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In Reply to: Re: Huh? posted by jamesgarvin on March 15, 2005 at 13:32:48:
Allow me to pontificate: There are inevitably those film watchers who liken themselves "high-brow." I assume that you are that type of viewer based upon your use of the word "middle-brow", because it is not a complementary term, and I assume you do not put yourself among them.I don't consider myself high-brow; what I identified as middle-brow were films with a set of cynical features designed, or whose unwitting function is, to appeal to the insecurities, aspirations, and sense of cultural obligations certain people have regarding art.
You know, the type that are too smart and intelligent, too experienced to enjoy those things enjoyed by the masses.
You're being ironic or anti-intellectual (an unintended irony in your intellectual stance here) or both, since otherwise being smart (and intelligent!) wouldn't be taken as some kind of handicap; and in generalizing that such a person can't enjoy anything enjoyed by the masses you are as snide as you presume your strawman to be.
The masses are too dumb, not smart enough to know what is good and not good, to know what is "art", and what is not "art."
Maybe they are. So what?
If the masses enjoy something, such as Mystic River, then it must not be good because, if they enjoy it, by definition, it is middle-brow.
It follows that something must be bad if the masses like it no more than that the masses must like something if it is bad. "Middle" and "low" brow are not intrinsically bad; nor is so-called "high" brow intrinsically good--I'm not even comfortable with these terms in the present context because I think something becomes low, middle, or high brow as a result of cynical, almost extra-artistic intentions or effects. Art succeeds according to its own terms; it can also fail on its own terms and earn meretritious praise from those predisposed to like it if its primary function is to employ a set of features to flatter or affirm its target audience. This is when something becomes low or middle or high brow. You might have on occassion written a film off as pretentious high-brow trash, because you think it's playing to the egos of its intended audience. I think that's what Mystic River and The English Patient do.
Never mind that it is one of the most celebrated films in the last five years or so, by both patrons and professional critics.
You could say the same of The English Patient and Forest Gump. Care to defend those? So what? A million people can't be wrong, I guess, and on that note you need no specific argument in favor of the film because you have the weight of popular acclaim to decide the case for you. Indeed, why even engage me here? "It is one of the most celebrated films in the last five years or so, by both patrons and professional critics!" Nuff said. I'm a high-brow elitists because I didn't like it, because I thought its patent shortcomings were exactly those things that played to its fans and earned their acclaim; worse, I'm not a professional critic (you seem not be against so-called arbiters of taste--but they must be professionals!)--or have those professional critics who didn't like the film, who think Eastwood is a wildly overrated director (David Edelstein comes to mind), disqualified themselves for agreeing with me and disagreeing with you.
It is middle brow precisely because it is enjoyed by so many people.
It would have been middle brow if it had flopped because of who it targets and, more importantly, how it targets them.
The film industry did not annoint Mystic River anything. If you read anything about Clint Eastwood, you would know that with both Mystic River, and particularly Million Dollar Baby, he largely raised his own funding because the industry did not consider those films marketable. The industry showed no interest in those films. The interest in those films arose because of the many patrons that saw them. Notice how there was very little marketing of Million Dollar Baby. Particularly in comparison of other films, and particularly for an academy award winner.
Well that's interesting to know. How consistent in style is Million Dollar Baby compared with Mystic River? Maybe that's not even an issue. I'm not quite sure what Eastwood's style is: I thought Bird and Unforgiven were pretty good. Whatever the case, maybe the industry will have hipped themselves to the Eastwood magic by now. Between Mystic River and Million Dollar Baby, he's got some cache now. I doubt he'll meet the same resistence to his next film. I wonder how differently a film like Bird would be received were it not made when it was but fell next in Eastwoods canon instead.
Your post strikes me as arrogant and snobbish because you set yourself up as the arbiter of what is middle-brow entertainment, which, obviously, cannot be enjoyed by anyone who has developed tastes such as yourself.
As I've defined it above, indeed I don't think anyone with developed taste can enjoy such entertainment.
You know, those rubes who go to a museum once a year to make themselves feel edumacated, to feel like they belong with people like you, and can never appreciate those things reserved for the sophisticated people.
