Acid King wrote:I think the chin stroker quotient is far too high when it comes to film lists, declaring unwatchable pieces of shit like Citizen Kane as the some of the greatest movies of all time when the only purpose they seem to serve is so art fag types can sit and deconstruct them.
I hope people don't just see Kane as a flim to deconstruct. There is no reason anyone can't sit down and enjoy that film, but calling it the greatest film of all time probably hasn't served it to well.
I'm really split on this because you can learn a lot about cinematic techniques (and how to use B&W) by watching Kane (much the same way you can learn a lot about animation by watching Bambi.) But, if you don't like these films, don't watch them! The idea of a movie-appreciator elite lording their films over you that they themselves don't like is a sort of absurd notion, and unfortunately Kane comes off like that sometime. Personally I really like Kane as a film, but I'm also wowed by everything it accomplishes.
No offense if you like that stuff, and maybe it's just me, but I fucking hate when film geeks dismiss stuff because they don't rise to their intellectual standards just as I hate when lit geeks dismiss stuff like Naked Lunch because of vulgar/grotesque/"pornographic" imagery. It's not so much snobbery as it is conservatism and a preference for the old over the new.
No offense taken, I enjoy films on a lot of different levels. I'll watch high concept-art shit next to low brow barbarian films. I actually find I'm a lot more open to movies than most, but I'm also more critical. You can like a film (for instance, I actually enjoyed Tale of Desperaux which I think everyone hated) and still cite a million things done wrong with it.
For me, geeking out over how a film is made--especially the masterful use of the medium is important. Since a quality director can actually use that medium to effectively communicate a great deal more to the audience than a director who is just emulating other films, the qualities director's films in general will be better. Case in point: Imagine The Good, The Bad and The Ugly filmed in standard Hollywood vision. That is, same soundtrack, same actors, but the guys behind the camera film it the same way they filmed The Magnificent Seven. Would it be the same movie? Would it even be a good movie?
What I'm trying to get at is that there's nothing wrong with just liking a film coz you like it, and hating a film coz you hate it; but don't hate on the people who want to reflect on their movies a bit and think about what makes a good movie good.
And yes, to get back to your original (my original?) statement: I do hold by some of those classics, but with a caveat: Whether now or then, most films are mediocre and highly imitative. The reason why the classics are called classics isn't because they are old but because they're the one out of a hundred (or thousand?) that actually tried to do or be something more. ...or in some cases, they were just fucking great, like Casablanca.