"mindless entertainment" vs "true art"

[Ladeeda]

To my opinion Art appeals to everyone crap appeals to a small demographic. The more people like something the more artistic it is.

I refuse to believe Twilight is anything of the kind.

[Racket_Man]

One of my favourite bad movies ever is Kiss Meets The Phantom Of The Park. It's a truly awful movie, with terrible acting and bad dialogue... but it's so bad, it's funny. There are other bad movies that one can watch and enjoy.

However, there are also bad movies that are so bad it's bad. I'd put some arty movies into this category, too.

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I remember actually watching that on TV (as in a made for TV movie on NBC (???) I think) in 1978. yeah it was so bad it was funny

but then again WHY do sooooo many people like Beaves and Butthead???? because as Patrick Steward once said (paraphrasing here) "IT is soo stupid and dumb it is funny". basically the whole show was dialogue like "assmunch" "bunghole (not really a dirty word)", "tweeter", etc comprising the "adventures" of two boys who should have been under phscyaitric care.

B&B is definately NOT high art

[AdminAssistant]

What amuses me is that the "high art" now will be ignored by the scholars of the future and the "low brow" aka the popular stuff that most people actually like will be considered classics.

Don't believe me? Think about how often your teachers are describing a "classic" and they say, "People back then really knew good art from bad this was very popular with the people of the time proving that they had good taste" when really the critics of their time probably thought the popular stuff was low brow like our people tend to now.

That's not quite true. For example, William Shakespeare. There is little doubt that Shakespeare is the best playwright of the English language. However, during the time that he was writing, Christopher Marlowe was actually more popular.

There is a rise in academics of studies in popular culture. However, they're still not saying that the subject matter is 'art.' For example, in performance studies, there's several people studying MMORPGs (like Warcraft). They write about gendered performance (the propensity of males to play female characters), race issues (Why are the moo cows so much like Native Americans?), and other things, like Chinese gold farmers.

Personally, I study 19th century American theatre, and my dissertation will involve a lot of popular entertainment (medicine shows, circus, showboat, chatauqua, etc.) It's not that those things were fine art, it's that fine art was not accessible to the place that I want to study, and therefore it is largely irrelevant.

TL;DR: No matter how much you may wish it to be so, a lot of very popular films will never be considered classic films.

[Rageaholic]

"I don't think that means what you think it means."

I don't feel as strongly about film as I do theatre, but the same principles apply. For me, a good play asks more questions than it gives answers. I don't want some overly contrived, deux ex machina-esque happy ending. While it's entertaining to watch "shit blows up" movies, and many of my favorite movies are of that variety (Lethal Weapon, anybody?), it doesn't make them "good." I think your problem is that a lot of artists and academics make a distinction between "good" and "entertaining," because, to them, art's ultimate purpose is not purely to entertain. You don't make that distinction, because you see film as pure entertainment.

I just watched a movie; a German film called, "The Lives of Others." Very beautiful, very dark, rather sad. It had one of those anti-climactic endings that you lament, but an all-wrapped-up happy denoument would not have been appropriate for that movie. At. All.

But if you enjoy those movies, can't they be good for what they are? Those art movies may be good for being really artistic and meaningful (depending on the intent of the creator of course), but don't other genres have their place?

My issue stems from this idea that those art movies are superior to everything else. Usually because they are "realistic" (put in quotations because some assume that dark and depressing equals realistic) or go against conventions. Then there are those who assume that the more depressing a movie is, the better it is. They look down on those who like to see the good guys win. I mean, come on! There's enough of that in the world as it is, is it really that big of a sin to not like a movie that depresses you?

[AdminAssistant]

But if you enjoy those movies, can't they be good for what they are?

They are. They're good for entertainment, which is their intended purpose.

[Lachrymose]

The Room

You're tearing me apart, Rageaholic!

[Rageaholic]

You're tearing me apart, Rageaholic!

Oh hi Lachrymose.

[lordlundar]

What amuses me is that the "high art" now will be ignored by the scholars of the future and the "low brow" aka the popular stuff that most people actually like will be considered classics.

Did you know Casablanca bombed in the reviews and It's a Wonderful Life performed so poorly in it's first showing in theaters that the producer never bothered to renew the copyright?

[jackfaire]

Did you know Casablanca bombed in the reviews

In the reviews or among audiences?

Critics are among those that rarely care what other people like and their opinion doesn't often agree with what the masses feel in my experience.

As for It's a Wonderful Life. It was a different type of role for Jimmy Stewart one a little darker than his usual stuff.

It's like Jim Carrey or Adam Sandler there are people that hated their older stuff and have since refused to watch any of their newer work.