It's the desire, the sense of social obligation, of people to make themselves feel educated in place of the desire to be educated or always learning that bothers me. And it's "art" that makes people feel educated that bugs me more for encouraging what I deplore.
Fools, thinking they are culturally literate.
And?
Of course, the culturally literate are the same goofballs who proclaimed Jackson Pollock a great artist. I saw his artwork first hand with I visited New York last spring, and no great artist is he.
Yeah, dude. I bet you could have done his shit with, like, your eyes closed when you were in diapers.
Elitism sucks unless it's your own. Now who's the arbiter of taste?
This attitude seems to pervade the Northeast. I remember a couple of years ago when my brother in law gave me a Nascar video game. I asked him why he would think that I wanted the game. He replied that he thought everyone in the Midwest liked Nascar. Oh well, he spends a lot of time in museums.
I don't know, after that Pollock comment, I might have considered buying you that game, then thought better so's not to encourage you.
Your comment about basketball is ironic, considering how many high brow types go to basketball games to be seen, trying to convince people they are hip. Damn slummers.
There's truth here--basketball is all the more ironic for being as expensive as it is to attend while also appealing so strongly to poor black urban youth. Baseball is more solidly populist; basketball tries to get it both ways by being glamorous and elite and gheto at once.
Me, I would prefer to pay $5.00 for the cheap seats at a baseball game, drink a few suds, hang out with a few friends, rather than go to a museum every week, or however many times you think it is necessary to get into the club.
The club? If you have to ask you can't join. . . .
You can go to the museum. I'll have more fun. Oh yea, Mystic River is a very good film, despite it's working class surroundings.
Perhaps, in response, you can specifically address what it is about Mystic River that you disliked, and what so many intelligent people have missed rather than spew forth name calling and insults to the people who actually enjoyed the film. Or is that the style of your ilk.
As for a specific argument against the film, I'll have to admit, it's not so fresh now. Maybe later. You might do a search in this forum and look at the arguments there. But in response to your "despite its working class surroundings" jab: are you actually working class? Do you know anyone who might be so classed? Because Mystic River was anything but: its depiction of working class life, its dialogue, its presentation of values, was so this-is-what-they're-like. That's partly what's so middle-brow about it: it convinces the suburban middle class that they've somehow been offered a window into this rough, streetwise world. It's hollow melodramtic bullshit.
Follow Ups:
"I don't consider myself high-brow; what I identified as middle-brow were films with a set of cynical features designed, or whose unwitting function is, to appeal to the insecurities, aspirations, and sense of cultural obligations certain people have regarding art."Well, that is a conclusion. The meat on the plate is providing specific examples in the film that demonstrate your argument. That is called analysis. You appear to regard films as something more than what they are, and at the end of the day, they are really entertainment. A method for the storyteller to tell a story. Two hundred years ago, the same thing was accomplished exclusively by books, music, or stories passed from generation to generation. If you learn something, that is a bonus. And anyone who watches a movie to learn about life, art, or anything else, needs to get out of the house. Your arrogance is in assuming that people who watch the film are doing so to learn. If you left your ivory tower, you would find that not to be the case.
What insecurities are you referring to? Aspirations? Cultural obligations? Films are designed to entertain. Some people, present company included, feel some need to seek more than entertainment in the films they watch. They seem to feel that if the film does nothing more than entertain, then it lacking in some way. This is arrogance because you define the intrinsic value of something according to your own value system, and insult those who enjoy a film for it's simple entertainment or story telling. 'This film is designed for you dolts to feel like to are actually attuned to the artistic world of me and my class.' Well, no, a, well, we just thought it was good entertainment, not a mechanism to change the world, or to feel smart, or "artsy." Or to be educated.
"You're being ironic or anti-intellectual (an unintended irony in your intellectual stance here) or both, since otherwise being smart (and intelligent!) wouldn't be taken as some kind of handicap; and in generalizing that such a person can't enjoy anything enjoyed by the masses you are as snide as you presume your strawman to be."
