeling that whereas first-time filmmakers breakthrough projects were things like Klute, Targets and Easy Rider, they're now Garden State. And, as I've said, there's nothing wrong whatsoever with personal movies, and I look forward to being entertained and moved by many more of them, its just... You can combine the personal and the social, and... I don't know - I just feel a bit of a gap...
I over-reacted a bit. I agree with you.
It's actually an interesting question you're asking...I think it's a combination of so many things in society and shifts in peoples interests.
Or maybe the questions we're asking today are less about politics and more philosophical...
a little off topic -- what does the conversation have to do with politics? -- as far as I'm concerned, the text of the narrative really has nothing to do with politics -- however, one could argue much of the film was devised from current political paranoia in the 70s. however i do bleive coppola wrote it when he was 19. It definatley is derrivative of many current politcal events of the time, but I'm not sure if it was intended to be a political commentary.
the 70s indie American movie was just a tred. I'm glad the filmmakers have moved on otherwise it'd be kinda boring. Nashville is awesome, but people don't have to try to be like it now, it's already been done, it had the best fusion of art and politics in an American film.
I'd like to see more American movies with more class diversity though. like, good movies about the marginalized people who are very much present in America today.
Yeah, The Conversation came out the year after Watergate broke. Maybe when Copolla wrote it it wasn't intended as political, but it takes on a large political significance in context: the surveillence, the corruption, the paranoia, the cover-ups - it all reflects Nixon-era America pretty strongly.
I'm not saying confront political issues head-on, make them the whole point of the film or anything, I'm just saying that an acknowledgement of the state of society will always be important. Like Pete said, even depictions of any other class structures other than the white middle classes, are pretty absent right now. I mean, I that's unfortunately always been the case, that may never change...
Bsically, social engagement shouldn't just be a trend that just applied to the seventies and then passed like it was a fashion: politics is always relevent - especially now. I would just love it if our clearly intelligent current filmmakers would show they care - and I'm sure they do... The director's they grew up on, and love to reference, certainly did - maybe not as much as I would like to idealise, but more than the current cinema.
Again I say, I don't wish the wonderful films that are coming out now to change into radical manifestos, I'd just love there to also be some political feelings in there (or in other films) that we can relate to/think about/debate as powerfully as the emotional ones that are handled so well.
but on the same token, like social engagement, imagination, visions of a utopia, interpersonal relationships, visceral imageries are just as needed as social engagement. I don't think social dramas are extinct; we just have less of them coming from Hollywood right now. we still have plenty of documentaries and foreign films coming in, I don't really think there's really a drought of social-conscious films. right now you have to check out Nobody Knows by Kore-Eda. that's quite a powerful film. then Born into the s.
I'd like to see an end to all movies that scrutinize the beauty and the hypocrisy of suburbia. I think after The Ice Storm, there really are no more reasons to make any more films from that subgenre. Okay, Solondz did pretty good, but really, no more. Please. I think the execs these days come from that type of white middle class background so they'll only greenlight films like that, or "urban" films that coincide with their aesthetic (ie. the gritty dangerous and cold aesthetic) directed by music video directors. They'll tell you that non-violent urban films are too heavy, too political (I've been told that by people like that lady graduated from my school who is the president of paramount classics) or "ghetto". they don't realize that films like Imaginary Heroes and Garden State are like the Juice and whatever DMX movie that Ernest Dickerson directed of the 'burbs, with just as much angst, romantization, and posturing.
on the other hand, I like this current trend of small but viceral/ introspective films that are getting the big budgets like Eternal Sunshine and Huckabees (and Last Life in the Universe in the East!). Hollywood should keep that up and see where would it take them.
I totally agree with what you're saying about 'suburban alienation movies' - I also think the reason for them being made is also the reason for them usually getting rave reviews (and then more being made): the critics are of generally the same class background too.
Quote from: peteI like this current trend of small but viceral/ introspective films that are getting the big budgets like Huckabees.
I'd actually say Huckabees is one of the few recent Hollywood films to engage, on some level, with social issues: the environmental activism being incorporated by a huge corporate chain to make them look good, Mark Whalberg's character and his crisis over gasoline. The film is very 'of its political time' in that respect. Of course it also deals with philosophy in great and entertaining way too - it strikes a great balance actually.
yes. if only it had been good. :yabbse-undecided:
Quote from: themodernage02yes. if only it had been good. :yabbse-undecided:
I thought it was a fantastic achievement - one of the best of last year... But I'm sure you must have had that argument already.
It's a good point that Pete made about the recent rise in popularity of documentaries - I agree: that is clealy something to be optimistic about. They are, I suppose, probably the best forum for a discussion of political issues, and if they can be brought into the mainstream then all the better. Though that's not to say that my original point about social engagement in fiction films doesn't still stand - the emotional potential that story and character can bring creates the added power of feeling for a subject more directly than a documentary ever can.
I found "The Village" to have a very strong political message. I know most people around here dislike it, I actually thought it was one of the best of 2004.
Quote from: rustinglassI actually thought it was one of the best of 2004.
i wouldn't go that far.
the biggest political message that movie had was "Bryce Dallas Howard for president".. which i totally support.
Quote from: peteI'd like to see an end to all movies that scrutinize the beauty and the hypocrisy of suburbia. I think after The Ice Storm, there really are no more reasons to make any more films from that subgenre.
This is a
shocker... I couldn't agree with you more.
Quote from: peteI'd like to see an end to all movies that scrutinize the beauty and the hypocrisy of suburbia. I think after The Ice Storm, there really are no more reasons to make any more films from that subgenre.
Speaking of Suburbia. Here's a classic.
"Sardine?"
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politically, Dogville was the best and most inflammatory film of the year.
Quote from: Film Studentpolitically, Dogville was the best and most inflammatory film of the year.
also most ignored.
The thing is we can look back at the 70's as a whole and get a feel of the 70's culture. It is very hard to look at films today and get the same result.
Plus they made Politaclly chrged films before the 70's they were just more subtle.
Quote from: ChrisdarkoThe thing is we can look back at the 70's as a whole and get a feel of the 70's culture. It is very hard to look at films today and get the same result.
Or maybe it is just as easy. Loud, obnoxious, bombastic...