Titanic was a popcorn blockbuster as well. I just don't understand this constant whining about this issue from some of you. It sounds like they either have a chip on their shoulder because they can't pay attention to movies unless there are fart jokes or explosions or they have some idiotic bias against some in Hollywood because they perceive everything they do to have some sort of liberal bias attached. If you don't want to see a movie, don't go. No one's forcing you to go see these movies. And that's another post from this elitist snob who dared to like No Country For Old Men.
Actually, it was original, in that I thought it, and wrote it, and didn't 'get it' from anywhere else except from within. If anyone else has said something similar in the past, perhaps it just means that I am not the only one who feels that way. Doesn't matter anyway. And yes, after the movie came out and the masses gave it the consideration it deserved and ignored it by the millions, what had been breathless anticipation suddenly received the cold shoulder. I can't give you specifics, because I read a lot from a lot of different places, some completely random, but I too noticed the phenomenon of such an anticipated 'important' upcoming movie suddenly getting panned. The tail wags the dog, in this case for sure. As for how miserable some of them may be, perhaps that was trite - in any case, it would be impossible to know for sure without knowing the people involved directly. However, the notion that someone being wealthy could automatically disqualify them from being miserable is just plain silly. Even the original article described 'There Will Be Blood' as 'audience-punishing', which is almost exactly what I thought when I saw the preview. One has to consider the motivation behind spending so much time and effort to create something which will give an audience member an unpleasant experience. Like all art, the appreciation thereof is entirely subjective. Some people can find greatness in a portrait of the Virgin Mary created out nothing but elephant dung. Other people look at that sort of thing and just see a pile of crap. It's the same with movies. People see what they feel compelled to see, and either like it or they don't. The point of the original article was how out-of-touch with the majority of the population that 'critics' have become, and the trickle-down effect that disconnect has on things like the Oscars and other awards shows. They render themselves less and less relevant by insulating themselves into this closed loop of creator, critic and award-giver all existing within the same vacuum jar, and those of us outside of it are just left scratching our heads much of the time.
Well I said "summer" blockbusters, which disqualifies Return of the King and Titanic. And besides, those two movies along with Gladiator were lengthy epic-style films which differentiates them from something like Raiders of the Lost Ark or Star Wars which were big budget crowd pleasers that managed to get Best Picture nods. The Academy loves epics. That's why James Cameron won all his Oscars for Titanic instead of vastly superior films like Aliens or his two Terminators.
The difference is, sports have objective measures, while art does not. The best football player is the one who contributes the most to his team winning. What does the best movie do? The only reasonable measure would be bringing the most pleasure to the most people. Since that is not satisfactory to most people, I would suggest that there is no such thing as the best movie. They are objectively speaking, equally good, and people can just have individual preferences. I disagree with Rocket River that making the most money is the best measure (although that would be good for a studio award, since their goal is making money) because sometimes we pay to see movies and then it turns out we don't like them. If there is going to be any kind of award given to movies, it should be the movie that has the highest average rating among everyone who has seen it.
Wow you sure don't give up an argument easily. If you look at the dates of most of the reviews on rotten tomatoes, you'll see that they were written in advance of the release of the film. Not as you say after the mass audience gave it the cold shoulder. Michael Clayton and No Country were awesome, as were bourne, knocked, up, and superbad. There will be blood looks amazing as well. I don't know, i just don't think that appealing to society's lowest common denominator should be the standard for excellent. If that makes me or those movies pretentious then so be it, but just remember it's not pretentious if it's deserved.
