Tuesday, May 23, 2006

when movies made you uncomfortable


I've noticed some things about movies today. They all want to reassure you things are fine. They all go soft and cuddly on you. No matter how mean they get, in the end they wimp out. They don't go out of their way to challenge you.

Travel back to the 1970's when movies wanted to make you uncomfortable. They wanted you to think. They wanted you to look away. They wanted you to know that sometimes the hero doesn't get the girl. The hero dies. The hero is a psycho. There are no heroes. The world is fucked up and anyone who tires to change that ends up doing more harm than good.

You see these movies( Taxi Driver, Chinatown) and you don't know where they're going. There an unpredictability to them that makes for great viewing.

There's nothing wrong with seeing predictable, feel good movies. I love them as well. In fact, my favorite film ever "Local Hero" is a life affirming movie. But sometimes it's good to see the other side, the queasy, creepy, uncomfortable one.

6 comments:

Zen said...

I agree...but I also see why that would happen. I guess we now live in a "world" that sees enough uncomfortabe situations everywhere (TV, internet, life situations) and Hollywood has tried to move away from shaking things up and assumed the position that being "politically correct" equals not questioning or making people think a little...don't know, just my opinion.

ARD said...

La última película que recuerdo me haya hecho sentir así de incómoda fue Natural Born Killers.

Creo que hoy en día las noticias son quienes juegan el papel de hacerte sentir incómodo. Su enfoque en las noticias negativas te cargan emocionalmente.
Quizás el "trend" de Hollywood responde a estudios de consumidores que han reflejado cierta inclinación, o a cuánta venta de taquilla se traduce cierto tipo de película.

Anonymous said...

a mi me encantan las películas donde los finales no necesariamente son felices. sin embargo, pienso como annette que la avalancha de finales felices en películas responde a presiones de las casas productoras que no se atreven al word of mouth negativo de un final que no satisface a la masa.

aún así, pienso que los productores y directores de las películas están concientes de esto y han encontrado una manera de satisfacer a todos: los alternate endings en los dvds.

carol said...

A Clockwork Orange, my favorite movie ever.

Anonymous said...

si pues, la verdad que tengo qeu admitir que, aunque me fascinan las pelis que te sorprenden, con tanta cochinada pasando uno va al cine a desenfocarse de tanto bombardeo de decadencia, por eso las animaciones tipo ice age 2 son lo maximo (y esta esta genial, todavia de aocrdarme y me rio con ganas).

pero claro, como siempre, el cine europeo te saca de tu comfort zone americanito, no te olvides de IRREVERSIBLE, de acordarme y sufro te juro.

justmeguy said...

irreversible tiene que ser la pelicula mas incomoda que he visto.