Last night, I re-lived the bliss of watching the movie that I long ago decided was my all-time favorite movie: The Aviator, with the stunning Leonardo DiCaprio.
It became my favorite movie the minute I walked out of the theater having seen it for the first time. Ever since then, whenever I want someone to get to know me, or whenever I'm in the middle of a deep conversation with a new close friend, I tend to somehow work in an opportunity to quote DiCaprio, as Howard Hughes, repeating: "The way of the future. The way of the future. The way of the future. The way of the future."
If the person I am speaking to finds this funny, then s/he will be able to understand me. If not, then probably not. It's very simple.
What does it say about me, that my "ALL-TIME FAVORITE MOVIE" is The Aviator? Well, I begin to answer this by first pointing you toward my previous favorite movie, before I had seen The Aviator. It was: The English Patient.
For this, the very first blog post in a series where I discuss my favorite movies, we'll have a perfect introduction by comparing The Aviator and The English Patient. Both of these movies have a tragic hero. That is crucial. Both of these movies have a flawed tragic hero, reminiscent of ancient Greek literature. Both of these movies tend toward the romantic, in style, philosophy and substance. Both of these movies are absolutely, breathtakingly gorgeous to watch -- Both movies fill the screen with huge, lucid portraits of landscapes, skies, architecture and masterpieces of human engineering. Both of these movies are masterpieces of cinematography.
Both of these movies have an extremely handsome male lead. Both of these movies have a quirky, unusual, melodramatic, introspective, fearful and socially awkward male character as the lead. And the things he must do! to make us love him. In both cases.
Both of these movies have Drama, with a capital D. Some would argue that both of these movies are overly dramatic and overly romantic -- that they veer so far from realism that they are unbearable. In their very unbearableness, they are both beautiful. Whether it is an apocalyptic small plane crash where the roofs of Los Angeles are torn in two and burst aflame, or a poetic dialogue between two lovers trapped in a dark car while a desert sandstorm gusts around them, the scenes in these movies will echo eternally in the walls of your imagination. They will not let you go.
Isn't the height of good Drama just fundamentally defined by how readily you are taken away from the mundane and lifted up into an experience that challenges your imagination? Your mind must burn new neural territory in order to accomodate how alive this makes you feel, and in order to burnish words for the new aesthetic you have been given.
So -- that's a nice introduction, isn't it? But let's talk just a little bit about why The Aviator is better than The English Patient.
First of all, The English Patient has a weaker plot. It relies on the adaptation of a book; the adaptation was much better than the book, (yes, I read it) --it kept the romantic magic the author intended. It just didn't translate in terms of the action into a movie. The action becomes, in the movie, a story of a love affair and a cuckolded husband, set against a backdrop of a war. The war becomes the most important character, and the moral message of "War is Evil" does not roll out lightly. No, it thunders down. The war/Evil character is primarily responsible for what befalls everyone in the movie. The burns on the patient; the bombing of loved ones; the missing thumbs; even the fatal union of the lovers is shaped by war. The war/Evil is so obviously the lowest, most morally wrong of all the wrongs that could be -- so much so that the affair, and the harm it does to the cuckolded husband, become forgivable and seem less wrong. They are let off the hook completely.
Which, in turn, (deeply analyzing the plot at this point, so follow along with me), almost destroys the weight of the problem for the two lovers. You may think that the lovers are driving the plot, but you see, they're not really. How could it be so important for them to stay apart, given what's going on with the war? --The plot is weak. Upon repeated viewings it becomes tiresome.
Ralph Fiennes is damned good and Kristin Scott Thomas earned my lifelong admiration. I have never been able to forget the charm of Naveen Andrews. I love the movie still, and I'll keep it on my favorites list. But it definitely got knocked down several bars as time went on and I saw more movies.
