The Criterion Collection

[pedromvu]

Originally Posted by theater dreamer

Opinions of movies change over time, often quite dramatically. Roger Ebert referenced this phenomenon throughout his book, Awake in the Dark. One film, in particular, where critics changed their tune was Warren Beatty's Bonnie and Clyde. Ebert hailed it as a historically important film from the very beginning, while other critics of the day panned it for being to overtly violent. If my memory serves me correctly, Ridley Scott's Blade Runner also received rather lukewarm critical reception early on. Today, it's viewed as a science fiction masterwork. Reviews of Charles Laughton's The Night of the Hunter were so poor that he never directed another film. Now, viewing the film is considered de rigueur by noir enthusiasts. And one of the movies consistently listed among the all-time greats, Hitchcock's Psycho, initially received mixed reviews.

Another one I always hear about is 2001: Space Odyssey, which apparently was marketed as another 70mm big spectacle film, which it really was, I mean those effects and visuals at that time should have been enough for everyone to at least enjoy it at an audiovisual level, but I guess most were expecting something more traditional.

I wonder if there are examples of the opposite though, films praised originally that are now considered average or bad

I've heard of a few on some podcasts but there is never a clear general consensus, most critics rarely update their old reviews so I guess a lot of years need to pass for that to happen.

[theater dreamer]

Originally Posted by Martin_31

Shouldn't someone who majors in English read the classics from yesteryear? Or someone in fashion study the works/designs of Chanel and Laurent? I agree with you on that. A foundation has to be built.

Absolutely. There are other examples, of course, but these are just a few.

I'm a guitarist. Though my music studies were based in classical theory, my favorite genre is progressive rock and metal, and when I noodle around on my guitars, that's what I'm playing most of the time. But there's no way I could be a halfway decent guitar player, in the rock genre, without an exposure to, and appreciation of the greats that have come before.

I started college in 1990 at the University of North Texas. I lived in a dorm filled with theory and performance majors, and there were no fewer than 10 guitarists studying on my wing. My very first day of college, August 27, 1990, Stevie Ray Vaughan died about 20 minutes from where I used to live, in Alpine Valley, Wisconsin. After classes that day, there was an impromptu jam session in his honor. There were guys riffing Pride and Joy, and I think I mixed in SRV's homage to Hendrix, Vodoo Child (Slight Return) on my Kramer Focus 3000. But most of what was played that night was stuff recorded by Eddie Van Halen, Malmsteen, Jeff Beck, Steve Lukather, Vai, Satriani, some Ernie Isley, Hendrix, Neil Schon, Jimmy Page, Al Di Meola, Allan Holdsworth, Ritchie Blackmore, Eric Clapton, Adrian Vandenberg, etc. It was undeniable evidence of that foundation we've referenced. Much like I learned how to build my musical vocabulary from the guys I grew up listening to, filmmakers today build upon techniques and styles exhibited by the men and women they were exposed to.

[cakefactory]

Originally Posted by pedromvu

Another one I always hear about is 2001: Space Odyssey, which apparently was marketed as another 70mm big spectacle film, which it really was, I mean those effects and visuals at that time should have been enough for everyone to at least enjoy it at an audiovisual level, but I guess most were expecting something more traditional.

I wonder if there are examples of the opposite though, films praised originally that are now considered average or bad

I've heard of a few on some podcasts but there is never a clear general consensus, most critics rarely update their old reviews so I guess a lot of years need to pass for that to happen.

Tons of them. Just look at a list of best picture winners over the years.

[cakefactory]

Originally Posted by Martin_31

Sarcasm? I'm not sure haha. I wasn't saying the old times were better. I'm saying that people aren't open or interested--in today's age--in something "different" or "old." In one of my classes we watched The Magnificent Ambersons. Only two people liked the movie, including myself. Everyone else didn't. Like someone mentioned before, Quentin Tarantino is the most popular director in today's film classes. He is the MAN. The class I'm taking is Film as Literature. We watch and the next week examine and breakdown the movie. There is one guy though who saw from the list she gave almost every single movie. The list was around 200 movies give or take. A sample she does to see what we have seen. And yeah there's always going to be sh**ty movies doesn't matter what year.

