This is brilliant, and why I love reading your publication. I realize when I read your reviews how art films of the 80s served as the lifeline out of my less than sophisticated world, into a place more exquisite and thoughtful. But so often, the art films were as crude and weird as the world I wanted to escape, probably more so.
To go back in time and review the world with adult eyes and with the help of critics who are not invested in clever tricks to disguise their sycophantilism (sycophant + infantilism) so they may achieve status without losing access, is helpful to reconsidering the touchstones I used to help me shape a view of the world I thought would be seviceable.
Bertolucci was gross. Polanski was gross. Not just gross, but terrifying. I never could understand why no one else saw it, but I was told I was responding to their works like a rube or a priss, primarily by my male college professors or my fellow male students, that I just ended up confused.
Bertolucci ruined The Sheltering Sky, a book that I found spoke beautifully to the despair of alientation and existentialism. He ruined it by sticking his dick in it. That's how they always ruin something beautiful. It's the same mutated gene that drives men with money to want to build an outlet mall on the rim of the Grand Canyon (yes, that is a decade+ old fight here in the States): the mutated gene to dominate and ruin rather than find dominion and peace with decay.
Thanks so much Whitney. That's a really good encapsulation of what we hoped to achieve when we started doing this.
Tobias and I were talking about our responses to this film and I said something like 'it just feels like Greenaway is being really *stupid*', and Tobias pointed out that there's no inherent reason why an eminent arthouse director should not also be intellectually below-par - that they're two different skill sets. Which was a genuine lightbulb moment for me!
I think the art I enjoy tends to put humanity at the centre - anything from Vermeer to Spielberg, it has to be empathetic and really get down in the hole with individual people and try to understand their motivations and their challenges. I guess I do think - for me anyway - that's an essential component of 'real' intelligence - broad intelligence rather than narrow specialism, I suppose. Art that positions women as less than human, inherently less interesting, less deserving of having their viewpoint centred, can only ever be shit art for me, because the artist is fundamentally not interested in me - they've written off half the human race, and they've rejected my interaction with their work before we've even begun.
But yes you're right it's fascinating how our perspective on this changes. I remember being really uncomfortable watching Bill Hicks (another one we have to have a close look at one of these days) with my friends - mostly men but also women - and going through that thought process of 'this makes me feel bad, but everyone is laughing, so I must be the one who's wrong'. It's such a terrible part of being young, that we're constantly repressing our gut instincts. Thank god for growing older and taking another look!
Great list! I really liked Picnic at Hanging Rock and haven’t seen it for years (in fact - annoying child anecdote alert - I *think* it was after seeing that that I bought the sheet music to Satie’s Gymnopedies - one of those weird examples of one thing opening up something else altogether). We watched Brideshead last year and it held up brilliantly (and then I read the book for the first time and they’re not wrong about Waugh being a pretty good writer…) - we need to work out what to say about it but it’s on the list. Meanwhile Tobias is pretty much levitating about HDS being your uncle!
FWIW, I thought I was replying in line here, but it posted with its own thread, but I am going to leave it where it is...unless you can't find it. Then I will re-engineer it.
Excellent review! Just discovered your publication and started perusing the titles of your articles. I’m Gen X as it gets. I don’t know about the UK, but here in the States my birth year falls at the very trough of a “baby bust”-- there simply aren’t very many people my age, which makes these takes by someone who shares a cultural landscape all the more compelling.
Ah that’s wonderful, thank you! I don’t know whether there was a fall-off in birthrate in the UK, although I guess post-Boomers that would make sense. Very glad you found us!
Ahahahahahah. I am cracking up thinking of Tobias mid-air. Here's a podcast I did about Uncle Harry. After Tobias listens to that, he might come down to earth:
I love E. Waugh's writing, and thought Brideshead was so sweet and sad. Meanwhile, his "Beloved" was hilarious, but you know, like when I read Maugham's Razor's Edge at age 20, I thought it was brilliant (another movie adaptation to add to your review list!) and then I went back at 40 and thought, Uh, hmm.
One of the reasons I used to love seeing art films was indeed for the music! It was a way to stay ahead of the curve and to force open yet a little more space for me to experience the "big" world I wanted to grab onto with my straining reach out of the tinier world where I felt so stuck.
This is brilliant, and why I love reading your publication. I realize when I read your reviews how art films of the 80s served as the lifeline out of my less than sophisticated world, into a place more exquisite and thoughtful. But so often, the art films were as crude and weird as the world I wanted to escape, probably more so.