You miss my point. It is not to insult intelligent people. Or smart people. I never wrote that those things were a handicap. Well, not always. And cetainly, smart and intelligent people can enjoy things that the masses enjoy. My point was that there are a group of people that think because they are smart and intelligent, they cannot enjoy what the masses enjoy, because if the masses enjoy something, and they are not as smart, it must be without merit. Your original post, by implication, argues that you have "found" the insult which the film perpetrates against the viewers, leading them to believe that they are witnessing art. The real insult is that you believe that the common viewer not capable of that which you are capable. Perhaps the average viewer looks at Mystic River an entertainment, and not some form of high art. Perhaps the average viewer understands that that those are the terms under which the film was made. Is it barely possible that the average viewer understands the purpose of the film, and what it seeks to accomplish, whereas you, with your notion that films must be "art", have missed. Alas, your arrogance prevents you from entertaining that possibility.
Intelligence and being smart can be a handicap if you allow those things to cloud the view. Placing more significance in a film than is intended. I remember a music course in college when the instructor played a portion of a symphony (time does not permit me to remember the title), and analyzed it according to the "symetry", or some other nonsense. I am thinking, just listen to the freakin' beauty. He was so smart, he never listened to what the composer intended because he was too busy analysing.
"As I've defined it above, indeed I don't think anyone with developed taste can enjoy such entertainment."
Well, the first thing you have to do is define middle-brown entertainment. Which, if I understand your posts, Mystic River, in your opinion, qualifies, because it attempts to acheive some fraud on the filmgoer. You failed to see the purpose of the film, but rather judged it based upon your erroneous understanding. The purpose of the film is merely to entertain, and tell a story, nothing more, nothing less, then your definition is incorrect. And what is developed taste? Who defined that term? You? At least have the backbone to admit that you are arrogant and/or a snob.
"It's the desire, the sense of social obligation, of people to make themselves feel educated in place of the desire to be educated or always learning that bothers me. And it's "art" that makes people feel educated that bugs me more for encouraging what I deplore."
I know what you mean here, but am not sure how that applies to Mystic River. You seem to be of the opinion that being educated in the things that you think are important is of great importance. How does "art" make people feel educated. When Rembrandt was painting, who was he trying to educate? When Bach was composing, who was he trying to educate? When Shakespeare was writing, who was he trying to educate? Even with your blinders on, do you really think that Eastwood was trying to create some "art", similar to these gentlemen?
This notion that one must have some level of education to appreciate "art", and that "art" educates is, again, elitist pap. I have never heard an actual creator utter such statements. You know, the person who was actually involved in the creation, to which you fawn. It is always the patron, the person who sat on the sideline. Some patrons have some need to separate themselves from the herd. You do not have the education to appreciate our art. We define the value of your "art" by our education. And, as a bonus, we define your entertainment according to our notion of art.
"Yeah, dude. I bet you could have done his shit with, like, your eyes closed when you were in diapers.
Elitism sucks unless it's your own. Now who's the arbiter of taste?"
The last deperate attempt: rewrite what I actually wrote. I never wrote that Pollock was without talent. Or that I could have done his "shit" (I see your vocabulary is middle-brow) when I was in diapers. I believe he had talent. I think that lifetime minor league baseball players have talent. I could never play minor league baseball. But I do not try to convince myself, or others, that a lifetime minor league baseball player can play in the major leagues. Pollock started out as a traditional artist. What prices do those paintings command? How many of them are in museums? He had talent, but he was a minor league baseball player. The fact that he failed as a traditional painter is not my opinion. But fact.
"There's truth here--basketball is all the more ironic for being as expensive as it is to attend while also appealing so strongly to poor black urban youth. Baseball is more solidly populist; basketball tries to get it both ways by being glamorous and elite and gheto at once."
Your elitism is fully evident here. Basketball is popular in the inner city NOT because of the N.B.A. It is popular in the inner city because it requires no more equipment than a ball. And you can play it by yourself, with two people, three people, etc. Can't do that with baseball or football. But then, inner city youth are not educated to appreciate art, so why bother with them? Those dolts.
"The club? If you have to ask you can't join. . . ."
I never asked to join. But thanks, if I need to feel self-important, I know where to go.
"As for a specific argument against the film, I'll have to admit, it's not so fresh now. Maybe later."
Not a surprise. Much easier to state conclusions and generalize. Ask for particulars, well, I'll get back to you. MESSAGE: DO NOT LET FACTS GET IN THE WAY OF YOUR OPINION. The only thing that is important is if Eastwood is popular, well, then bash him.
