The Art of Movies

This is post's subject is on my level of expertise. Movies. Oh yes, you couldn't ask for a better person to comment XD. It's what I devote like 85-90% of my life to. As my parents say, I speak in movie quotes and I know all sorts of trivia on all types of movies. I must warn you beforehand, this post might be a little scatter-brained.

So what got me really thinking about movies was my art class. Last week, we were talking about cinematography. The entire class was devoted to how movies have evolved over time as an art form. It was extremely fascinating to me. Now I'm not going to bore you with who invented the projector and where the first movies were shown, etc., but I will be bringing up some of the things I learned that apply to my post.

I've observed that a lot of people today really don't know a good movie when they see one. They think a good movie has something to do with the camera techniques, the special effects, and so on. While those thing contribute to a movie, I believe that they are not the key to a good movie.

Plot. That's what I think is what is really important to a movie. It always comes down to plot. As time wears on, people seem to care less and less about the plot, and more and more about the techniques put into the film. This has really been driving me insane lately since I've come up here to college and I've seen people's tastes in movies. I can't tell you how many movie nights I've skipped out on because they were watching a horror movie. Now, I know some of you are rolling your eyes and thinking, "What's wrong with a horror movie?" Well, nothing really, it's just that I don't really like that genre, but that's not my point. It's that the particular horror movies that they were watching were the blood and gore, slice and dice type horror movies. (I know this because they would always be talking about the exploding heads and stuff later). Why on earth would people want to watch this? People are beginning to fail to appreciate good plots and just enjoy such violence on the screen.

I seem to be the only person to enjoy old movies. Really old stuff. I've watched things from the 1930's, the 1950's, the 1960's, etc. and enjoyed them all. However, many people will watch the same thing and will be bored out of their minds. This is because they grew up in this day and age where they are always bombarded with visual stimulus. I mean, a lot of that old stuff didn't even have color, much less lots of action.

For example, I was watching The Scarlet Pimpernel (1934). I thoroughly enjoyed it, but I have yet to meet someone else who enjoyed it just as much as I did. Now I also enjoyed The Scarlet Pimpernel (1982) and these same people watched it and enjoyed that version much more. Why didn't they like the 1934 version? I know why they didn't like it very much. To name a few: it was in black and white, there was hardly any background music, the special effects were not very adequate, there was hardly any camera movement, and there were some long drawn-out scenes that easily could have been cut down to a few minutes. So why did I enjoy it so much? Well, because of the plot. In the old days, moviemakers really paid attention to the plot and much less to techniques. That's why I find old movies so fascinating.

People often complain that old movies are "too slow". Quite right too, if you're comparing them to today's movies. In my art class, my professor showed us a clip from the old King Kong movie, where King Kong was battling the T-Rex (in which he breaks its jaw). The fight seemed to go on forever and things were just repeating themselves, I found myself asking, "Is something going to happen already?" until finally it ended.

The fight probably lasted around five minutes. Then my professor showed us a clip from the King Kong remake from 2005. It was the same fight scene and it lasted probably just under a minute. His point of showing us the clips were for a different reason than what I'm going to explain here, but what I observed was just what I explained above; we're bombarded with so much visual stimulus today, that we are easily bored with that old stuff because it's "too slow".

Now back to plot. People also like to complain that a good book will be ruined by turning it into a movie because they movie always changes the plot. This is true. The book's plot will be adapted for the screen in different degrees, but just because the plot is changed, that doesn't mean the movie will be bad. True, it may not completely butcher the book, but the movie itself may still be good. Take, for example, Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Now that plot was altered by almost every degree, but if you're some stuck up literature nerd (*cough* I'm not naming any names *cough*), I suggest you still give the movie a chance.

I will now bash techniques again. Sometimes adapting a book to movie will ruin the book though. (I'm sorry to those of you who loved it) Pride and Prejudice (2005) was a little too focused on rather than the story itself. It was an absolutely gorgeous movie, with brilliant costumes, sets, scenery, music, camera movements, etc, but the story was annoyingly rushed.

When a movie can equally combine plot AND techniques that equals a fantastic movie. While I am more interested in plot rather than the beauty, that doesn't mean I don't appreciate it. As an artist and an amateur movie-maker, I probably appreciate it more than the average citizen and am more nit-picky when it comes to my movies. I won't watch some stupid horror movie with a lame plot that's full of gore and nastiness. Where's the art in that?

So I'm not saying that technique and beauty aren't a good thing. On the contrary, it will definitely keep you in your seat watching the entire time, but plot is what makes you come back to watch it again.