Some when finally willing to watch the newer stuff have changed their opinions of the actors.

Also some shows find an audience in different venues for example just about every Kevin Smith film has done better on DVD than it has in theaters.

I am not saying the "classics" will be the most popular but they will be popular. It is rare that something "obscure" and not well known would go onto be considered a classic by so many people unless it became popular enough to garner their attention in the first place.

If Shakespeare had never been more popular than some small theater in some small town and no one else really liked his stuff then it is likely we would have never heard of him.

"Twain was popular, and his wit and satire earned praise from critics and peers. Upon his death he was lauded as the "greatest American humorist of his age",[2] and William Faulkner called Twain "the father of American literature".[3]" Taken from the Wikipedia page of Mark Twain.

The Catcher in the Rye also an interesting book but one that is incomplete and doesn't ever finish the story.

How good or bad something is entirely based on personal opinion however popularity is what creates a pieces exposure and if 10 people think a painting is awesome and they all pass on without passing that love onto anyone else or documenting it much then likely that painting will fail to become a classic.



I fail to see the draw of the Mona Lisa.

I think the movie Rules of Attraction was an amazing piece.

I found the Novel Tom Sawyer to be more entertaining and artistic than Huckleberry Finn.

I also think that no one can declare definitivly that something is low brow or high brow.

You either think something is art or not.

[AdminAssistant]

If Shakespeare had never been more popular than some small theater in some small town and no one else really liked his stuff then it is likely we would have never heard of him.

I didn't say....whatever you just said. He was well known in London; in fact, the troupe of players he belonged to had the sponsorship of King James I. I said he wasn't the most popular with the masses. The tragedies of Christopher Marlowe and the light comedies by Dekker were far more popular. Shakespeare's current popularity (i.e. why everyone reads Julius Caeser instead of Doctor Faustus in high school), has more to do with moralists in the Victorian era than it does with Shakespeare's popularity in his own time.

How good or bad something is entirely based on personal opinion however popularity is what creates a pieces exposure and if 10 people think a painting is awesome and they all pass on without passing that love onto anyone else or documenting it much then likely that painting will fail to become a classic.

So there aren't *any* objective measures? At all? I don't think so. There will always be some objective ways to determine the quality of film and theatre, anyway. (I don't have as much experience with visual art, so I won't speak for it.)

[Wingates_Hellsing]

There really are only a couple of objective measures when you get right down to it, unless you include "serving correct purpose" type things, which can go either way (ex. Showing viewers everything vs showing next to nothing or realism vs theatrics), you're left with only the number of technical mistakes. Missing or incorrect sounds, jump cuts, continuity errors, that sort of thing.

As for "serving correct purpose" well, not only is this muddled by differing opinions on what that purpose actually is, but also differing opinions on what would or wouldn't serve that purpose correctly.

For some people, fast cuts in action scenes defeats the purpose of those scenes by failing to adequately display the action. For others, like myself, it goes a long way towards capturing the kind of frantic energy inherent to violent conflict. For some people, slow-motion kills energy because it slows the movie down, for others, it's just totally bad ass. I could go on for days.

To say nothing of genre, which to me is almost useless when determining quality. Both The Road and Book of Eli were popular, high quality post-apocalypse movies. On the objective scale they rate pretty evenly, but I hated Road and I loved Eli. The road is nothing but whatever number of minutes of some guy whinging and whining about this kid and ultimately getting no where and failing to rise to the occasion in any way I would consider admirable, kicking the bucket when it turns out is was all a waste of time, whereas Eli was an action-packed flick that still managed to tell a meaningful story about the good and bad sides of religion, complexities of morality, and general abuse of power.

But other people are going to be just as vehement about how the Road was an artful masterpiece gazing deep into the human struggle in a hopeless situation, while Eli was just another body count. So, who's right?

No one, everyone... IMHO the only valid distinction of what constitutes a good movie is "X is a good movie, for what it was, to me."

Feel free to list all the reasons you want, but ultimately it's opinion. Some of them may be pretty stupid, but they're all just opinions.

[lordlundar]

In the reviews or among audiences?

Critics. Don't forget that it was made in 1942, and communication was still done by the papers.

"Twain was popular, and his wit and satire earned praise from critics and peers. Upon his death he was lauded as the "greatest American humorist of his age",[2] and William Faulkner called Twain "the father of American literature".[3]" Taken from the Wikipedia page of Mark Twain.

And yet, before he took the Nome de plume of Mark Twain, Samuel Clements couldn't get a single story published, being referenced as second rate amateur writing. The only thing he changed was the pen name.


