Why?
There is a British filmmaker named Peter Greenaway. He has made some incredible films and some pieces of junk. His most infamous work is The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover. It’s visually stunning, grotesque, decadent, horrific and funny. The first time I saw it I was so uncomfortable after the first scene, I wondered if I would make it through the entire movie. So why did I stay? Because the film was asking me to do more than just sit back and watch. It was asking me to be a participant on an emotional level. It tested who I was as a person and made me question what it is that I believe is right and wrong. Where was my moral line and how far was I willing to cross it? He was challenging me to look at the world from a different perspective.
I bring up Greenaway because he said something once that really struck me and has always been a go-to line when discussing my stance on film. He said, “There was a time when people watched movies, now movies watch people.” I’ll be the snob here and say: take a minute. Read that out loud. Let it roll around in the skull and marinade.
All right, what does it mean? It means that there was a time when movies were self-contained beings, not homogenized, gentrified, tested, and target-audienced to within an inch of its life. Movies could address topics that might be difficult to bring up. They could have characters that may not be the most likable or acceptable. They could play with plot, theme, structure, editing, and visual style. These are the elements that make up what is called the ‘language of film’. Now most popular movies require no thought process. They have turned us into sheep. Don’t get angry, I can prove it.
National Treasure. Pick one, it doesn’t matter. Justin Bartha plays Riley, the tech nerd/wacky sidekick to Nicholas Cage. I saw these movies in the theater on a day when the audience was around half capacity. Now at several moments during both of these movies, the sidekick responds with a one-liner to a situation. One of these lines was, “Who wants to go down the creepy tunnel inside the tomb first?” A majority of the audience cracked up. Is this line funny? Does it have any creativity to it? No, no it doesn’t. Oh, and was it in the trailer that was playing on television twenty-four seven? Yes, yes it was. The audience laughs because we have been trained over the years to laugh at any little shtick the sidekick spouts. Think about it. Think about all of the sidekicks over the years that have been played by talented comics or character actors who were given creative dialog. Take the line from Aliens when Hudson (Bill Paxton) whales, “That's it man, game over man, game over!” How ever ridiculous it seems now, the first time hearing it we laughed because it was spontaneous and brought out a moment that actually helped build the character a little bit. A very little bit, but a little bit nonetheless.
Today you’ll also find that most commercial films are about branding. Any title or name recognition will do the trick. Let’s face it, we all saw the trilogy based off of the Disneyland ride. (Yes, I enjoyed The Country Bears as much as you did.) Much like the characters we have been trained to respond to, we’ve been trained to respond to branding, good or bad. The film industry, I mean studio executives here, could end up spending a couple hundred million on a movie and they want to make sure it’s something that everyone already knows about. They want to see big returns for their big investment. They want to target kids and the parents’ nostalgia gland. So whip out a Transformers or a G.I. Joe. You’re guaranteed a big opening weekend. You’re guaranteed we’ll all "ooooh and ahhh" as the car turns into a giant robot because it reminds us of how cool it was to play with those toys when we were younger. We’ll cheer when Megatron gets smashed or a building crumbles under the weight of two tons of sentient metal crashing into it.
Now I can name a ton of films out there that are smarter, that don’t tow the corporate line. Some of them find an audience (look at Juno) but most slip through the cracks. I’m not saying they are better films, some of them suck, like really suck. But these films attempt to reach us from a different perspective. They ask us to challenge ourselves, to connect and try to understand what is going on instead of ringing a bell so we start to salivate.
We can’t stop the machine; I’m not inciting revolution. That would be naive. Just do one thing for the hell of it. We’ll call it a social experiment to make us sound smart. The next time your out at a big ol’ blockbuster popcorn movie, take three to five minutes during a dialog scene where there is some comic relief. Separate yourself from the movie and just feel what’s going on in the audience. When they laugh at something, was it earned, or was it a trained response? Was the movie watching you at that moment, or am I just talking out of my ass? It wouldn’t be the first time.
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