"But in response to your "despite its working class surroundings" jab: are you actually working class? Do you know anyone who might be so classed?"
Well, I must admit that I am not working class. And the Federal Government, for what that is worth, would not consider me working class. My professional colleagues are not working class, but most, though not all, of my social contacts are.
"Because Mystic River was anything but: its depiction of working class life, its dialogue, its presentation of values, was so this-is-what-they're-like. That's partly what's so middle-brow about it: it convinces the suburban middle class that they've somehow been offered a window into this rough, streetwise world. It's hollow melodramtic bullshit."
Really? Please provide me your curriculum vitae of the streetwise world. You do not know why inner city kids play basketball, so I suspect that your streetwise credentials are probably lacking. Do you know if Eastwood visited the locations he filmed? Talked with people there? Studied anyone?
Presentation of values? Such as? Bacon has a daughter and estranged wife that he cares about. Penn loves his family, particularly his daughter, and works hard. Robbins was raped and has experienced torment since that day. Okay, which of those values is out of place in the "streetwise" world? Or are they only interested in fighting, drugs, promiscuous sex?
Your arrogance suggests to you, and in turn, to everyone else, that the purpose for the film was to provide a "window" into the streetwise world. That is not the purpose of the film. It is not a documentary. The film could just as easily taken place in silicon valley. The purpose of the film is to entertain. To tell a story. The backdrop is a working class neighborhood. That does not mean that Eastwood is trying to provide you a window into a working class neighborhood anymore than he was providing a window into the old west in Unforgiven, or he was providing a window into space in Space Cowboys. Instead of looking at a film for what you THINK it is trying to accomplish, take off the blinders to look to what it is really trying to accomplish.
Well, that is a conclusion. The meat on the plate is providing specific examples in the film that demonstrate your argument. That is called analysis.Well, no shit. Perhaps I'll netflix it and offer up some kind of dissertation sometime soon. Until then, search out past conversations had when the film was in theaters. I may be mistaking private e-mail discussions with this forum, I don't know. Rhizo has pretty well captured my response to the film, however.
You appear to regard films as something more than what they are, and at the end of the day, they are really entertainment.
What a cop out. You want me to provide examples, analysis, and then trot out this criticism-obviating cliche. All art, at the end of the day, is entertainment.
And anyone who watches a movie to learn about life, art, or anything else, needs to get out of the house.
If art is so bottomlessly frivolous to you, why dwell so much in the house of even step into a theater in the first place? Again, if all films for you are at bottom merely entertainment, what's the point of analysis or criticism, professional or otherwise? All we need to hear is the democratic voice of the people as expressed through ticket sales.
Your arrogance is in assuming that people who watch the film are doing so to learn. If you left your ivory tower, you would find that not to be the case.
No, I know that's not the case and I think it's unfortunate.
What insecurities are you referring to? Aspirations? Cultural obligations? Films are designed to entertain. Some people, present company included, feel some need to seek more than entertainment in the films they watch. They seem to feel that if the film does nothing more than entertain, then it lacking in some way. This is arrogance because you define the intrinsic value of something according to your own value system, and insult those who enjoy a film for it's simple entertainment or story telling. 'This film is designed for you dolts to feel like to are actually attuned to the artistic world of me and my class.' Well, no, a, well, we just thought it was good entertainment, not a mechanism to change the world, or to feel smart, or "artsy." Or to be educated.
And yet any critique you're going to find of this or any other film is going to be centered on it's success as entertainment and story telling. A mechanism to change the world? Why resort to hyperbole? Who expects that of any film. A mechanism to change an individual through profound if imperceptible ways? Sure. Arrogant to judge something according to my own value system? Maybe--to the extent that's unavoidable. After all, from what, if not from your own values, does your exception to my criticism proceed?
My point was that there are a group of people that think because they are smart and intelligent, they cannot enjoy what the masses enjoy, because if the masses enjoy something, and they are not as smart, it must be without merit.
Likewise, there are people who believe that what "smart" and "intelligent" people enjoy cannot be enjoyed by them. Both kinds of people are depriving themselves of the broadest range of possible artistic experience.
Your original post, by implication, argues that you have "found" the insult which the film perpetrates against the viewers, leading them to believe that they are witnessing art.
