Manohla’s snob picks
“One reason for joy [at this year's Cannes Film Festival] is that word ‘art,’ which isn’t always mentioned in the same breath, much less the same paragraph, when Americans talk about movies,” writes N.Y. Times critic Manohla Dargis in a good sum-up piece about the best snob highbrow films that have played there.
“One of the sustaining pleasures of Cannes is that it allows you to immerse yourself fully from early morning to evening in the kind of aesthetically adventurous, intellectually exhilarating cinematic practices that end up in the American art-house ghetto or being shut out of theaters completely.”
The reasons for the shut-out are sad or tragic or both, but I’ve always said and still believe that the greatest films are those that appeal to not just the Manohla Dargis crowd but also the somewhat more primitive, less intellectually high falutin’ moviegoers. Most aesthetically adventurous, intellectually exhilarating cinematic practices do not straddle this divide, which is probably inevitable and natural. Almost all truly great films are met (at first) with indifference or derision by the mob.
But I’ve always tried to live in (and keep in touch with) both worlds. All my life I’ve tried to absorb and understand the finest films made by the greatest filmmakers, but at the same time apply the educated but not-overly-elitist criteria that I absorbed from my suburban middle-class New Jersey upbringing, which was influenced by the fact that I was always an all-around B student except when it came to knowing films and the film world. (I was also pretty good in art class.)
I believe if I’d ever told my own New Jersy family about all the Jim Jarmusch festivals or how many times I watched Journey Into Bliss, they’d probably have said “Enough of that gay shit, you’re transferring to Rutgers!”
Damn my spelling is awful this morning. Entirely unacceptable.
How the f___ does Wells think he can reconcile this populist sentiment with his regularly expressed hatred of the Walmart-patronizing middle-country simpletons that he loathes so? Or his establishment of a special category of horribleness just for Spider-Man 3, a movie that no matter how bad you think it might be, is still better than the bottom of the barrel (this year, that being populated by the likes of The Hitcher/Norbit/plenty more).
Either he’s lying to us, or to himself.
Wells to jeffmcm: There’s a fairly well-educated, moderately middle-class, but not excessively elitist way of processing films, and then there’s the total gorilla Walmart “just entertain us so we can have a half-justified reason to sit in an air-conditioned theatre and stuff our faces with popcorn” way of processing films. I know it’s tough to absorb these distinctions (and I’m not saying there aren’t other ways of assessing the moviegoing culture), but you seem to be having trouble with it to the point that you thought I was lying to the readers or to myself.
PWNED!
and yet you go ahead and trash We Own the Night in a later post. Wells, you can’t even remain consistent in your thought for a few hours.
What is loved is a hit. What is a hit is loved.
What is loved is a hit. What is a hit is loved.
Sophism, Wells. Empty self-justifying rhetoric.
I’ve never felt that the festival is the best place for thought-provoking Serious Art, in large part because such films generally need some time to be digested. At a fest — if you’re press, anyway — you don’t have that time; it’s on to the next one right away.
I’ve always liked the way the LA film fest mixes it up. They’ll have something like JU-ON side by side with a documentary about pollution.
I might agree that maybe Wells does demand way too much and is much too critical of films meant for wider audiences, but his impassioned praise for miscast and unrewarding MIAMI VICE cuts the heart out of jeffmcm’s sucker-punch attack. It doesn’t help that Hollywood releases so few satisfying “popcorn” movies these days.
****** ****** *******
On the other hand, Manohla Dargis is full of shit trying to peddle that old twaddle about how the rest of the world goes in for Art while Americans waddle in only crass, low-brow pop-porn. Showing that she either skipped, flunked or slept through statistical analysis, she doesn’t seem to understand that if all you see is the best other countries have to offer while not having to deal with their dribble you might falsely assume that the few represent the few.
Anyone who has travelled outside the US and seen the local, for-the-masses-fare knows their shit stinks as much as ours does. Perhaps worse, because most of the top grossers each year in just about every country is our stuff. Even more damning, it’s almost never that year’s top “Art” film was supposed to be.
To really add insult to injury, sometimes one can perceive that American/English filmmakers who do attempt something more than simple entertainment are held to a higher standard than films with subtitles. It’s hard to see several critically praised, yet underwhelming world cinema films and not get that feeling. Like the reviewers were too busy reading to notice the flaws.
“the few represents the whole.” (what happens when you change your original phrasing)
We really don’t need to be bringing Manohla’s old twaddle into this.
Roy, you’re probably right about Manohla’s misrepresentation of the sophistication of non-US movie goers…I mean come on, most of the dogshit made in this country these days is made with the understanding it will be gobbled up by retarded foreigners (and I use the term “retarded foreigners” in the most positive sense of the word so don’t go sending me cards and letters about what an intolerant xenophobic asshair I am).
But the thing is…don’t go dissing Manohla. I love her. I’m stalking her. She can do no wrong in my eyes.
Ok, I forgot what the point of this comment was. I’m carrying on about my business now and pretending this never happened.
Roy, you’re probably right about Manohla’s misrepresentation of the sophistication of non-US movie goers…I mean come on, most of the dogshit made in this country these days is made with the understanding it will be gobbled up by retarded foreigners (and I use the term “retarded foreigners” in the most positive sense of the word so don’t go sending me cards and letters about what an intolerant xenophobic asshair I am).
But the thing is…don’t go dissing Manohla. I love her. I’m stalking her. She can do no wrong in my eyes.
Ok, I forgot what the point of this comment was. I’m carrying on about my business now and pretending this never happened.
On top of everything else, Manohla smokes.