Tag Archives: hitchcock

New rating: BA

Posted on by under Movies

Previously, I wrote a post about new MPAA ratings that need to be introduced for the protection of the viewing public. There are plenty more where those came from. Today, I’d like to introduce one:

This one isn’t aimed at viewers but rather at the lazy and imagination-bankrupt producers of much of the dreck that passes for movie releases these days. (Thank goodness the “colorization” rage suffered a rapid demise.)

Fine. I get it. You want to produce sure money makers so you revive or piggyback on successful movies of the past. (We’ll ignore that fact that it doesn’t work.) It used to be that they at least had the decency to (1) wait a few decades to remake a movie and (2) stay away from classic films that have stood the test of time.

No more.

A popular movie stands a good chance of generating a reboot every ten years or so. (A remake of “Memento”, only 16 years old, is being developed.) And sequels? They flow like pee from a race horse. With much the same value. (There’s a sequel to “Mary Poppins” coming. Sacrilege.) No big deal. Crap is crap and we’ve come to expect it from Hollywood in large steaming heaps.

But “Ben Hur”?!?! Were they serious? It’s not enough that they put Morgan Freeman in dreadlocks. This is a movie that should never even have been considered for a remake or sequel. (If it had made money, the sequel would have been a lock.) Back in 1998, Gus Van Sant must have been psycho to remake Hitchcock’s classic. (From the “those who don’t know history are condemned to repeat it” department: Michael Bay, of all people, wants to remake “The Birds”. Make it go away!!!)

The good news is that both of those films were box office disasters. And rightly so. Those two films, along with a lot more, should have been rated Back Away, Off Limits, Don’t Touch, Hands Off. Anything to keep producers’ grubby and greedy little mitts off the Good Stuff.

Here’s a short list of a few films that beg for the BA rating:

  • Casablanca
  • Gone with the Wind
  • 2001: A Space Odyssey
  • Singing in the Rain
  • City Lights

…along with probably every film in the AFI’s top 100. There should be serious penalties for violating this rating, above and beyond the deserved scorn and likely financial loss.

There’s plenty of stuff in the can that are legitimate candidates for remakes. Here are a few I would like to see:

  • It Happens Every Spring – Fun baseball story rife for new humor and technology.
  • I’d Rather Be Rich – Wonderful 1964 screwball romcom, hysterical but badly dated. It’s actually a remake of 1941’s “It Started with Eve”. Time for a new one.
  • On the Town – Great Broadway musical hacked by censors into an uneven movie. Remake from the original stage version.

Do you have any candidates for either list?

Borehood?

Posted on by under Movies

Hitchcock,_AlfredSir Alfred Hitchcock was credited with saying, “Drama is life with the dull bits cut out.”* Hard to argue with that, especially since its source is arguably the least boring filmmaker of them all. Still, I’ve always wondered what happened to those “dull bits.”

This week, I think I found out.

boyhoodThis post could get me into trouble, but I have to get this thought out of my neurons. The Academy Award nominated Best Picture, “Boyhood”, while a laudable piece of logistics, makes for agonizingly boring viewing. You’d think you could find 2¾ hours of material in a 12-year span of a kid’s life that would be gripping enough to keep my attention.

You’d be wrong. Thank goodness for the fast forward button.

There’s a certain hubris required to make a movie that’s almost three hours long. Some directors have (or had) it and pulled it off: Kubrick and Peter Jackson, to name a couple who succeeded. The former because of his genius, the latter because of his rich source material, courtesy of Tolkien who supplied the genius in that case.

Others are less successful. I’ve already noted Mr. Nolan in these virtual pages. I think I can now safely add Mr. Linklater. Both are obviously gifted filmmakers. They’ve proved as much in previous films.

I’m not suggesting that “Boyhood” is a bad film. Who the heck am I to make such a presumptuous claim? I’m just saying it’s dull as dirt. It makes me wonder, who was this movie made for, the creator or the viewer?

The concept is undoubtedly exceptional. Much of the obviously improvised dialog is engaging. But it’s the “dull bits” of life. There’s nothing really new being said. The film’s notoriety seems to be riding on a single gimmick, albeit a brilliant gimmick. If this film had been shot all at the same time with different actors playing the aging youthful roles (the only ones that show marked change), would it have received the acclaim it has? I’m guessing no. It would be just another tired coming-of-age story.

russianarkThere’s another, less well-known film that deserves similar praise for its use of an even more innovative device. “Russian Ark” is a 99-minute movie that was made in one continuous shot. That’s right, no “cut”, no edits, no stopping the camera at all. It’s ingenious, inventive, amazing. It’s also excruciatingly tedious to view. The Mona Lisa is fantastic, but I don’t want to stare at it for 99 minutes, never mind 165.

I’ve seen longer and slower movies that didn’t bore me. The aforementioned Mr. Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey” is the classic example. (That’s why a clever Mad magazine spoof of it was called “201 Minutes of Space Idiocy”.) It’s long and it’s slow, yet I’m entranced by its entirety.

straightstoryI adore movies that take time to tell their stories. If that story is compelling, if the characters are engaging, they can take all the time they want.

  • The Straight Story
  • The Trip to Bountiful
  • The Conversation
  • The Elephant Man
  • Koyaanisqatsi

These are all among my favorite films. They all unfold at a leisurely – some might say plodding – pace but never bore me for a second. Why? Maybe it’s just me.

“Boyhood” feels a lot like life – an admirable accomplishment – but hardly groundbreaking. Every good movie should feel like life in some way or another. The problem is, if I want to view life as it presents itself, I don’t have to go to the theater or watch TV.

It’s happening all around me, with far more interesting people than populate “Boyhood”.

*The great auteur also made the observation that, “The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder.” A lot depends on the bladder of the viewer. In my case, “Boyhood” failed that test as well.