And, short of a scene-by-scene analysis, I think Rhizo's general remarks will suffice to this great "discovery," which took little effort to find, being the big circus elephant in the room that it is.
The real insult is that you believe that the common viewer not capable of that which you are capable.
I don't believe that at all. I believe them exactly as capable; there would be no justification for being so exacting otherwise.
Perhaps the average viewer looks at Mystic River an entertainment, and not some form of high art.
What is this "high art" you're referring to? What is its function? What are its conventions? How is it subject to standards of, say, story-telling, characterization, logical consistency, any differently than, what?, the somewhere-below-high-art of Mystic River? Low art, high art; low, middle, and high-brow: I'll have to give this more thought, but I think these are categories in which a work situates itself only by virtue of a cynical appeal to a particular audience: it's a function of a work's concern for its marketing over the concerns most proper to it as art--story-telling, characterization, logical consistency, yes, entertainment.
Intelligence and being smart can be a handicap if you allow those things to cloud the view.
How can such things cloed one's view?
Placing more significance in a film than is intended.
Except that Mystic River intends a degree of significance it just doesn't bear. That part of the point.
I remember a music course in college when the instructor played a portion of a symphony (time does not permit me to remember the title), and analyzed it according to the "symetry", or some other nonsense. I am thinking, just listen to the freakin' beauty. He was so smart, he never listened to what the composer intended because he was too busy analysing.
Good God, man. You think this instructor hadn't devoted a good piece of his life to that recording? You think his analysis of symetry wasn't something arrived at after a long and deep acquaintance with this piece of music and that it wasn't motivated by his initial apprehension of its beauty? When, after respond negatively or positively to a work of art, we ask why and turn to the work to find out how it achieves of fails at bringing off its effects, that is criticism. It's not stolid academization--it can be in isolation, if studied only as the mechanics behind the effects instead of in conjunction with them--it's enriching. Poetry for example--or, better, verse. Learn a thing or two about meter and form and you haven't reduced poetry to mere mechanics, you've become more acquainted with its language and with half the field (formerly concealed to those not hipped to it) on which the poet works his art.
Well, the first thing you have to do is define middle-brown entertainment. Which, if I understand your posts, Mystic River, in your opinion, qualifies, because it attempts to acheive some fraud on the filmgoer. You failed to see the purpose of the film, but rather judged it based upon your erroneous understanding. The purpose of the film is merely to entertain, and tell a story, nothing more, nothing less, then your definition is incorrect.
Whatever I may have failed in, you've not pointed it out here. The film does perpetrate of fraud on its audience, and it does so exactly through those things it employs to entertain its audience.
And what is developed taste? Who defined that term? You? At least have the backbone to admit that you are arrogant and/or a snob.
Why should I admit to such a thing? Why can't there be developed taste or knowledge vis-a-vis art as this is in any other profession? There are limits to subjectivity. That we've having this conversation in which we fully expect to be understood (nevermind that we both probably feel ourselves to be talking past each other) demonstrates that to an extent. Someone watched and liked Mystic River: theirs is a valid to response to the film as they perceived it. I'd argue, though, that they've missed a thing or two, and if they weren't so on the defensive against someone for presuming to know more than they--and here anti-intellectualism exposes itself as fundamentally defensive in nature--they might learn a thing or two. (Admittedly, strong negative responses to things we like tend to do that to all of us, though--passions run high, don't they?) But whether a convincing analysis could be produced or not often matters little, since, if such an analysis is even asked for, it's likely done perfunctorily with little expectation that it could possibly be convincing. "Yeah, whatever, I know what I know."
I know what you mean here, but am not sure how that applies to Mystic River. You seem to be of the opinion that being educated in the things that you think are important is of great importance. How does "art" make people feel educated. When Rembrandt was painting, who was he trying to educate? When Bach was composing, who was he trying to educate? When Shakespeare was writing, who was he trying to educate? Even with your blinders on, do you really think that Eastwood was trying to create some "art", similar to these gentlemen?
You're using "educate" in a parochial sense I neither expect nor want of art. And, yes, I think Eastwood was trying to make something profound and enduring. I think he failed. Why wouldn't I be miffed at and baffled by its success?
