Movies, some mine, some theirs
I spent most of the day yesterday working on The Couple in 204, except for a break to see Good Night and Good Luck. After spending the last two years in a news office, I very much appreciated the minimalistic dialog of the actors. David Strathairn (who always looks a little bit like Ben Kingsley to me) did an incredible job with his role. I love seeing movies where the actors actually get the opportunity to act, and I especially love movies where the actors have a chance to actually use body language and facial expressions to show their character, rather than being beat about the head with dialog.
I spent the entire movie tense, on the edge of my seat more or less. I find it amusing and sad that I connect so deeply with the movie because of our current environment. Of course, we have no Edward R Murrow, today.
Also, I was stunned and in awe of the amount of smoking in this movie. It was amazing, incredible, and a fascinating reminder that in the world outside of hollywood make-believe, everyone smoked. We, as a country, smoked so much, so frequently, that we never, ever thought of it (beyond “Our tasty treat”), and having a newscaster appear on TV as a disembodied head with a cigarette floating in hand next to him was nothing to us. The sheer ubiquity is just amazing. (Of course, on the surface, Ben The Smoker was in heaven.)
In other news, I’ve joined a writing community in the hopes that it’ll help me to pick back up that first creative skill I ever felt confident exercising. They insist that you write at least one thing a month, which I think will be a nice challenge, and will fold in well with all the other creative challenges I’m facing.
David Strathairn (who always looks a little bit like Ben Kingsley to me) did an incredible job with his role.
Ever since I saw the movie I’ve wanted him to get the Best Actor Oscar. He won’t, but I think he beats al the other candidates hands down.
I find it amusing and sad that I connect so deeply with the movie because of our current environment. Of course, we have no Edward R Murrow, today.
If it makes you feel any better, you can know that this is exactly what was intended, and I can guarantee you every journalist and other person (I know for a fact Wolf Blitzer saw it) got the not-so-subtle poke in the stomach. Those of us in the theater watching it exchanged knowing glances.
I was stunned and in awe of the amount of smoking in this movie. It was amazing, incredible, and a fascinating reminder that in the world outside of hollywood make-believe, everyone smoked
Smoking serves a number of functions in the movie, but I think one of them is to show optimistically that unforeseen cultural changes really can and do happen on a wide scale over time–smoking is just not that common anymore.
The soundtrack to that movie was fantastic. I will pick it up if I see it used.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t really matter what they do to the methods for selecting the actual winners – the Academy itself is b0rked, and so it will always be highly political instead of an authentic measure of talent.
Of course it was intended, but I have little confidence in a resurgence of responsible and fearless media. Our capacity for discomfort in the modern day, at least in the average and above-average class brackets, are miniscule. Okay, I’m being cynical, but I have no intention of breaking into News and Making That Difference – I’ll stick to art. Not that most forms of art don’t come with their own forms of placation to the moneymakers and advertisers.
Putting his opening/closing speech in the context of his recognition ceremony (I presume that is according to the actual circumstances) was a perfect and fairly blatant self-referential effect, with murrow/peers reflecting the movie/us situation, and specifically his speech reaching another generation of his peers.
In a tertiary way, I find there is a great point here about subtle facial expression in men that are overlooked and misunderstood as either a lack of depth or a repression of one’s emotions. I felt that he was -clearly- accessible, and so did Ben, but another person who saw it, I believe, really missed out on those distinctions.
I also see that smoking served several purposes, but, having finished a smoking documentary on the psychological and emotional reasons people continue to smoke, I was just amazed at how different our perception is of it today vs. yesteryear. That we’re even aware of it at all, comparatively speaking.