The Aviator is breathless and literally, awesome. The planes alone -- the engineering -- make the film worth watching. Right from the start you are treated to triumphant scenes. Hughes informs his new CFO that he's standing looking at the "largest private airforce in the entire world." So right away you get the scope of it. The planes swoop and duck, and sometimes you get this amazing angle as if you were in one of the planes yourself! Cate Blanchett steps in to play Katharine Hepburn, and you feel that as a movie viewer you have suddenly gone to Heaven without having died. DiCaprio makes you know Hughes, makes you know not only Hughes' temper and stridency, passion and vulnerability, but also his shyness, his nightmares, and his inner ego. I have never in all my life felt like I could live inside another human's brain as much as DiCaprio allowed me permission to live inside Hughes'. And I relate to Hughes. I relate to him because anyone with a big heart would have to relate to him. We've all been that vulnerable at some point. We've all wished we were that powerful.
Plot, as far as it goes, in this movie takes on one of my criteria for "HIGHLY SUCCESSFUL DIRECTING;" which is to say, it is subtle and nuanced. I can't even sum up the plot in a few sentences. I might be able to say that it is a biopic of Howard Hughes, which is vague enough not to touch the plot question, but avoid it altogether! Or, I might be able to sum up the plot in a few paragraphs. That's the range. For example, I might write a paragraph about each of these questions: is it a movie about competing airlines? Is it a movie about United States history? Is it about obsessive-compulsive disorder? Is it a love story? Is it about Hollywood? Is it about money and greed, power and fame? Holy shit, buddy: it's about all of those things and more. This movie is, in short, epic. It's epic because it's directed by Martin Scorsese. He has a knack for making things larger than life, nuanced, and unforgettable. I'll write more on the perfect partnership of Scorsese and DiCaprio soon, when I discuss another fave, The Gangs of New York.
There are so many scenes in this movie that I could rave about. I don't know what excited me more: the sweeping interior of a Hollywood lounge, the plane crash scene mentioned above, the lights of nighttime LA as Cate and Leo glide above it in a gentle airplane motion (that you as the viewer can actually feel, like you're back in childhood riding the Peter Plan flight ride at Disneyland), or the horror of the dank red theater in which Hughes slides into craziness, growing wolflike and repeating his instructions for milk delivery into the void. This movie is SO big in my imagination. It takes me to SO many different places, unreal places, vivid dreamscapes. It satisfies me intellectually, too -- when Hughes takes the microphone into his overscrubbed fingers and charges Senator Brewster with corruption, this is quite a bit more than a history lesson. The movie is political, and DiCaprio is at his best in those scenes.
Shall I go on? On a personal note, the scene when Hughes burns all of his clothing after Hepburn walks out on him will always move my heart. On a technical note, the scene where Hughes is barraged by cameras for the debut of his movie, and bulbs are smoking, popping and exploding all around him, is the best piece of cinematography that I have ever witnessed.
If you don't believe me, watch it again.
So we have powerful acting, (of the highest caliber -- the kind that makes you intimate with the characters), nuanced direction, action-packed and complex screenwriting, layered and intellectual plotlines, unforgettable cinematography, and stellar stylistic design from head to toe. It has the best ending to a film that I can possibly imagine, with one the most ironic and memorable lines of dialogue for its concluding sequence.
One last thing: The Aviator bears watching again. And again. And again.
Showing posts with label favoritesProject. Show all posts
Showing posts with label favoritesProject. Show all posts
Saturday, September 1, 2012
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Preliminary List of Favorite Movies
OK. So this is what I've done: gone through other various lists I had of "favorite movies." Combined them. Added one or two based on some considered thought about what I'm going to do with this project. I had 24 at this point.
Then I added one more to make it 25, which feels like a nice number. Alphabetized it. And here we go. Now we have a list to work with for this project. Am I guaranteeing that this is the exact list of all my favorites and that I haven't forgotten any? No. Will I add to this over time? Definitely.
Then I added one more to make it 25, which feels like a nice number. Alphabetized it. And here we go. Now we have a list to work with for this project. Am I guaranteeing that this is the exact list of all my favorites and that I haven't forgotten any? No. Will I add to this over time? Definitely.
What makes a favorite?
I've been thinking about criteria. What qualities do I love in a "really really really good" movie, and how many of those have to be in the movie before I call it "favorite"?
Well, let's get more specific. For example, what if I said that "good acting" was very important to me? Wouldn't that be too simple? There are hundreds of movies that contain good acting. So as an example, this illustrates that for me to say a film is a favorite of mine, it would have to contain more than merely good acting. It should have good acting and good directing -- right? And is that sufficient? Doubtful.