To go back in time and review the world with adult eyes and with the help of critics who are not invested in clever tricks to disguise their sycophantilism (sycophant + infantilism) so they may achieve status without losing access, is helpful to reconsidering the touchstones I used to help me shape a view of the world I thought would be seviceable.
Bertolucci was gross. Polanski was gross. Not just gross, but terrifying. I never could understand why no one else saw it, but I was told I was responding to their works like a rube or a priss, primarily by my male college professors or my fellow male students, that I just ended up confused.
Bertolucci ruined The Sheltering Sky, a book that I found spoke beautifully to the despair of alientation and existentialism. He ruined it by sticking his dick in it. That's how they always ruin something beautiful. It's the same mutated gene that drives men with money to want to build an outlet mall on the rim of the Grand Canyon (yes, that is a decade+ old fight here in the States): the mutated gene to dominate and ruin rather than find dominion and peace with decay.
Thanks so much Whitney. That's a really good encapsulation of what we hoped to achieve when we started doing this.
Tobias and I were talking about our responses to this film and I said something like 'it just feels like Greenaway is being really *stupid*', and Tobias pointed out that there's no inherent reason why an eminent arthouse director should not also be intellectually below-par - that they're two different skill sets. Which was a genuine lightbulb moment for me!
I think the art I enjoy tends to put humanity at the centre - anything from Vermeer to Spielberg, it has to be empathetic and really get down in the hole with individual people and try to understand their motivations and their challenges. I guess I do think - for me anyway - that's an essential component of 'real' intelligence - broad intelligence rather than narrow specialism, I suppose. Art that positions women as less than human, inherently less interesting, less deserving of having their viewpoint centred, can only ever be shit art for me, because the artist is fundamentally not interested in me - they've written off half the human race, and they've rejected my interaction with their work before we've even begun.
But yes you're right it's fascinating how our perspective on this changes. I remember being really uncomfortable watching Bill Hicks (another one we have to have a close look at one of these days) with my friends - mostly men but also women - and going through that thought process of 'this makes me feel bad, but everyone is laughing, so I must be the one who's wrong'. It's such a terrible part of being young, that we're constantly repressing our gut instincts. Thank god for growing older and taking another look!
There are so many films I'd love to have you review...if you are taking requests...
Yep absolutely, fire away!
Oh, goody! Here's my list:
Baghdad Cafe
Billy Elliot (the movie)
Educating Rita
Little Voice
Paris, Texas (disclosure: HDS is my uncle)
Repo Man
Picnic at Hanging Rock
A Chorus of Disapproval
Hidden Agenda (anything by Ken Loach, really)
Brideshead Revisited (I thought I already asked you about this, but it's not showing up in the archives)
Yay! (Expression of my enthusiasm, not a movie title, so far as I am aware)
Great list! I really liked Picnic at Hanging Rock and haven’t seen it for years (in fact - annoying child anecdote alert - I *think* it was after seeing that that I bought the sheet music to Satie’s Gymnopedies - one of those weird examples of one thing opening up something else altogether). We watched Brideshead last year and it held up brilliantly (and then I read the book for the first time and they’re not wrong about Waugh being a pretty good writer…) - we need to work out what to say about it but it’s on the list. Meanwhile Tobias is pretty much levitating about HDS being your uncle!
FWIW, I thought I was replying in line here, but it posted with its own thread, but I am going to leave it where it is...unless you can't find it. Then I will re-engineer it.
Excellent review! Just discovered your publication and started perusing the titles of your articles. I’m Gen X as it gets. I don’t know about the UK, but here in the States my birth year falls at the very trough of a “baby bust”-- there simply aren’t very many people my age, which makes these takes by someone who shares a cultural landscape all the more compelling.
Ah that’s wonderful, thank you! I don’t know whether there was a fall-off in birthrate in the UK, although I guess post-Boomers that would make sense. Very glad you found us!
Ahahahahahah. I am cracking up thinking of Tobias mid-air. Here's a podcast I did about Uncle Harry. After Tobias listens to that, he might come down to earth:
https://documental.substack.com/p/family-legacies-that-hurt-the-secret#details
I love E. Waugh's writing, and thought Brideshead was so sweet and sad. Meanwhile, his "Beloved" was hilarious, but you know, like when I read Maugham's Razor's Edge at age 20, I thought it was brilliant (another movie adaptation to add to your review list!) and then I went back at 40 and thought, Uh, hmm.
One of the reasons I used to love seeing art films was indeed for the music! It was a way to stay ahead of the curve and to force open yet a little more space for me to experience the "big" world I wanted to grab onto with my straining reach out of the tinier world where I felt so stuck.