ChristyLemire Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Documentaries Are Better?
Filed under: Documentary », Critical Thought »
Normally I don't pay much attention to newswire critics, but Tuesday's article by Christy Lemire (Associated Press & Canadian Press) put me in a defensive mood. Lemire has written a piece in which she reflects on the movies she's seen in the first half of 2006, and realizes that her current top ten list is made up primarily of documentaries. I don't reject the declaration that we're experiencing another good year for docs, but since critics have been making this same observation for the pasts several years, it makes you wonder if it's the docs that are getting better or simply the fiction films that are getting worse. Or is it a little of both?
I say that it's neither. Documentaries just always seem universally better than narratives. Because they typically lack artificial elements like acting, plot and dialogue, on which viewers most easily judge the qualities of fiction films, docs are more difficult to analyze. Despite the fact that some docs are misleading and may distort or completely fabricate facts, they always have the perception of reality, and for most people, reality means truth and truth means good.
With most documentaries, the audience is given more than mere entertainment, whether it is taught something, is convinced of something, or prompted to think about something further. In this way, docs are rarely a waste of time, and therefore critics may find it difficult to give them bad reviews. But what about when a doc isn't intent on being educational or insightful? How is it that Dave Chappelle's Block Party is a great film for someone (me) who doesn't necessarily favor the comedy of Chappelle of the music of the film's featured artists?
SXSW: Conversation with Peter Bart
Filed under: SXSW », Paramount », Critical Thought », Tech Stuff », DIY/Filmmaking »
photo by Nicholas Branda
The first full day of the 2006 SXSW Film Festival got off to perplexing start this morning, as AP film critic Christy Lemire's Conversation with Peter Bart produced far too many "WTF?" moments to parse on a Saturday before noon. The venerable Variety editor/cable TV personality/former Paramount chief drew about a 3/4 capacity crowd for his musings on new technology, the culture of celebrity, and the future of filmmaking. It was a frustrating panel; as much as Bart is known (and clearly likes to think of himself) as a "straight shooter", there were at least two incidences this morning where he seemed to directly contradict himself. All throughout, Bart (not unrightfully) glorified his role in Hollywood's most exciting historical moment, but very early on, Bart warned us not to look for a repeat of the American New Wave which he and Robert Evans helped usher and mold. Gesturing somewhere over his shoulder, he said, "All those people over there, the interactive ... with the digital, and the blogging ... [in the 70s], studios were wide open to people at that end of the hall. That surely will never happen again." By the end of the talk, Bart was drawing parallels between the new breed of tech savvy, indie filmmakers and the 70s vanguard, and predicted that the former will soon take over Hollywood the way the latter did so many decades ago. So to recap: young, indie filmmakers are never going to have it as good as they did in the 70s. Also, young, indie filmmakers are about to take over Hollywood, just like they did in the 70s.
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Conan O'Brien Heads for the Big Screen
The Geek Beat: These Too Shall Cast
Insert Caption: The Runaways
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