Overall, If you're going to praise something, don't sell yourself short. Praising only one aspect of something isn't appreciating it. And this applies to any artistic medium. Paint, sculpture, literature, music, film, both large and small screen, video games (yes, video games, which often contain all of the preceding forms of art), etc. If you're only looking a painting to comment on the lines, a sculpture to mention how detailed it is, reading a book to comment on the grammar, listen to a song to comment on the tempo, watch a film to comment on the camerawork, or play a game for the HD resolution, then you're not really appreciating it. The sad part is that it is all a lot of the "high art" has going for it, just some minor detail that gets all the praise, despite tending to be a piece of crap otherwise. It's not always true, but is true enough for the stereotype to continue.

[Ginger Tea]

appologies for the thread jump, I'll read the rest of the first page and the next later.

I hate movies where the good guy has to win no matter what, the plot device the bad guy talks about long enough to escape and foil it etc.

Broken Arrow would be a better movie if Travolta just detonated the bomb after the Helecopter was destroyed instead of the enevitable duke out, I avoided Swordfish for so long after that, it being another Travolta movie, the ending worked, the alternate ending with the hacker sending the money to charity sucked.

Who needs to watch Rocky movies, doesn't he always win in the last round?

I don't mind mindless entertainment movies, I'm just sick of the hero has to win cliche and was reading a book on creative writing. It harped on about conflict and resolution as if that was the be all and end all of story telling, why not leave some issues unresolved, real life is like that, it's not wrapped up in a nice little bundle for me at the end of the day so why should every movie have that, especially if you are being shot at for most of the damn movie.

I watched some Steve Austin movie, basically Battle Royale with adults instead of children, I knew he would live, it was blatantly obvious he wasn't going to die and that Vinnie Jones would last to see a face off. Hell I knew this just reading the back and still bought the damn movie and watched it, it was entertaining in itself, but fit in the good guy must win, hell he wasn't even moraly ambiguous, he was disavowed from the CIA and left to dry after being captured foiling a terrorist cell on forign soil.

edit:

[sarcasm] Yeah, but that's the brilliance of it! It's not susposed to make sense! Oh and that abrupt, anti climactic ending, it was meant to be that way! It was to display how in reality things aren't always concluded in a satisfactory way. Other movies don't have the guts to have no plot and no ending, but this goes all out! I mean who wants to watch a movie that will actually satisfy audiances with a consistent plot and an entertaining story? That's been so overdone! Who wants to be entertained anyway?[/sarcasm]

I'd like to see more abrupt anti climatic endings to mainstream movies, but I don't see that happening any time soon and I don't go out of my way to the Art's Theatre to see movies that might

I'm also 50/50 on the found footage genre
blair witch worked for most of it
Rec. (or whatever the American remake was called if Rec. was the original) seemed disjointed due to it
Paranormal Activity sucked as all the spooky shit happened when they were asleep so they might as well have had an arrow saying "look at the door", the best scare happened (in one of the cuts) in daylight when the photo was smashed whilst they were just videoing themselves for no reason
Cloverfeild was ok but could have been better, lacking a 3rd person view and insight into what was going on annoyed cinema goers from what I recall, but as seen from someones perspective it worked, If I was there I wouldn't know what was going on either. It was more of lets see another point of view whilst godzilla is happening, we watch Godzilla and we see all sorts of angles, we watch cloverfield same shite but from one perspective. If we just followed Broderic, cloverfild is the kind of movie we would have had

[Rageaholic]

Ginger Tea: I see what you're saying. The good guy doesn't always have to win everything. He can save the world, but he doesn't have to get the girl. Or he can fail to save the world, but save the girl. It's not always black and white. I actually like it better that way. It makes the heroic victories seem all the more satisfying if there were loses along the way. However, I don't think that means the hero living happily ever after is always bad. Sometimes it'snice to see justice at work, even if it is just in a movie.

But if there's one thing I absolutely despise in story telling, it's dropped plots. Especially in TV serials. They build up all these plot elements, leaving the audiance guessing where it's gonna go. Annnnd, they just forget these things were ever brought up. Things like that are why I stopped watching heroes, refuse to watch lost, and this new show "The Event" (the gimmicky advertising was a major red flag for me). They keep you waiting for something to happen, but never deliver. That's just bad story telling.

Though, I could start an entirely different topic on TV show offenses.

[blas87]

This is similar to people criticizing my taste in TV or movies because they aren't works of true "art" or are just mindless cartoons and stupid reality shows or soap operas. Hey smartass, Deadliest Catch is a reality show just as much as Hell's Kitchen.

Since I don't watch smart people TV shows or read smart people books, I must be retarded.

Oh, and don't get me started on reviews or critiques. My bf's dad is religious about rottentomatoes, and if it doesn't have a good score, bf will refuse to go see that movie.