On Film Criticism.

I know I've been gone for a while but in truth the Japanese left arm theory is turning into a whole freaking book and has more to do with culture shock on a global level and I wasn't really prepared for that.

I want to talk about film criticism today. Not just the men and women who "critique" movies for your local paper/news broadcast/radio shows, but actual film criticism. Most of you probably aren't aware that while there are quite a few people out there who have made a career out of deeming a film "good" or "bad" or presenting it with a number of gold stars, much the same way my second grade teacher kept discipline, there are also people who take the time not only to watch a film, but to comment on it with more than a blurb explaining who's in it and why it happens to get the rating it does. This isn't new.

I went to the University of Nevada Las Vegas (HOLY SHIT I'M NAME DROPPING) and while I was there I took a film criticism class. At the time I couldn't properly quantify how hot the fires of my hatred burned for that class. Later, after re-reading the class text, doing research, and more reading on my own, I realized this was due in large part to the person who was "teaching" the class. So, I had to ask myself, what is film criticism? I mean, doesn't anyone who views a movie in some way decide whether their time was well spent and come up with at least rudimentary reasons as to their decision? The short answer is: Yes. But "Josh Duhamel is teh hot!" isn't film criticism, and don't let any air time hogging yutz with a gimmick try and sell you on their "credibility" as a critic if they have nothing more to say than: "they had good chemistry" or "the character's motivations didn't make any sense" or happens to be this kid

Reviewing a film is a completely different monster than critiquing it. A review doesn't add anything to the experience of watching the film. You get a cliff note of the screen time and that’s it. A critique adds to the experience of sitting down with a movie and really breaking into it. Some critiques pick a cultural mind set or an angle of exploration and discovery based on a set of theories or hypothesis laid out by quite a long history of film critics. So you ask: What are the general schools of thought within film criticism?

So glad you asked... (just a heads up in the name of full disclosure, my room is a mess and I cannot find my stupid film theory book, which is actually a really good book. So I'm getting this info off Wikipedia. DO NOT just accept my word as law. Educate yourself. Get information from as many sources as possible. I play a gnome Mage in World of Warcraft for god’s sake! I'm no expert.)

Wikipedia is for lazy people who don't want to clean their room.

I am going to go in depth into any of them except for “Auteur Theory” because honestly let’s face it, cinema is too much for any one person to be the sole driving creative force. Yes, one man on a carriage controls the reins of many horses, but without the horses, he is a guy sitting on a wooden box going nowhere. Yes, the Director can very often come through in the work they helm, but the general idea is like reality television: what used to be true has gotten blown so out of shape and proportion by an uncountable number of self important blowhards that it’s difficult to discern actual directors who can be properly dissected with this school of thought from those directors who just get hard or wet calling themselves "auteurs" with a shitty fake French accent. I can call myself a Smurf when I wear a blue shirt, but it doesn't make that shit true.

Check these things out. There are many more schools of thought than presented in the Wiki article and most likely, with the invention of the internet, there are more and more people presenting their views on a daily basis.

My favorite form of film theory/criticism happens about ten seconds after the film ends and the group of people I am with start pulling it apart. This can go on for a few minutes or all night. The first time I saw District 9 the group I went with ended up talking about the film for about four and a half hours. We made mental taffy out of that film. I'm not saying this school of thought and reflection will produce intellectual revelations you can cement forever as a well thought out discourse on the nature of film, but for most folks it’s a much more honest and raw way of dealing with what we experience. And I suppose you could try and force a discourse but I think the discussions that happen naturally are a clearer indicator of not only the quality of a film but the types of people you see it with.

If you’re interested in sort of a homework assignment, see ”Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”, and “The Social Network”. These are both stories about massive, incalculable levels of power, and how they are gained and used. Pay attention to how the writers and directors emphasize wardrobe, setting, and lighting to present similar themes.

Both films deal with characters that desperately want to be admitted to circles of power. They deal with acts of betrayal, alienation, disconnection from peer groups, and paranoia. Both films use major turning points in the last ten years to take a look at two completely different generations and, most likely completely by accident, you get a rather interesting picture of the major elements causing strife between those trying to stay in power and those who are coming into it as they grow up. And yet both stories begin and end on roughly the same emotional notes. Characters who have found themselves on the receiving end of an ass kicking make their way to a place where they realize that personal connection is a defining characteristic that they understand the least but desire the most.