I disagree that there is no objective measures to art, particular in the technical aspects of it. Shakespeare is literature as is the short stories my 5- yr old nephew writes, but there are identifiable objective measures as to why Shakespeare's literature is better than my nephew's work. Spelling, grammar, and punctuation are obvious examples of this. Also literature/art can be measure objectively by standards such as character development, dialogue, and style. It may be subjective that the standards we as a society, or the artistic community, create values x or y, but it doesn't mean that there aren't objective measures to determine what X is. It may be less identifiable than a first down in football but that doesn't mean it isn't objective. Likewise, what is or is not a touchdown may be objective, the rules of football were subjectively created to value some thing more than others as to who "wins". If this were the standard then pornographic movies would be the "best" movies of all time. I'm sure Debbie Does Dallas derived more pleasure among the people who have seen it than Citizen Kane. But i'd have a hard time lending any credence to a standard than rates Cocks and Jocks 5: The Rising above the best Scorsese movie.
I just got the "There Will Be Blood" DVD screener in the mail. If you want to be jealous of me, it's okay. Personally, I like all sorts of movies, and I do think a lot of movies are overpraised and a lot are underappreciated by various groups. I think there is a tendency among critics and awards groups to honor "important" works, which is one reason why comedies, no matter how well made, and fantasy films are rarely, if ever, Best Picture winners. And while my favorite movie in any given year is sometimes among the nominees for Best Picture, I can't remember a single time when my yearly fave was the one that won.
According to this view, you can make up whatever measure you want and say that it determines which movie is better. My movie is better than yours because we had more grips named Steve. No, my movie is better than yours because we filmed it in color but only shade of gray appear in the whole movie. Shakespeare is not objectively better, it is subjectively better. People have created a system by which to measure it that has nothing to do with literature. There are no rules of literature (except perhaps spelling and grammar). The point is that there is no standard. I would much rather watch p*rn than Citizen Kane, which is one of the most boring movies I have ever seen. Citizen Kane is no better or worse than Dude, Where's My Car? Some people will prefer one, and some will prefer the other.
First off, no, that's not what determines the quality of a movie according to the view i gave. Society and the community itself sets the standard. Can you make any rational argument that the grip's name or the use of the color gray is a societal or industry wide standard? Second, this post doesn't represent your argument from the previous post. You're argument was that there are no objective measures for art. But there clearly are. If nothing more than rules of grammar. Whether you agree with the standards society, and the artistic community, sets is irrelevant to that argument. Furthermore, if you are going to adopt this argument now, how the heck is it consistent with your statement that football and sports are objective? Stuff like OPS, PPG, DVOA are objective measures, but like critical analysis in art, it's only valid in so much as it measures some standard. They may be better, more accurate measures, but they are still reliant on rules that were made subjectively. Football rules, like all sports were created as subjectively and (perhaps more) arbitrarily as any community standard. Because in the end that's all they. Some people may prefer the '07 Miami Dolphins to the '07 New England Patriots, but by the standards set forth by the football community the Patriots are better. Some people may prefer Dude, Where's My Car? to Citizen Kane but by the standards set forth by the artistic community Citizen Kane is a better movie
You don't really make much sense. Proper grammar is a determining factor of good art? You, sir, are wrong. Some of Mark Twain's books had poor grammar way back when, more recently Peter Carey won the Booker with a book that was all first person and grammatically crazy. The list goes on and on of mostly intentional and sometimes unintentional poor grammar being in books that are well reeived, considered fine literature/art. There simply are no such rules. Further, grammar has nothing to do with anything visual in the art world. Looking at art, looking at films, everything is subjective. Just because a movie is technically amazing (something quantifiable) doesn't mean it is good and things get even more complicated with fine art (as opposed to the mass culture we are talking about here).
