Monday, September 13, 2010

Response to John (late July- present)

I'd be lying if I said I read all of your (plural) posts super carefully- I'm just trying to catch up. But I do want to respond to each of your blogs individually and highlight some things that stood out to me:

1) I tried to skim your Greenberg comments, because I didn't want to know anything about the film beforehand. One of the downsides of these blogs- we try not to give away any spoilers, but it's hard to talk about a film if you can't talk about all of it, right? And we are all watching such different things that we'll criss-cross on a film maybe one out of ten (you and Brandon more perhaps). It becomes impractical to say "I'll wait to say more until the others see it." In any event, I just got Greenberg today and will see it soon. I still have Brandon's blog to catch up with as well [update: I am waiting to read Brandon's thoughts now until after I've seen it], so my head will be filled with others' ideas when I see it :). Oh well.

2) I will not be here on the 18th. My sister is going to England to study for a year and this will be my last opportunity to see her for a while. I hope that if you do come up, you will not have used up your going-to-Rochester bucks, because I'd really like to see you before too many more years go by. And I'd like to meet Brandon very much as well.

3) I am still posting to Flixster on Facebook. I do wish that you both were more frequent users, but I have compromised finally and cut and paste a number of my Flixster mini-reviews in my earlier post. Please reward me by noting and commenting on them. I could say more about Scott Pilgrim than my mini-review if you wanted to start a discussion about it, by the way.

4) I am absolutely not interested in seeing The Killer Inside Me. However, I am intrigued by Edge of Darkness and The Last Exorcism. I am on the fence about Dragon Tattoo. Mostly, though, because it and all of its ilk are all the rage right now and I want to be defiant about it.

5) I really, really liked Date Night. I laughed hard and often. Is this a matter of taste, or do I really not know how to determine good film? I always have thoughts about films, but the truth is that I tend to generally like most of what I see. I'll take issue with this point or that, but even if I'm initially turned off by a film, simply watching the making-of special feature will result in my developing a respect for the film's process at the very least. You and Brandon often have very clear-cut opinions on whether or not you've liked a film and it's a curious thing to me. You both certainly have done your research- I tend not to read film criticism. I think it often over-analyzes particulars of a film to the detriment of a bigger picture- the bigger picture of why anyone goes out to watch a film in the first place. I don't always get film criticism, honestly. But I have watched a lot of movies on a lot of different topics and lot of different genres. So I do think that I have a leg to stand on. But what is the nature precisely of the leg I'm standing on?

Please don't think this is a reaction to anything either of you has made me feel. It just seems like I am looking at films differently than either of you sometimes and I'm trying to put my finger on what it is that's different... I can't figure it out.

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