I even care about one of the movies — the one about Bob Dylan — though I haven't gone out to see it, not yet at least. But I have to recognize that I don't care about present-day movie directors. They're not these giants of the culture like they were in past decades, not to me anyway. I cared when David Lynch died, and I never even particularly liked his movies. But he was an important cultural figure, and I felt interested and reverent about that. Maybe it's me, and I'm getting not just old but very old.
What do you think? Have we lost something? Is there any way back? Or should we not even want to go back — back to that era of giants. I know Francis Ford Coppola had a movie this year. He's one of the giants, one of the names that used to come up time and again in the nomination lists. But he's not there this year, nor was he expected. Nobody liked his magnum opus. Hollywood is not growing giants anymore, and it has no use for magna opera.
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Since the Oscars demand a certain diversity quota be met prior to even considering a film for an award, they have kind of kneecapped themselves regarding cultural relevance.
Hollywood has followed a similar trajectory to all of the media. Never mind star directors - can somebody point out a celebrity that is truly a star actor? They all seem unremarkable to me, as if selected from a pool of conventional people. Nothing about them suggests the character arising from hardship, the drive and ambition to be superior at their craft. Maybe it's a sign of (my) age.
The decline of the movie theatre and the accompanying fragmentation of audiences surely contributes, but IMO the collapse to creativity and artistry, the end of originality, in Hollywood contributes much more. When everything is based on something else, who is doing it matters a lot less.
The only person in Hollywood who really interests me right now--director, actor, writer, the whole bag of monkeys--is Greta Gerwig. There really isn't anybody else worth noting.
Brady Corbet's "The Brutalist" is at least trying to be big (magnum). Vistavision, roadshow presentation, 3 1/2 hours long, projected on film. I had some complaints about the film, particularly towards the end where his subtext overwhelms his text, but still, it was fairly impressive.
The world is diverse - around 8 billion of us at last count. I have written and directed lifetime movies with a number of them that are still in production.
The thing that drives creativity is advances in technology, as new (usually younger) people dabble in that new technology. What is the new technology vis-a-vis movies these days? Maybe everything has been done already. Also, the curtain has been pulled back to reveal what goes on, and it's ugly.
The last thing I think about these days is actually going to a theater to watch a film. Eventually, they find their way to a streaming service.
This is part of the general post-Internet media collapse. It extends to music, news outlets, and serials/old-school TV, too. In my experience some new content is quite good, but it doesn't flow to you, become a water-cooler topic, or self-sort where popularity suggests quality. You must seek it out and slog through a lot of garbage, but nice stuff is still made.
"A Complete Unknown" was terrific, and given the abundance of Dylan's music within the film (all sung by Chalamet, almost too well), seeing it in a theater with a good sound system is recommended. I intend to see the upcoming Led Zeppelin doc in the theater for the same reason.
Life is a movie produced on planet Earth. Most people are, if not enthusiastic, active players in a lifetime production... full of love and striving signifying something.
Right now there are more top tier film directors alive than ever before. Let's see, the Coen Brothers, Christopher Nolan, Paul Thomas Anderson, Quinton Terrentino, David Fincher. Plus a whole slew of great commercially successful artistic vision directors like Wes Anderson, Clint Eastwood, Marty, Spielberg, Oliver Stone, James Cameron, Ridley Scott, Terrace Mallick, Peter Jackson. Werner Herzog is still making movies.
Ann I think you are feeling what most former movie-goers are feeling. Modern day Hollywood is boring, overly violent, overly preachy and lacking originality.
There are only a few directors in this generation that are worth caring about. Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson, maybe Doug Liman because he's crazy. But I have been deeply affected by Lynch's passing, because he was so unique.
The job of a movie director is to make a movie that people will pay to see and cable TV will pay to show.
magna opera
Christopher Nolan is terrific. He wrote and directed "Oppenheimer" which is nearly as good as my "Frankenstein, Part II."
James Mangold directed "Ford v. Ferrari" and that was an exceptionally good movie.
And, fellow Creighton Prep alum, Alexander Payne is a very good writer and director.
Ya know how the left are obsessed with re-creating the political past - with their spin on it? someone needs to make a movie (It would be a dark horror movie) about Crook Joe, and his schemes as VP going back to 2014... all the way up to his ruinous presidency. Not that we want to re-live that right now. no.
But -someone should get busy making it.