Hollywood and the Internet

Anime and Japanese art theory discussion coming soon. Till then I present for you my take on the sad, backwards, and totally unnecessary battle between Hollywood and the Internet.  You might be saying to yourself "But Fish! Hollywood and the Internet are the bestest of friends, why I just saw them at the coffee house I frequent not because they make good coffee (bleagh!) but because they have the free wireless and I love me some Hulu (till I have to pay for it.) and they were totally making out in the corner with little concern for the general public. To this statement I say they were making out in the corner specifically to make you uncomfortable, trying to prove that they are in fact still a happy couple and not having deep seated and troubling emotional problems at home...where in point of fact they do not make out, which is sad cause Hollywood has a sweet apartment (its rent controlled).

Hollywood has been trying to convince you that video on the net is for sicko's, criminals, and borderline psychopaths. I am willing to amend this statement if anyone can so me video on the web being used for positive awesomeness in a Hollywood film but until that time my examples are as follows.

In Never back down (this film is decidedly not very good. Think "The Karate Kid" meets a steaming pile of mediocrity.) , the kids who wanna fight use Youtube to show off and if I remember correctly schedule events where guys who never bleed, get bruised or hurt permanently in any way, beat on each other till floozies sex them at the after party.

In Untraceable the whole plot centers around collections of shocking and often VERY disturbing video collections on the web. Yes the film leans very strong on the "internet is for sickos and freaks" button. which is sad cause other than that it was a pretty decent film. Gross but decent.

In Kick Ass The titular hero ends up on Youtube doing his thing. EVERYONE (including your grandparents...don't ask) watches his videos. seriously I think he racks up like 65 trillion views...gee golly gosh people on the internet love to watch cellphone videos of people getting the shit kicked out of them.

Then there are the professionally made films that attempt to imitate amateur film making. I make no judgment as to the quality of these films i just want to point out that this genre does exist. Examples include REC, Cloverfield, Blair Witch Project, and many others.

Now some of you may be saying "But Fish what about the dancers communicating though Youtube in Step Up 2?" And my response to that is "Damn you talk a lot during MY article but you make an interesting point. Basically Jon Chu is an outlying factor in this particular debate, he makes movies that are released in theaters (of which I refuse to go into quality debates on. People dance and make life decisions based around their desire to dance. You know where you stand on this particular issue Trust me.) But he also has embraced the internet culture of film and art creation and distribution. So yes technically speaking my point is flawed but its my article so I'ma finish making my point.

So why would Hollywood want to make this anti Youtube, anti internet video distribution theme at all? Because they have NO CLUE why ticket sales are dropping through the floor. Seriously look at the numbers, its scaring the shit out of the accountants that run the industry, mostly because accountants know next to nothing about emotional investment, artistic expression, or creative honesty. Which is how we end up with Scary Movie 1-4, Date/Epic/Super Hero/Disaster Movie and now Vampires Suck. They make just enough money to keep Aaron Seltzer and Jason Friedburg in the business of force feeding people shit sandwiches.

These aren't the only guys who are churning out soulless crap because it makes more financial sense than it does artistic sense. MGM is in huge financial trouble right now and chose to cancel its next James Bond film. A major movie studio with the rights to one of America's longest and culturally recognized icons decided the best way to deal with financial problems was to NOT make a product they could sell. This is a course of action that would have lead to things like Easy Rider, THX 1138, and a bunch of other American classics never being made.

And here in my opinion lies the first major problem Hollywood faces. The truly creative people have next to no power in Hollywood anymore. The money guys hold all the cards and the money is all they care about. They have little to know demonstrated understanding of the relationship between quality and profit and have spent almost thee decades creating a large group of consumers who have grown accustomed to the shit that gets churned out on a regular basis, but don't really care that much because its Hollywood's job to fuck them out of ten or more dollars.

The same goes for television. More often than not when my friends and acquaintances find a show they love they automatically assume it will be canceled by the end of the season (or ASAP). This doesn't count for LOST because LOST is for television what Transformers 2 was for film. Periods of time that made noise and showed you screens of shifting colors that you could apply what ever logic, plot, or character you liked. You might have thought you were watching something that was scripted or created by people who had a story to tell but what you were actually watching was the cinematic equivalent of a Rorschach test. Everyone saw something different because in truth there was never anything of structure to see, it needed human input to be turned into something and there in lies the financial brilliance of Transformers and the very possible artistic brilliance of LOST. (I still refuse to watch it all because from end of season 1 on I knew what they were trying to do and if I wanted to mentally masturbate I'd stick a vibrator in my ear.).

