Toto on Why We Love Horror

Posted on October 30, 2008 at 8:00 am

Christian Toto asks why we love horror movies and he comes up with what to me — someone who has very little tolerance for horror movies — some very plausible answers. The entire post is well worth reading and here is a sample:
Losing control: Our lives tend to be bland, or at least uneventful. And that’s a very good thing. But horror movies offer an alternative reality that play upon our worst fears. In most cases, the hero lives to tell the tale. On some level we hope we’d react with the same heroism if we were fleeing a knife-wielding maniac.

An inept drama or comedy can be painful to endure. An inept horror can pack one moment, one scene, which can prove unforgettable.
Horror is communal. I’d never encourage people talking in a theater … but once in a while the crowd noise can elevate a standard horror viewing into an event.
Hidden messages: Horror movies often pack a political or social punch that would otherwise come off as trite or heavy handed. George A. Romero has led the way with his “Dead” features, commenting on racism and consumerism courtesy of his flesh-chomping zombies.
I believe that a scary film, whether a noir thriller, a slam-bang action film, or a horror film, or even a drama with an angry confrontation and some emotional risks, is a dress rehearsal for our emotions, a way for us to work through our fears and experience a sense of release. I’d just rather do it with a little better dialogue and a little less blood. But if you feel differently, be sure to check out the Rotten Tomatoes list of the all-time best horror films.

Is Hollywood Taking the Oscars Back from the Indies?

Posted on October 28, 2008 at 6:00 pm

For the past few years, independent films have out-performed Hollywood studio productions when it comes to awards like the Oscars so consistently that the studios made very little effort to campaign on behalf of big-budget films. But the New York Times reports that the studios are getting ready to promote some of their blockbuster releases for awards this year.
In theory, any film released this year is eligible for awards, but as a practical matter only the films supported by their studios will get the critical mass of support necessary for a nomination. Each fall, very expensive campaigns — special screenings, distribution of DVDs, some promotional swag, ads in trade publications “for your consideration” — determine which films are prominent in the voters’ minds when it comes time to cast their ballots.
After years of giving plenty of running room to independent film companies or studio art house divisions that set the pace with critic-friendly but limited-audience films like last year’s “No Country for Old Men” and “There Will Be Blood,” this year the major studios are pushing some of their biggest crowd-pleasers into the thick of the awards race.

Their approaching multimillion-dollar campaigns come at a time when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, whose 6,000-plus members award the Oscars, is planning to give its annual show a more commercially popular flavor. In part the academy’s producers will do that by including glimpses of the year’s box office favorites , whether or not they are nominated for prizes….
Shrinkage in the small-film business has left more room for big studios to play the Oscar game. Awaiting awards pushes are films like Universal’s “Frost/Nixon,” directed by Ron Howard; Paramount’s “Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” a David Fincher film starring Brad Pitt; and 20th Century Fox’s “Australia,” a Baz Luhrmann epic starring Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman.
The Times says there could be campaigns for such commercial hits as Wall?E and Iron Man. While this could be more about attracting viewers to the Oscar broadcast as it is about the quality of the film candidates for awards, I like the idea of recognizing that just because a movie makes a lot of money does not mean it is without artistic merit. A large part of what made Iron Man successful was the artistry of Robert Downey, Jr., Gwenyth Paltrow, and director Jon Favreau. And what made Wall?E so successful was the way its stories and characters touched the hearts of the audience, thanks to its writers and artists. I like seeing independent films get nominated for awards because it brings them a larger audience. But I’m glad to see blockbusters getting studio support for awards because it reminds us why they are so important to us.

Economic Crisis and the Movies

Posted on October 25, 2008 at 2:59 pm

Hundreds of news articles are referring to our current economic crisis as the worst since the Great Depression of the 1930’s. Movies were just coming of age in that decade. The first talkie was “The Jazz Singer” in 1927 and the first three-strip Technicolor film was “Becky Sharp” in 1935. So the first big contemporary story told in movies was about the Depression and films as varied as Meet John Doe, Swing Time, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, The Grapes of Wrath, Sullivan’s Travels, Gold Diggers of 1933, Modern Times, and The Poor Little Rich Girl with Shirley Temple, the Depression era’s top box office star, both reflected and influenced their time.

In The Guardian, David Thomson writes about the classic films of the 30’s and his pessimism that the current economic struggles will produce anything as enduring.

In 1930, the talent in American pictures was from literature, the theatre and journalism, with educated backgrounds and a shared sense of the moral identity in being American. Today’s talent consists of absurdly rich young people who have made the hits of the past dozen years. They know very little about life, except what they have to lose. Those people and much of the audience have lost the habit, or even the memory, of hard times.