I think a few things are at play. There is the fact that any relatively new director will have less recognition than directors that have been around for decades. It is easy to have a bias to what you have known for quite some time. Then there is the fact that the movie industry hasn't recovered from various problems over the past 10 years. #MeToo gutted the industry in good ways and bad. That was followed up by a combination of DEI and message movies which marginalized the audience. The Covid shutdown theaters at a time when younger audiences were already moving towards video games and social media streaming. When you finally go back to the theaters, the writers and actors went on strike. Now, the only movies that make a profit are ones for young children, because parents will pay to play the show over and over for their toddlers and pre-teens. What used to be tent pole blockbusters might breakeven. Everything else is a losing endeavor, and that's before considering most Academy Award movies were niche products.
Finally, the light at the end of the tunnel is a wildfire.
I thought A Complete Unknown was a great movie, primarily because it centered on Dylan's music, and musical evolution. It was front and center for most of the movie.
I went with a friend who wasn't a Dylan fan, and wondered if we would be able to understand any of the lyrics in the songs. Yes, I assured him, he only mumbles when he talks. His lyrics have always been crystal clear.
The name James Mangold is familiar to me for some reason, but I couldn't say why. I hadn't heard of any of the others. Brady Corbett was a child actor in the early 2000s. Maybe he deserves a special Oscar for surviving into his thirties without developing a drug habit (assuming he didn't develop a drug habit).
Coppola may think of Megalopolis as his magnum opus -- maybe even bigger than that (his Jereboam opus?) -- but I don't think anyone else did. Coppola's later movies (Tetro, Twixt, Youth Without Youth) didn't attract much notice at all. Apart from the money and the publicity, is there any reason his new movie should have?
Megalopolus was pretty cringey like heavens gate 30 years later
And The Academy went full retard, imposing even more DEI on movies, such that several popular films from this year are not eligible for awards. Not enough brown people or girlbosses in leading roles. I saw Complete Unknown in the theater and enjoyed it so much I thought it flew by too quickly, despite the longer than average run time. But it didn't have a lot of brown people or girlbosses so...
There is no common culture anymore. Thank God. And Hollywood can make its money catering to foreign audiences and niche audiences in the USA. They can also be who they really are: Leftwing, anti-American, vulgar, and untalented. And still make zillions.
Hollywood also believes in DEI. Not just for Network Execs or Directors, but actors. So, we get POC's shoehorned into roles they don't really fit. And since POCs cant be shown in a bad light, their characters are usually boring.
The hypertext "the nominations were announced a few minutes ago " doesn't go to a list of nominees. It goes to a dead internal URL.
Lets just be honest: The people in Hollywood hate White, Christian America and they always have. Now, they don't have to mute that or hide it. We're not the target audience anymore. That accounts for a lot of their casting choices, and their stories.
"Have we lost something? Is there any way back? "
Yes, we've lost something. Our culture is so framented now that it's hard for film, music and books to have the impact they once had. To some extent it's now new technology that has the cultural impact; the pc, internet, google, smart phone and now AI. But I sense that new technology is starting to lose the wow factor - we now take it for granted that every few years there will be something new.
We can sometimes go back a little way but not all the way. It happened with TV when HBO and Netflix made some great series that everyone saw, but now the streaming market has gotten so fragmented that it's hard to see all the good shows even if you're interested. And occansionally a film like Barbie can be something that everyone around the water cooler can talk about, but that doesn't happen often.
I have wondered if this is just part of aging.
As a 9 year old, sports were everything. Now I follow sports, but there is no passion and little emotion.
As a 30 year old, I was passionate about politics. Knew every (100) senator by name and face. Now, don't know if I can name 20 senators.
Movies my peak intensity was 25 to 40, with a preference for older stuff. Wife and I have not seen a movie in the theatre in 5 years or more.
Circle of Life
"Maybe it's me, and I'm getting not just old but very old."
Old is when you don't recognize the Academy Award nominees. Very old is when you don't care about Academy Awards.
There was a time when I'd look to the Academy Award nominees for movie suggestions. Not anymore. Modern culture has too firm of a grip on AMPAS.
Modern culture has too many landmines that writers and directors must avoid, to concentrate on a good story. There will always be good writers and directors, but they may not be in Hollywood and they may not be making movies.
My most common question to wife when watching Netflix, Prime, Hulu/Max/etc is "who is that person/what did he/she star in?".
I agree that most of the people on your list are greats. They're also old, with their best work decades behind them. Who is replacing them?
Mangold is the only name I recognize. I think he’s been in their biz for a good while.