Plus, these would be too simple if they were generalized. This is still not specific enough. What makes "good acting," and what makes "great acting"? What makes the acting SO great that the actor disappears, and the character becomes a person you know, a seemingly real flesh and blood person, a person you sympathize with or despise or dream about?
So there must be a list of criteria -- and well-defined very specific criteria -- that a movie has to meet before it rises from the level of "a movie I enjoyed," or "a good movie," to one that I will cherish, carry with me in my heart, watch again and again, plead with friends to watch, and turn to as if it were itself a friend.
And what is more, I want to tell you, I don't think every favorite of mine meets every one of the criteria. There may be some favorites where certain criteria are carrying so much weight that the others can go the wayside. For example, is plot important in "Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle," which is a biopic of Dorothy Parker as dark and grimly comic as the great lady herself? Is not mood much more important in a film like that?
I think that the aims of the movie have to be taken into account when weighting the criteria. And I'm telling you all this now because it will save me having to justify it later. We all know that Tom Cruise is not a "great" actor by any means. But what he accomplishes in "Top Gun" could not have been done by anybody else and transformed that movie from a one-summer blockbuster into a modern classic. If you were a screenwriter and you storyboarded Casablanca and you storyboarded Top Gun and you put them right alongside each other, you would see many similarities, because plotwise and structurewise they are nearly the same. Each of these films has the elements of a classic -- built into their scripts. That is to say, each has a script formulated according to the rules of screenwriting. They don't deviate much from these rules. The very aim of the movie is a classic rise and fall, with all those little moments along the way that seem like organic cues for emotion even though they are scripted. However, there are so many movies that aim for classic status. What makes it something you can watch again and again has more to do with the success of the actors to bring the script to life, to see what is called for -- in this formula! -- and give the viewer an experience that is more than formulaic. Each of these films is highly predictable, and yet, in some way not. Because the main character in each feels like a real person. So, I will argue even when it comes to the basics, like acting, the criteria must be considered according to the aims of the movie itself.
And one other point about criteria. I have known films that I have loved very much based on one criterion or two, but I could never call them a "favorite" despite this fact. That would be a scenario where there's a negative criterion. Something that should have been good enough but wasn't -- something that was so terrible that it brought the whole thing down on its knees. God, there are so many films like that. You often see great actors wasted, or great scripts wasted. I'll give you just one sweet example of this. "Brokeback Mountain." My oh my. Talk about great acting! Those were characters that I literally, still dream about. And you have great directing, great cinematography, etcetera etcetera -- many positives. But you have one major negative. Which is mood. And folks, this is MY blog. Perhaps you can have favorite movies that you'll watch again and again where the mood of the movie doesn't factor in. Perhaps mood ain't one of your criteria. But for me it is. It is very, very important and it'll probably be one of the first things I write about for each of these precious babies.
I'm not saying the mood has to be 'upbeat' or any such hogwash. But why on earth would I ever want to watch "Brokeback Mountain" more than the 3 times I've already seen it, when I know for a fact that the central experience of watching the film is to feel absolutely devastated?
By this I am trying to point out that, whatever its other qualities, each movie is an experience, just like any other sort of thing you can experience in this life, and when it claims a couple hours of your life, it becomes your reality for a short while. If you are a true film lover, a bona fide movie buff, you know exactly what I mean when I say there are some experiences you don't want to have more than once. Or maybe -- maybe -- twice. A 'favorite' movie has to be, for me, an experience I want to repeat over and over and over again. For the rest of my life.
Well, let's get more specific. For example, what if I said that "good acting" was very important to me? Wouldn't that be too simple? There are hundreds of movies that contain good acting. So as an example, this illustrates that for me to say a film is a favorite of mine, it would have to contain more than merely good acting. It should have good acting and good directing -- right? And is that sufficient? Doubtful.
Plus, these would be too simple if they were generalized. This is still not specific enough. What makes "good acting," and what makes "great acting"? What makes the acting SO great that the actor disappears, and the character becomes a person you know, a seemingly real flesh and blood person, a person you sympathize with or despise or dream about?
