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In Reply to: Do you let a movie take you for a ride? posted by violinist3 on January 17, 2011 at 19:11:47:
The best films engross my attention absolutely and they are indeed immersive. Like listening to good music, time seems to fall away.
I do notice and appreciate (or not) technical aspects of a film while I'm watching. Always. This habit is second nature to me and comes from long practice, a sense of discernment honed over 40+ years of movie watching. It doesn't take me out of the film - it enhances my viewing. It's a source of delight done well.
Cinema has its own language, and one learns it as one learns any other language. Although I'm no scholar, my eye is perhaps trained to a degree above the average movie goer: I've done film studies in art school and graduate studies in the university of life including some video production. Plus, of course, I've seen a several thousand films in my life so far.
Thus I'm very aware of the history of movies and the craft of filmmaking because - one way or another - I've educated myselft to be. I love films and art enough to care about them.
But while I have a critical eye at all movies, that's not to say I'm necessarily looking for flaws to criticize. That's something quite different. Something that would be way too depressing an outlook for me.
Viewing a good or great film, the awareness of craft and technique is there but below the surface; it's superceded by the thrill of watching something excellent. With a lesser film, the things one finds lacking can become intrusive. That's not as much fun.
There are, of course, degrees in all this, guilty pleasures that have redeeming features I enjoy so much I overlook the flaws. And craft and technique only take any movie so far - a great work is more than just the sum of its parts.
I do try to keep an open mind and a "clean" eye when seeing a film for the first time, to take it on its own terms. I hope I'm "smart" enough to be open to whatever the filmmakers are trying to do, to receive their gestalt.
Film is not real life, so the fact that something in a movie "couldn't happen in the real world" doesn't necessarily on its own enter into my assessment. (That would not take you far in appreciating some of my favorite movies: Blue Velvet, the Red Shoes, The Draughtman's Contract,etc.) The freedom to tell a story expressively, metaphorically and visually is one of the greatest strengths of the medium IMO...unless the work is truly intended to be very realistic. Dumb movies where the protagonists do stupid and/or implausible things are just...dumb.
Even in a so-called "realistic" movie, the filmmakers - by selecting specific lighting, staging, costuming, camera angles, editing etc. - are dramatising the on-screen experience in a particular way, emphasizing this into the foreground, that into the background. The best films engage the imagination and participation of the audience - realism may or may not be the means to that.
I've also found that "plot holes" are sometimes anything but - instead viewers have missed something or misread something or presumed something. This isn't necessarily true of "dumb" movies, but I try to avoid those.
If a movie sounds like its' gonna be truly bad, or not at all to my taste, I don't see them. Life is way too short.
But I'm still hungry for the film experience and anticipate new movies from filmmakers favorite and new with eagerness. I sometimes feel like the Russian ballet impressario Diaghilev who commanded his minions to "astonish me." I should be so lucky.
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Follow Ups
- Indeed I do...but it's not either/or for me. - Harmonia 15:29:14 01/18/11 (0)
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