Whether it's movies or politics or sports, people know the pack they grew up knowing -- and maybe the pack of their own generation who became prominent in their own young adulthood. As those packs thin out and a new one comes along, we don't give them as much notice as we did the earlier ones. The fact that so many younger directors go into virtually identical franchise films (Disney, Marvel, DC, Star Wars, Star Trek, James Bond, Mission Impossible, Jurassic Park) gives one even less reason to remember them. As people get older still, even the names they know don't trip off the tongue as easily as before.
The Apprentice gets nods for best actor and supporting actor. Who is last president not to be portrayed in a film? Biden? Al Pacino won a bunch of awards 2 decades ago for his TV portrayal of Roy Cohn in Angels in America. Who died 2 decades earlier of AIds.
Plus, you've now seen hundreds of versions of the seven dramatic plotlines. Gets predictable, gets routine. Find a new hobby...
"The Apprentice gets nods for best actor and supporting actor. Who is last president not to be portrayed in a film? Biden? Al Pacino won a bunch of awards 2 decades ago for his TV portrayal of Roy Cohn in Angels in America. Who died 2 decades earlier of AIds."
Your question is making Dennis Quaid very sad.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IcAsIvzSaM
I see Biden portrayed by John James in My Son Hunter a few years back and by Greg Kinear on HBO in the Confirmation.
"Reagan" didn't even get a makeup nomination... and somebody painted the birthmark on the Gorbachev actor's head. That's so unfair.
I won’t watch the brutalist but I’m glad it’s getting all these nominations I feel like the Oscar’s needed to go back to its roots of awarding boring dramatic works nobody has seen
Wow, Coppola last nominated in 1991 for Godfather 3. Before that, Apocalypse Now in 1980. He did get a lifetime award in 2011.
"Your question is making Dennis Quaid very sad."
My answer made no sense as it related to the question, so just take it as a remark that there was another President portrayed in a movie last year.
I think some of y'all are much older than me, and I'm kinda old. I almost never make it to the theater anymore, but there are still at least a few directors who have distinctive styles and are always worth seeing. Just in the English speaking world and not seriously old, we have: Wes Anderson, Paul Thomas Anderson, Robert Eggers, Christopher Nolan, Greta Gerwig, Sophia Copola, Jordan Peele, Edgar Wright, Ti West. The Coen Brothers and Quentin Tarantino may be semi-retired, but we'll see. There are probably some I'm forgetting.
I see it had an enormous cast, but did not see the Senator listed. I think it did well at box office. Maybe I'll see the Apprentice which did not last long in theaters.
Hollywood makes non stop comic book movies and non stop depressing dystopian movies.
We just managed to emerge from Fauci gain of Function Chi-Com democrat party virus for power - aka - 4 actual years of a dystopian nightmare.
Super-power-spider-penguin-joker is not going to save us.
Ficta: Greta Gerwig coming out with a Narnia movie for Netflix Thanksgiving 2026, exclusively on Imax. Rumored to be the Magician's Nephew. Save the date.
Emilia Pérez, the feel-good movie of the year about a drug kingpin who wants a sex change, leads with the most nominations. The blog should celebrate by reposting "Vaginoplasty, Peneplasty," the feel-good song of the year. If nothing else the film will teach us that Rosie Perez, Tony Perez, Tom Perez, and all those other Perezes were actually Pérezes, rather than Perézes.
In the event that "we are the main character in our own movie" there is no room for other characters in somebody else's movie. We don't have the time nor the inclination to devote the kind of attention needed to appreciate some nebulous undistilled message. We got a stream to catch.
Per Wikipedia, it looks like every president has been portrayed in film or television except Fillmore. Tyler only makes the list because of the animated cartoon "Futurama." What people may forget is that in the golden age of Hollywood, older people still had memories of Hayes, Arthur, and Benjamin Harrison -- plus, people actually learned about earlier presidents in school back then.
Is it a question of aging? Well for myself, yes and no. Now I've got to a certain age, I've see a lot of film and not interested in seeing the same type of movie over and over again. Been there, done that.
Otherwise, my dislike of current film has nothing to do with age. Hollywood wants you to believe that "old farts" dont like movies because they're old. Y'know Hollywood is doing something new and cool and those old fogies just want to watch Gone with the Wind and Gunsmoke reruns.
Nope. crap is crap. And being New Crap, doesnt change that.
Of course, some people really are stuck in the past. I'm always amazed how many people will be shocked that someone who wasn't alive at the time will like Benny Goodman or Elvis Presley or whoever. Or they think "Their Generation" had a lock on good music.
