I loved both of those movies so much. As I read Zack Morris’s essay, I actually wondered whether Living had been shot on film, because its appearance felt grittier and more old-fashioned. And it was so lovely to see actors with imperfect teeth and irregular features! Just like people!
These two essays make such a terrific--and convincing--argument. I was particularly struck in Zack Morris’s essay by his point about how flawless and uncanny the people and interiors look in current films. Your essay points to a pernicious, motivation behind this phenomenon. Not only do flawless people and things in the media make us regular-looking people with our messy homes feel bad about ourselves, but they push us toward consumerism. Media consolidation means that the few owners of the studios want us to feel bad about our faces, bodies, clothes, and homes so that we will want to purchase products to “fix” ourselves and make ourselves look more like what we see in the media. It’s really destructive in more ways than just crappy movies.
Great essay. This is definitely by and large true, but I do think there’s more change happening to the industry than we realize.
For example, what do you think of A24? They produce more movies a year than Paramount, and their model for success is to buy or produce the movies that modern Hollywood has abandoned.
They have a rabid fan base, and while they don’t directly compete with Marvel and have partnered with Netflix, their films remind me of the cinema days of yore.
Yep! I actually linked to their catalogue in the essay. None of their movies are giant successes, but most of them are financially successful.
I think this clearly demonstrates there'd a relatively large audience for weird, off-kilter movies.
The question will be: can they survive in the coming waves of mergers? As Matt Stoller reported in his essay, top Studio executives are anticipating further consolidation, which will leave 2 or 3 mega-studios. Unless the FTC blocks such mergers (likely now, but this election may change that), studios like A24 may get bought up and rolled into Disney or Paramount or Warner.
I used to be a very stridently anti-MCU person, for reasons that are obvious and correct (:P), and would pointedly refer to those films as "baby movies for babies." Eventually I grew up and realized that the only thing lamer than being obsessed with Barney is being obsessively anti-Barney. I think a lot of people have a (pardon my French) hateboner for Marvel that, beyond blinding them to the structural reasons blockbusters are shitty these days, brings them to bizarre decisions like cheering on Avatar 2.
(It doesn't help that the subtext behind a lot of anti-MCU stuff is also very nakedly "I miss when action movies were made for MEN," which I'm pretty sure is the subtext behind people insisting that, like, John Wick is a good movie instead of a soulless three hour Cyberpunk 2077 Let's Play.)
Yeah, it reminds me of the console wars, in a way. Arguing whether Sony or Microsoft is better ignores the fact that both of them are gobbling up the industry and, often, shuttering once independent studios.
The problem with Marvel isn't that they're made for babies, but that Disney--one of the few remaining media conglomerate--won't make anything that's not guaranteed to make half a billion dollars.
Wow: console wars is *exactly* the framework I've used in the past to describe how I feel about the Marvel v. DC thing (with superhero films being the equivalent of, e.g., platformers circa 1990, when Sega tried to muscle in on Nintendo's market share by promoting themselves as the ""mature"" alternative to Nintendo's ""kiddy"" stuff, but in 1990 you couldn't really do maturity in that genre or on that hardware, so they just did "edgy" instead in a way that looks pretty puerile in hindsight - and yes, this is the world's first and last analogy in which Zack Snyder is Sonic the Hedgehog). But it also applies in this context.
"a lot of anti-MCU stuff is also very nakedly 'I miss when action movies were made for MEN,'"
I'm a woman whose never seen a Marvel movie, and I hate the lazy intellectual shorthand of accusing people with a different opinion as harboring some secret bigotry.
Just to be clear - I am also deeply apathetic about Marvel stuff (and most IP-driven blockbusters, for that matter) ... and yet, I don't think you can really debate that there is a fairly loud contingent of people who actively despise that some of these movies and their spin-offs have female leads. Like... the kind of person who (to cite a recent-ish example) spams IMDB with one-star reviews of "She-Hulk: Attorney At Law" before a single episode of the show even dropped on the grounds that this television show which they have not watched is too "woke." I can't come up with a reason any of the hundreds of people who did that would do so other than Neanderthal-level sexism. (This is true, incidentally, even if the show did turn out to be genuinely bad - which it mostly did, IMO.)
The people who complain about Marvel movies with female leads aren't the same people who complain about the dominance of Marvel movies in general. And even, so there's nothing misogynist about being against didactic, heavy-handed ideology in entertainment.
I watch scandi-drama, African, Korean, Russian and Turkish shows almost exclusively. There’s a refreshing focus on entertainment instead of “box-checking” with these shows. When I attempt to watch a Hollywood show, I’m bombarded by “men are stupid” and alphabet messages along with rude behavior and often the required violence or sex scenes within the first few minutes. Needless to say, I am not the audience they’re targeting. So, back to something really entertaining, like, for example, “The Platform.” It’s a shame, really, because Hollywood used to be the gold standard, in my opinion.
Agree 100% and seldom watch any movies now. "Living" and "Banshees" were the only films I watched that were 2022.
