In Defense of the Blockbuster
- Posted by Andrew Bailey on Wednesday, May 09, 2007 at 12:14 PM
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2 Comments |
I rather like movies. And I rather liked this defense of Hollywood Summer Blockbusters in the New York Times:
A good blockbuster, like the recent Bond flick “Casino Royale,” takes you places you might never otherwise go and shows you things you could never do. It brings you into new worlds, offers you new attractions. It takes hold of your body, making you quiver with anxiety, joy, laughter, relief. When great blockbusters sweep you up and away — I’m thinking about watching “The Matrix” for the first time with a few hundred other enraptured souls — they usher you into a realm of communal pleasure. In a culture of entertainment niches, they remind you of what going to the movies can still be like.
There's nothing quite like a cool dark theater, a humid summer afternoon, and an enthusiastic audience. It looks like Summer 2007 will bring these things in force.
2 Comments:
Noumena at 10:51 AM said... A good blockbuster is different from a good art house drama, but still needs to be a good movie, not a condescending piece of crap. And in terms of big-budget general releases, there are only a few films I can find that, in my opinion, might possibly not be condescending pieces of crap: Ocean's 13, Pirates 3, Harry Potter, and The Invasion. And then I have my doubts about the first three.
What movies do you have in mind?
Eric at 12:51 PM said... I'm *tentatively* looking forward to Evan Almighty; hopefully Steve Carell doesn't let us down. Also the Bourne Ultimatum and the next Harry Potter could be watchable.
Transformers, Die Hard 4, and the Simpsons movie, on the other hand? I can't think of any possible state of affairs in which one of those movies is worth the price of admission, much less all three. (This is assuming that they didn't somehow bring back all the writers from seasons 3-5 of the Simpsons to write the movie script. If so, then there is a small chance that it could be great.)