Because those are just as arbitrary as whatever measure the critics or the MPAAS use. Character development is not determinative of how "good" a movie is. Some people may use that as a deciding factor, but it is in no way an objective measure of film quality. I stand by my statement that there are no objective measures of the quality of art. Grammar is (reasonably) objective, but is not determinative of quality, as rimbaud pointed out. You have decided to fall in line with the people that decide awards, and that is fine for you. That doesn't make their or your opinion about what makes a movie "good" a fact. Sports are like math. There are things that are true by definition, and if you don't accept them, then everything else is meaningless. Unless 1+1=2 then math makes no sense. Unless the team with the most points wins, then football makes no sense. That is why sports have objective measures and art does not. You can say that having great character development makes a movie good, but that doesn't make it so. The point of making a movie is not to develop the characters. It is to entertain the audience. A movie could have the most complex plot imaginable, fully flesh out all of the characters, have stunning cinematography, and still be boring as hell. If so, it is not a good movie, no matter how well it rates on your "objective" (read: subjective) metrics. By virtue of winning more games they are better. The football community may agree that a dominant running game or great pass defense is important for being a great team, but that is irrelevent. The only determining factor is which team wins more games. That is the difference between objective and subjective and the difference between sports and art. The standards set forth by the artistic community are their way of patting themselves on the back. As far as the purpose of movies is concerned, they are meaningless.
Art is subjective. For an individual person, Ashlee Simpson might be "better than" the Beatles, The Marine might be "better than" Casablanca or a 2nd grades hand tracing thanksgiving turkey picture might be "better than" the Mona Lisa. That does not make awards shows useless. The Oscars are simply a case of creators of art using their own criteria to judge films and performances relative to each other. If that information is useful to you watch it and use it. If you prefer The Marine...then feel free to ignore it. Sometimes the Academy screws the pooch...but normally its at least a semi entertaining if overlong spectacle.
They may be somewhat arbitrary standards, but the same can be said for just about every set of standards i can imagine. Sports standards/rules are just as arbitrary. Hell if anything the standards that govern art may be less subjective than sports rules because sports' rules are generally set by one or a small group of people, while artistic standards have evolved from thousands of years and billions of people. You don't agree that character development is determinative of how "good" a movie is. Ok. You might not agree that it's the right standard to use, but, that doesn't mean that some of these standards can be objectively measured. I really don't understand this. There are plenty of "objective measures" that are either used or could be used to determine the "quality" of art. The voting that leds to Academy Awards, or the Grammies, or the noble prize in literature are objective measures. There are devices that determine whether you playing or singing intune. Those are objective. Hell, rating movies based on rotten tomatoes scores is an objective measure. There may be some subjective decision within that measurement. Similarly, a pitcher's ERA is an objective measure, but it's based on subjective interpretations of standards (balls/strikes) I think you are confusing standards with measures. I'd agree with you that the standard are subjective (and somewhat arbritrary), but those standards, even if subjective, can be, and are, objectively measured. Sports are like math, because the arbirtrary standards that governs what is "good" lend themselves more to statistical analysis than the standards that our society has decided governs what is "good" art. Wins are an objective measure, because the person (people?) who invented football (likely trying to decide what best way to entertain) decided to develop a set of standards that make up a game. They are arbitrary standards and win/loses is one of the main measures. It is not the only measure. Likewise society has created standards that determine what is good art. They maybe arbitrary standards but there are objective ways to measure them. Wins are to sports as academy awards votes are to movies. It is just one objective measure of how "good" that medium is. A player in china can play a pickup game with no running score and no wins or loses and there can still be objective measures to determine how good that player is at basketball. Likely a 18 nyu film student can make a movie and not submit it to the academy awards and there can still be objective measures as to how good that movie is. Someone might not think character development is important to a movie because it's not what entertains them, just like someone might think that which ever team wears the brightest socks should determine "good" football because that's what entertains them.
Huh? When did i say it was the only measure? It is one measure of many. Think about it like this. Is FG% measure of a good basketball player? Can there exist a good basketball player who does not have a good FG%? Grammar is a measure of good literature, however it is possible for good literature not to have good grammar. I was discussing art as a whole, but just the visual world.
Wow my argument is really convoluted and i'm not even sure i argee with the direction in which i'm arguing. To try and clarify: There are societal standards in which govern the "quality" of art. These standards are largely arbitrary and subjective. However, inspite of this, some of these standards can be objectively measured.