I loved both of those movies so much. As I read Zack Morris’s essay, I actually wondered whether Living had been shot on film, because its appearance felt grittier and more old-fashioned. And it was so lovely to see actors with imperfect teeth and irregular features! Just like people!
Banshees was great! And part of what made it great was the humanness of the direction that Zack Morris the Elder talked about in his essay.
I liked both the original essay and the response!
These two essays make such a terrific--and convincing--argument. I was particularly struck in Zack Morris’s essay by his point about how flawless and uncanny the people and interiors look in current films. Your essay points to a pernicious, motivation behind this phenomenon. Not only do flawless people and things in the media make us regular-looking people with our messy homes feel bad about ourselves, but they push us toward consumerism. Media consolidation means that the few owners of the studios want us to feel bad about our faces, bodies, clothes, and homes so that we will want to purchase products to “fix” ourselves and make ourselves look more like what we see in the media. It’s really destructive in more ways than just crappy movies.
That's another interesting point!
Great essay. This is definitely by and large true, but I do think there’s more change happening to the industry than we realize.
For example, what do you think of A24? They produce more movies a year than Paramount, and their model for success is to buy or produce the movies that modern Hollywood has abandoned.
They have a rabid fan base, and while they don’t directly compete with Marvel and have partnered with Netflix, their films remind me of the cinema days of yore.
Yep! I actually linked to their catalogue in the essay. None of their movies are giant successes, but most of them are financially successful.
I think this clearly demonstrates there'd a relatively large audience for weird, off-kilter movies.
The question will be: can they survive in the coming waves of mergers? As Matt Stoller reported in his essay, top Studio executives are anticipating further consolidation, which will leave 2 or 3 mega-studios. Unless the FTC blocks such mergers (likely now, but this election may change that), studios like A24 may get bought up and rolled into Disney or Paramount or Warner.
I used to be a very stridently anti-MCU person, for reasons that are obvious and correct (:P), and would pointedly refer to those films as "baby movies for babies." Eventually I grew up and realized that the only thing lamer than being obsessed with Barney is being obsessively anti-Barney. I think a lot of people have a (pardon my French) hateboner for Marvel that, beyond blinding them to the structural reasons blockbusters are shitty these days, brings them to bizarre decisions like cheering on Avatar 2.
(It doesn't help that the subtext behind a lot of anti-MCU stuff is also very nakedly "I miss when action movies were made for MEN," which I'm pretty sure is the subtext behind people insisting that, like, John Wick is a good movie instead of a soulless three hour Cyberpunk 2077 Let's Play.)
Yeah, it reminds me of the console wars, in a way. Arguing whether Sony or Microsoft is better ignores the fact that both of them are gobbling up the industry and, often, shuttering once independent studios.
The problem with Marvel isn't that they're made for babies, but that Disney--one of the few remaining media conglomerate--won't make anything that's not guaranteed to make half a billion dollars.
Wow: console wars is *exactly* the framework I've used in the past to describe how I feel about the Marvel v. DC thing (with superhero films being the equivalent of, e.g., platformers circa 1990, when Sega tried to muscle in on Nintendo's market share by promoting themselves as the ""mature"" alternative to Nintendo's ""kiddy"" stuff, but in 1990 you couldn't really do maturity in that genre or on that hardware, so they just did "edgy" instead in a way that looks pretty puerile in hindsight - and yes, this is the world's first and last analogy in which Zack Snyder is Sonic the Hedgehog). But it also applies in this context.
"a lot of anti-MCU stuff is also very nakedly 'I miss when action movies were made for MEN,'"
I'm a woman whose never seen a Marvel movie, and I hate the lazy intellectual shorthand of accusing people with a different opinion as harboring some secret bigotry.
Just to be clear - I am also deeply apathetic about Marvel stuff (and most IP-driven blockbusters, for that matter) ... and yet, I don't think you can really debate that there is a fairly loud contingent of people who actively despise that some of these movies and their spin-offs have female leads. Like... the kind of person who (to cite a recent-ish example) spams IMDB with one-star reviews of "She-Hulk: Attorney At Law" before a single episode of the show even dropped on the grounds that this television show which they have not watched is too "woke." I can't come up with a reason any of the hundreds of people who did that would do so other than Neanderthal-level sexism. (This is true, incidentally, even if the show did turn out to be genuinely bad - which it mostly did, IMO.)
The people who complain about Marvel movies with female leads aren't the same people who complain about the dominance of Marvel movies in general. And even, so there's nothing misogynist about being against didactic, heavy-handed ideology in entertainment.
I watch scandi-drama, African, Korean, Russian and Turkish shows almost exclusively. There’s a refreshing focus on entertainment instead of “box-checking” with these shows. When I attempt to watch a Hollywood show, I’m bombarded by “men are stupid” and alphabet messages along with rude behavior and often the required violence or sex scenes within the first few minutes. Needless to say, I am not the audience they’re targeting. So, back to something really entertaining, like, for example, “The Platform.” It’s a shame, really, because Hollywood used to be the gold standard, in my opinion.