The truth of the matter is this: Hollywood through film and television is catering to the Lowest Common Denominator and that was floating the industry financially for a really long time. For a great period of years it allowed them enough financial freedom to let some of the more artistic and experimental creative types to float some truly fantastic shit under the general public's nose, but in the end this market strategy had unintended consequences. Explosive growth in technology, the price of said technology and the dramatic drop in distribution difficulty. You no longer had to be independently wealthy to make film. And over the last few years EVERYONE has been filming stuff. Yes most of it is dogs or cats doing stupid shit, or guys getting kicked in the nuts. 90% of anything is bound to be crap, and on the internet that other 10% is SO SO SO SO SO worth it. Think about what you like to read and watch, there is someone out there who is making movies and shows probably for free about that. Trust me, its so cheap and easy now that its almost a crime not to express yourself.

So over the last few years while Hollywood was busy giving us "movie" movies, the audience who used to KNOW that genre was either Comedy, Drama, Horror, Romance, or Sci-fi. Their Audience used to wait breathlessly for season premiers and movie releases because they had nothing better to do. Now they check out the over 100 YEARS of video uploaded to Youtube A DAY. That's just the content on one site. Now add in all the sites out there by actual studios of various size and content production that have their own sites or other video collection and distribution sites. An you have more content than any human will be able to watch EVER. No season breaks, no dry spells, if you are looking for something to watch, you will find it and odds are if you look long enough you will find something you will love forever.

Now its pretty understandable that Hollywood would be smart enough to NEVER even dream of competing with over a hundred years of new FREE data that is created and distributed DAILY. But looking at the above examples and Hollywood's obsession with "shaky cam" its pretty obvious they are trying to make some kind of statement. And what is that statement? I offer the filtered version as I have understood it. "We don't understand this behemoth of culture that has been birthed but we can imitate it so there is little to no reason to stop paying for content distributed in a theater. Please come back to films, we look just like the stuff your watching online and thats cool right?....guys?...hello?"

The fundamental problem with this is that the content on Youtube is FREE, and there is a never ending supply of it. How stupid do you have to be to try and compete with something that is infinite, and FREE, specifically by trying to imitate it? Hollywood should be competing with the internet by providing a higher quality product created by skilled people with drive. The Lowest Common Denominator now entertains themselves. Hollywood should be making nothing but ART now. because nuts shots are free but I've never seen anything remotely close to Inception on Youtube.

So why aren't they doing that? Because Hollywood isn't aware that they are slipping further and further out of date. Countries all around the world are starting to make more and more of their own films. The sad fact of the matter is that Hollywood missed the entertainment revolution and now the profits are seeping out to the masses. Now is not the time for multimillion dollar movies. with actors and crew paid seven or eight figure salaries for a few months work. Those days are gone, everyone's just lying to themselves about it now. Its time for Hollywood to change, we have to find a new financial reality so that people can keep working, keep creating. Because the products they used to sell are being created and shared for free by the old audience. Its time to make something they can't, at a reasonable sustainable price. Once they figure that out, internet could have a Billion years of video a second and people will still go to movies faithfully and happily.

The corporate world of marketing and advertising is a different battle all together. But that's an article for a different day.

Blame Lundon, and a rambling introduction to my thoughts on Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World

Welcome to the first week of Blame Lundon. The "When ever I feel like it, but very probably weekly" commentary on film, culture, politics, toys, alcohol, tipping your waitress, day jobs, chocolate, farming, games, swimming pools, sheep, ninjas, pirates, robots, monkeys, vacations, caffeine, the proper way to skin a cat, raising children, boating accidents, marshmallows and Taco Bell. Truthfully a large portion of the above paragraph was total BS.

As this is my first article and the film is pretty fresh in my mind we are going to be taking about Scott Pilgrim. 15 SPOILERS on a dead critics chest, yo ho ho and a bottle of...what am I drinking right now anyway?  Cruzan Vanilla Rum mixed with Pepsi. HA I'm a pirate tonight!