This notion that one must have some level of education to appreciate "art", and that "art" educates is, again, elitist pap.
I agree to an extent. On the other side, your statement is populist, complacent, anti-intellectual pap.
I have never heard an actual creator utter such statements. You know, the person who was actually involved in the creation, to which you fawn. It is always the patron, the person who sat on the sideline. Some patrons have some need to separate themselves from the herd. You do not have the education to appreciate our art. We define the value of your "art" by our education. And, as a bonus, we define your entertainment according to our notion of art.
You're talking to a strawman again.
The last deperate attempt: rewrite what I actually wrote. I never wrote that Pollock was without talent. Or that I could have done his "shit" (I see your vocabulary is middle-brow) when I was in diapers. I believe he had talent. I think that lifetime minor league baseball players have talent. I could never play minor league baseball. But I do not try to convince myself, or others, that a lifetime minor league baseball player can play in the major leagues. Pollock started out as a traditional artist. What prices do those paintings command? How many of them are in museums? He had talent, but he was a minor league baseball player. The fact that he failed as a traditional painter is not my opinion. But fact.
Really? A fact?
Your elitism is fully evident here. Basketball is popular in the inner city NOT because of the N.B.A. It is popular in the inner city because it requires no more equipment than a ball. And you can play it by yourself, with two people, three people, etc. Can't do that with baseball or football. But then, inner city youth are not educated to appreciate art, so why bother with them? Those dolts.
Please, dude. Innercity, high-school, and college basketball, beyond the intinsic interest in the sport (it's really fun) and the fact that the little space and equipment it requires makes it much more accessible than other sports, are driven by the NBA Dream. Don't be naive.
Education and intelligence are two different things in my mind. If inercity kids aren't educated in art, that's a tragedy. That doesn't make them dolts.
Not a surprise. Much easier to state conclusions and generalize. Ask for particulars, well, I'll get back to you. MESSAGE: DO NOT LET FACTS GET IN THE WAY OF YOUR OPINION. The only thing that is important is if Eastwood is popular, well, then bash him.
How lame. When was the film in theaters? Obviously I didn't love it so much I bought the DVD for repeated viewing. Take it easy, dude. You've got the masses behind you. And you're not interested in particulars anyway, as you've demonstrated they can't possibly make any difference.
Really? Please provide me your curriculum vitae of the streetwise world. You do not know why inner city kids play basketball, so I suspect that your streetwise credentials are probably lacking. Do you know if Eastwood visited the locations he filmed? Talked with people there? Studied anyone?
C'mon, dawg, I got tons of street cred. Just ask. . . . I see, Eastwood interviewed a bunch of walking cliches and put their likeness up on the screen?
Presentation of values? Such as? Bacon has a daughter and estranged wife that he cares about.
Yeah, I remember the lips.
Penn loves his family, particularly his daughter, and works hard.
The daughter who was easily mistaken as a love-interest when she was introduced and who put on the laughable teens-gone-wild routine at the bar before she was killed.
Robbins was raped and has experienced torment since that day.
Contrary to much of the criticism of the film, I think Robbins put in perhaps the best performance.
Okay, which of those values is out of place in the "streetwise" world? Or are they only interested in fighting, drugs, promiscuous sex?
You're so bent on seeing me as some kind of prude. Hilarious.
The film could just as easily taken place in silicon valley.
And with its red-herring sexual abuse backdrop, general humorlessness, flat and overwraught dialogue, and BIG, BIG ACTING, it may well have come off as all the more absurd.
The purpose of the film is to entertain. To tell a story. The backdrop is a working class neighborhood. That does not mean that Eastwood is trying to provide you a window into a working class neighborhood anymore than he was providing a window into the old west in Unforgiven, or he was providing a window into space in Space Cowboys. Instead of looking at a film for what you THINK it is trying to accomplish, take off the blinders to look to what it is really trying to accomplish.
Well, obviously it failed to entertain me. I think it failed to tell its story. The backdrop was wholly unconvincing, and if it's true he wasn't trying to provide me this window, that might explain the failure. No, the stage isn't the point of his films and shouldn't be in any film: but the stage is essential, esp. when the film clearly pretends to a certain level of realism and human significance.
I've added Mystic River to my queue. I'll get back to you.
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