So there must be a list of criteria -- and well-defined very specific criteria -- that a movie has to meet before it rises from the level of "a movie I enjoyed," or "a good movie," to one that I will cherish, carry with me in my heart, watch again and again, plead with friends to watch, and turn to as if it were itself a friend.
And what is more, I want to tell you, I don't think every favorite of mine meets every one of the criteria. There may be some favorites where certain criteria are carrying so much weight that the others can go the wayside. For example, is plot important in "Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle," which is a biopic of Dorothy Parker as dark and grimly comic as the great lady herself? Is not mood much more important in a film like that?
I think that the aims of the movie have to be taken into account when weighting the criteria. And I'm telling you all this now because it will save me having to justify it later. We all know that Tom Cruise is not a "great" actor by any means. But what he accomplishes in "Top Gun" could not have been done by anybody else and transformed that movie from a one-summer blockbuster into a modern classic. If you were a screenwriter and you storyboarded Casablanca and you storyboarded Top Gun and you put them right alongside each other, you would see many similarities, because plotwise and structurewise they are nearly the same. Each of these films has the elements of a classic -- built into their scripts. That is to say, each has a script formulated according to the rules of screenwriting. They don't deviate much from these rules. The very aim of the movie is a classic rise and fall, with all those little moments along the way that seem like organic cues for emotion even though they are scripted. However, there are so many movies that aim for classic status. What makes it something you can watch again and again has more to do with the success of the actors to bring the script to life, to see what is called for -- in this formula! -- and give the viewer an experience that is more than formulaic. Each of these films is highly predictable, and yet, in some way not. Because the main character in each feels like a real person. So, I will argue even when it comes to the basics, like acting, the criteria must be considered according to the aims of the movie itself.
And one other point about criteria. I have known films that I have loved very much based on one criterion or two, but I could never call them a "favorite" despite this fact. That would be a scenario where there's a negative criterion. Something that should have been good enough but wasn't -- something that was so terrible that it brought the whole thing down on its knees. God, there are so many films like that. You often see great actors wasted, or great scripts wasted. I'll give you just one sweet example of this. "Brokeback Mountain." My oh my. Talk about great acting! Those were characters that I literally, still dream about. And you have great directing, great cinematography, etcetera etcetera -- many positives. But you have one major negative. Which is mood. And folks, this is MY blog. Perhaps you can have favorite movies that you'll watch again and again where the mood of the movie doesn't factor in. Perhaps mood ain't one of your criteria. But for me it is. It is very, very important and it'll probably be one of the first things I write about for each of these precious babies.
I'm not saying the mood has to be 'upbeat' or any such hogwash. But why on earth would I ever want to watch "Brokeback Mountain" more than the 3 times I've already seen it, when I know for a fact that the central experience of watching the film is to feel absolutely devastated?
By this I am trying to point out that, whatever its other qualities, each movie is an experience, just like any other sort of thing you can experience in this life, and when it claims a couple hours of your life, it becomes your reality for a short while. If you are a true film lover, a bona fide movie buff, you know exactly what I mean when I say there are some experiences you don't want to have more than once. Or maybe -- maybe -- twice. A 'favorite' movie has to be, for me, an experience I want to repeat over and over and over again. For the rest of my life.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Coming Soon: The Favorites Project
Hello to my few faithful readers!
I am very excited to announce that I am going to embark on a new project in this blog, which will be very much a departure from what I've done previously. I have decided to undertake a serious critical examination of my "favorite" films, and ask myself why they are my favorites, and attempt to list and describe detailed criteria.
Aren't you excited?!?
Scroll down to the bottom of the screen to get an idea of SOME of the movies I consider favorites. Of course, one asks, how many are there? Out of thousands of films I have viewed, there are probably only 20 or so that I consider favorites. So far.
I am very excited to announce that I am going to embark on a new project in this blog, which will be very much a departure from what I've done previously. I have decided to undertake a serious critical examination of my "favorite" films, and ask myself why they are my favorites, and attempt to list and describe detailed criteria.
Aren't you excited?!?
Scroll down to the bottom of the screen to get an idea of SOME of the movies I consider favorites. Of course, one asks, how many are there? Out of thousands of films I have viewed, there are probably only 20 or so that I consider favorites. So far.
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