Imagine someone going, "Yeah, I wish I'd been alive back in 1800 and heard Beethoven". But they'll say "Gosh, if only I'd been alive in 64 and heard the Beatles". As if you cant listen to them right now.
Part of what keeps me away from movies these days is all the plastic surgery (and fake-looking hair and makeup). People look really bad these days. You have to want gaze at the faces in closeups.
Liked the Dylan movie: 90% the first 3 album covers; 10% the 4th.
I agree with you but most of those directors are older now.
I was going to mention that a friend used to say that Shakespeare had the seven plotlines established for all time,
Megalopolis was a pure waste of time--no other way to say it--in every way. Anora is a stunningly good movie and story. There are plenty of really good movies out there, but they seem not to be "popular," and the well-rated popular movies (in my judgement) are formulaic, predictable, sequels of sequels, and a waste of time and effort.
Theaters are largely empty or sparse (at best) for the films I enjoy--and that's a real risk to the craft and art.
C'mon man!
What about the one where the people go to a remote cabin in the woods?
You’ll like the Dylan movie then. Seeing 1961-65 Greenwich Village fashion was fun. And Edward Norton is the oldest actor in the movie so no plastic surgery.
Last night I saw a 2022 movie with Mickey Rourke in it. He was unrecognizable!
Silicone people are bad, but half are now using AI/digital touchups. Old, old actors are playing youngish roles. The uncanny valley of fakeness always creeps people out.
Hollywood, like DC, is a haven for moral and intellectual pygmies. The former is beyond redemption. The latter may be redeemed in part by Trump and Co., but not if Democrats continue to subvert our constitutional republic.
I saw the Ridley Scott film Gladiator II last night. It's streaming on Paramount. It's definitely entertaining, although not anywhere near as good as Gladiator.....Ancient Rome has changed a lot over the years. When I was a kid, in movies like Quo Vadis, The Robe, and Ben Hur, Romans were decadent. Some of them were redeemed and, indeed, transformed by their embrace of the Christian faith. There were lots of good looking slave girls who danced before the Emperor in scanty outfits. How times have changed in ancient Rome. In Gladiator II, Christianity gets only a passing mention. While it's true that the two twin Emperors are exceedingly decadent, the real villain is played by Denzel Washington and he's on some kind of revenge mission against Rome. In fact just about everyone in the movie is against Rome or, anyway, Imperial Rome. The Rome Republic is presented as some kind of Camelot which some of the characters plot to restore. The movie is kind of muddled in its vision of Rome.....Anyway, the gladiator sequences are pretty good. What with CGI, modern audiences get more gore than the Coliseum audiences witnessed back in the day or that were available to me in my youth. I don't think gladiators rode rhinos back then, but here they do. It's very entertaining.
If you haven't seen the recently released French film The Count of Monte Cristo, do yourself a favor (if you can still find it)
All I know is I'm rooting for the dude to win best actress.
Matt Walsh
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There should be no outrage on the right. Let this dude take home the best actress trophy. The actual female actresses who get robbed deserve it. None of them have the courage to speak out. All of them supported this madness. Now the monster turns against them. Poetic justice.
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Karla Sofía Gascón is the first openly trans actor to be nominated for an Oscar.
"But he was an important cultural figure, and I felt interested and reverent about that. Maybe it's me, and I'm getting not just old but very old."
It's called "growing up". "When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child ...". But now I realize that "cinema" is mostly just sex and violence porn. And that's the good part.
Jupiter: agree on the violence. Watched last night the Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. Supposedly based on a true story, backed up during credits. But violence porn nonetheless. But saw an article noting that a number of films and performers that were well reviewed but featured sex were overlooked this morning.
This is a dud year for flicks
Ridley Scott forgot how to make movies
We can see the big movies of the past - or the nichies, for that matter - anytime we want, at home, free or almost free. That's got to be having an effect. And then there is a large supply of unknown plot lines based on experiences of conservatives in Bidentime. These plots could become movies but they won't or anyhow, not at the moment. The current tedious reruns embodying various versions of Portrait Whoever [Guatamalan Lesbian? American Trust Fund Baby? New Model Captain Americess ] As a Young Liberal Seeing Through Everyone Else's Hypocrisy in so over, but the epigoni making movies won't change; they're stiff with the formaldehyde of nihilism.
As an 25 year old PA, I once delivered things to his office from a producer
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