While we might not see anything like Ginger Rogers singing “We’re in the Money” in pig latin during the recovery from this economic upheaval, history has shown that the toughest times most often produce the greatest art. Furthermore, just as technology transformed the movies of the 1930’s, changes that it possible for people to create and distribute movies outside the studio system are opening up the chance to share stories and ideas to a much broader range of people from a much broader range of backgrounds than was possible 80 years ago. I look forward to seeing what hardship inspires. And in the meantime, we can still enjoy Ginger singing about how she’s in-way the oney-may.

Alan Klavan’s ‘Liberal Myths’ in and About Movies

Posted on October 19, 2008 at 8:00 am

Writer Alan Klavan calls Hollywood movies liberal propaganda in a provocative opinion piece in the Washington Post.
For the past 30 years or so, Hollywood storytelling has been guided by a liberal mythos in which, for example, blacklisting communist screenwriters during the ’50s was somehow morally worse than fellow-traveling with the Stalinist murderers of tens of millions (“Trumbo”); Che Guevara was a dashing, romantic liberator instead of a charismatic killer (“The Motorcycle Diaries”); and the worldwide violence currently being waged by Islamo-fascists is either a figment of our bigoted imaginations or the product of our evil deeds (“V for Vendetta“).

Hollywood moviemakers, in other words, have been telling lies — loudly, constantly and almost always in support of a left-wing point of view. And these lies are most prolific and tenacious when the Hollywood left is lying about itself.
This seems over the top to me. “The Motorcyle Diaries” was about Che Guevara’s early, idealistic years, as though it was a prequel to “The Godfather” that just focused on the time between the night Michael enlisted and the wedding scene that begins the film. Unless Klavan wants to insist that Guevara was intentionally and inherently evil in his twenties, it seems to me part of what makes the movie so intriguing is our knowledge of what he became when the injustice that troubles him so deeply in this film persuades him that the ends justify the means and he loses his ability to resist the corruption of power. And “V for Vendetta” is an allegory that is intended to be open-ended so that it can be interpreted in several ways. The movie begins with a reference to Guy Fawkes, whose foiled 1605 attempt to bomb Parliament is still celebrated every year. And it specifically raises the questions about whether the main characters can be seen as terrorists or as revolutionaries — or both — and how to respond to fascism without becoming fascistic.
He does make some good points:
But Hollywood supports unions, a stalwart Democratic cause, right? Well, yeah, if you watch “Norma Rae” or “Hoffa.” But in real life, filmmakers routinely outsource their productions to places such as Vancouver and Budapest, where they can avoid paying union premiums. And when the Writers Guild struck last year, we saw studio liberals turn into corporate hard-guys in the blink of an eye.
I would not say that “Hoffa” is a valentine to unions, but Klavan’s accusation of hypocrisy is well-founded, especially when it comes to the writer’s strike, and I am delighted to see someone who is politically conservative speak out on behalf of unions.
However, he makes an enormous mistake by characterizing the new Oliver Stone movie about President Bush, “W.,” without having seen it, based only on the trailers and advance work. A screenwriter should know better.
And his accusation that liberals are not patriotic is hogwash. He says,
The meaning of the word patriotism is “love of country.” If you don’t love your country, you’re not a patriot.
Liberals love America every bit as much as conservatives do, and it is shameful of Klevan to suggest otherwise. Loving America means wanting it to live up to its ideals, ideal of democracy and freedom that transformed the world. The first principle of the founding fathers was their commitment to challenge, even revolution, to keep the country vibrant and constantly renewing itself. In a moment when opposing political candidates are both running on a platform of change, Klavan should realize that we can best show our love for our country by renewing its commitment to the values at its foundation, those same values of freedom of speech that gave him his space in a “liberal” newspaper.

The Most (Unexpectedly) Spiritual Film of the Week

Posted on October 18, 2008 at 7:47 am

This week’s releases include some very spiritual themes. W. shows us the 43rd President’s decision to let his life be guided by God, his lessons from a spiritual advisor, and his participation in Bible study. The Secret Life of Bees portrays three sisters who conduct Christian religious services in their home and call their brand of honey “Black Madonna.” But it just might be the based-on-a-videogame “Max Payne” that has the most spiritual themes of the week. Along with a lot of guns, chases, and explosions, it finds time to consider its title character’s thoughts about angels, Satan, Judgment Day, and the afterlife. Not just grafted on, these themes are central to the character’s decisions and ability to find meaning in life following the murder of his wife and child.