[lit-ideas] Re: Decisions, decisions

  • From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 21:05:39 +0100 (BST)

>It occurred to me
> that many movies (and many short stories and novels) illustrate
> philosophical themes, 

This remark seems so correct to me, and its denial so wrong, that it might be
asked whether list-members want to name movies etc. that they think
illustrate no "philosophical themes" whatever? [Such a counter-example would
be interesting on a number of levels].

>but of course people will choose ones they also
> like and think are good.

Yes: but again I suggest we try to think in terms of counter-examples - are
there films I think are good but don't like [unfortunately this question
leads into more sophisticated ones - like what degree or kind of like? etc].
(I used to like, as in enjoy, some subtitled continental movies, but now
switch off many for lack of enjoyment even though I am far from thinking this
means they are not "good" - I am sure some are). - 'La Dolce Vita' may be
gripping at age 18-21 but seem rather tired and predictable ten years on,
when a kitsh classic like 'The Baby' might grip like a vice.

Conversely while I think Godfather PtII is truly excellent a movie, maybe the
best of the last thirty years, I did not even like it (or think it that good)
when I first saw it - and while I now think it is good, there are films that
are far less excellent from which I now would get more enjoyment, certainly
in the sense of immediate pleasure such as laughter and shock/stimulation
value. The truth is that Godfather PtII is to me a work of art and enjoyable
as such despite the demands it makes on the viewer (and they are many, the
film I believe to be only partly comprehensible to most at first or second
viewing). Bob Dylan isn't,  as Clinton said when BD got his Kennedy Award,
always pleasing on the ears. But qua art there is more to his work than many
more enjoyable artists, and when you get the art the enjoyment - of a kind -
follows.

The Beatles are probably the only entity (after Sinatra's hey-day) who were
both the best and most popular at what they did - but again the level of
their music that excited immediate appreciation and popularity is not perhaps
the same level that one appreciates when understanding why they were the
best.
(After all they gave up touring because the screaming crowds were drowning
out the music). And if the level of the music (being appreciated) is the same
in either case, the level of the appreciation surely isn't the same.

This again invites the distinction between art as stimulant of pleasure etc
and art as art/technique, and the ubiquitous trade-offs that seem to follow
between art as art and art as commerce.

Donal
London


        
        
                
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