So...Scott Pilgrim. Its gonna be hard for me to talk about the film purely from the perspective of the film on its own because what you have is a film directly targeted at what American Business would call a "limited" audience. My parents will not get the same thing out of the film that I got. From the general sampling of the "mass" media I took after the film came out, the Nintendo generation is ready to see this film at midnight every saturday for the next ten years unfortunately kicking Rocky Horror Picture Show out of all its old haunts. But for most folks who didn't grow up on Nintendo hard games, and most "average" folks born before 1975 view this film with the exact same confusion and general contempt they view the people who see it and/or the comics the film is based on as a sort of bible, or metaphorical mirror of their reality. So what you have here is something akin to the Twilight Saga but for a much smaller WAY more dedicated audience that "gets it". if you find yourself saying "I don't get it" do not worry, Scott Pilgrim is kind of the deep end of the pool and your admitting you don't know how to swim. Stick around in a week or two I'll put together a list of beginner, intermediate, and advanced cultural elements and icons of the "Nintendo Generation" so for those of you who are interested can explore.

So having said that what the hell was the movie about?

Simply put its the heart felt, romantic comedy, action adventure, coming of age, comic book movie that details the surreal journey of one shy, often clueless, 24 year old geek who's ultimate goal in life is to be Awesome. For those of you who have seen a movie or two in the last 33 years (25 May 1977 guess the film! ) , you are probably assuming that the "Awesome" that Scott Pilgrim wants to be includes saving the "world" mentioned in the title. And you would be entirely wrong, the world at large is largely unaffected by Scott's journey of personal growth. Self respect and respect of women are the two core messages in Scott Pilgrim. And while this is true the bells and whistles that dress that message up all nice and pretty so you can take it out to the club are the bread and butter of the film.

My review of the film:  I really enjoyed the film. well worth the money I paid to see it. Keep in mind I've been look forward to this film sense I heard it was being made so that probably makes me one the youngins with the ADD.

Elements I was fascinated by or interested in outside of cultural references:

Every straight man or lesbian in Scott Pilgrim is either an self centered idiot, a chauvinistic asshole, or just plain annoying ( Unless you include the men in Sex Bob-Omb then I'm just full of shit.) Scott Pilgrim's character arc is to not be a self centered idiot, a chauvinistic asshole, or just plain annoying. In the end he makes some simple efforts to become a better human being and we get awesome flashy fight scenes, kick ass music, and nifty graphics, awesome lines of dialogue, and fantastic visuals

Straight women and gay men on the other hand are smart, strong willed, and opinionated with out being combative, Sadly this is not true for the women who are romantically connected to Scott Pilgrim. These women are either not yet fully realized as people or are self centered, assholes, and/or just plain annoying. Though Knives does reach a sort of self actualization in the end when she no longer lusts after Scott. His ex girlfriend is the embodiment of shallow and Ramona carries around her baggage almost like a trophy of the hard road she has walked, which she admits herself was a road of her own making.

Scott and Ramona make a lot of thematic and generational sense as a couple. Both characters are no where close to fully formed people, their parents are non existent, and they like so many others from their generation face the world alone with only minimal advice or interference from those who gave birth to them. They explore each others issues without the luxury of open honest communication, revealing major information about their situations and personalities long after the information would have been useful. The film plays these behaviors for laughs but all you need to do is watch reality television or talk to someone in high school or a sophomore in college to see that its a disturbingly common social behavior.

Here's the Rotten Tomato Page. And remind me later to talk about the guy who talks about his "critic hat" falling off cause he was having to much fun...SPOILER ALERT: Fuck that guy for insinuating that having fun at a film makes you incapable of approaching it intellectually or from a critical perspective. Mindsets like that ruin this shit for everyone. Why fuck over not only yourself, but the people who made the movie by attaching a sense of "failure" to enjoyment. If you wanna be like that then save ten bucks and stay home. I think I would quit watching and making films if I ever made it my main goal to fight against being emotionally involved in something I was watching.

There it is. The first Article on Blame Lundon. Comments make the world go round. Have film you would like me to review? Comment Bellow. I have netflix and am willing to hunt down rarer elements of cinematic history. So old or new make your suggestions. Unless something more interesting presents itself come back Wednesday for an article on Godzilla, Final Fantasy 7 Advent Children, my "hero's left arm" theory and the obsession in Japanese film and anime to present an alternative explanation for the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Jesse "Fish" Simpson