Well, you specifically said people couldn't even deal with things as challenging or "long" as even the LOTR trilogy, which is patently untrue unless you're really dealing with the lower echelon of society. The most popular movies these days are all overlong. All the listing of terrible stuff and then saying you were the only one that liked "old things" seemed like a strong implication of "older is better." I have never watched anything Kardashian-related besides the new OJ Simpson show (which is good), but I am willing to bet it's no dumber than The Gong Show!

My college didn't even have a film major, so any film class was something whipped up to fit into another department. One of the few that was offered during my time was focused on Weimar Germany films, so we watched The Blue Angel, M, Sunrise (even though that one isn't German!), Nosferatu, The Last Laugh, Pandora's Box, Diary of a Lost Girl, Cabinet of Caligari, and some others I can't remember the names of. No one ever vocally complained about anything we saw, even though no one in the class was a film major and almost everything was not only old but silent! Another history class I had featured such films as a 3 hour extract of a 7 hour art film about Hitler, Night and Fog, and Prospero's Books, and again, people really enjoyed talking about those and we had no vocal complainers at all. Now that I think back to high school, we had this odd film unit where every english class had to watch Safety Last, The Gold Rush, and The General, and there again pretty much everyone seemed to have a good time with those. I guess it's just a matter of having bad people in your classes! Don't write off the rest of our generation for the sins of the worst.

[theater dreamer]

Originally Posted by pedromvu

Another one I always hear about is 2001: Space Odyssey, which apparently was marketed as another 70mm big spectacle film, which it really was, I mean those effects and visuals at that time should have been enough for everyone to at least enjoy it at an audiovisual level, but I guess most were expecting something more traditional.

I wonder if there are examples of the opposite though, films praised originally that are now considered average or bad

I've heard of a few on some podcasts but there is never a clear general consensus, most critics rarely update their old reviews so I guess a lot of years need to pass for that to happen.

Ebert is one critic who went back, and reflected on his older reviews. And, he occasionally changed his mind about films. I give him a lot of credit for that. We all grow as people over time, and he, too, matured as a writer, and as one who considered the importance of films he watched.

And yes, opinions change on films in the other direction. While some films are hoisted to greatness, other films do not hold up as well over time, and see their luster wear off somewhat. One Best Picture winner that has not stood the test of time is Cavalcade. There are others. Out of Africa won a handful of awards, including Best Picture, yet now it's viewed as a more flawed film. Shakespeare in Love won in 1998, yet now I question how it beat The Thin Red Line and Saving Private Ryan. Hell, if you ask me, Cate Blanchet's Elizabeth and Life is Beautiful are both better pictures. Of the five films nominated that year, perhaps the weakest of the bunch won the top award. Think How Green Was My Valley would beat The Maltese Falcon or Citizen Kane today? Obviously, these are just a few examples, and re-evaluation of films are not restricted to award winners.

[mja345]

Ebert's biggest misfire was probably giving "The Devils" zero stars. I was looking at a list of the films Ebert gave zero stars and was blown away "The Devils" was on there. Cimino's "Heaven's Gate" has to be the film that has been re-assessed more than any I can think of. Critics just took an absolute dump on that film in 1980, using the film's financial failure as a way to tear it down. Didn't help that Cimino wasn't allowed to show his 3 1/2 hour cut of the film. I remember when I was a kid reading about "Heaven's Gate" and thinking it must be absolutely godawful. Turns out it's a fantastic film.

Fun fact: Ebert gave a zero star review to one film in the Criterion Collection...Alex Cox's "Walker", which I really enjoy.

[malakaheso]

They also thought it was a boring film with a story that was all middle, but it's true that opinions do change over time.

[malakaheso]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

It's easy to cherry-pick quality stuff from generations before yourself and come up with a totally inaccurate impression of the old times being better.

Again, this tired old argument of cherry picking. What matters is the best, not the worst or the forgotten. When people compare American film in the 70's to last decade, for example, there is no reason to bring up Airport or The World's Greatest Lover, just as there is equally no reason to bring up Catwoman or The Hunted, unless we are having a discussion about bad and/or forgotten/underrated films.

Granted it's hard for us to see the best now, but it's very easy to see why people would think pop music was poor now compared to the late 60's and early 70's or even the mid 80's.

[mja345]

Originally Posted by malakaheso

They also thought it was a boring film with a story that was all middle, but it's true that opinions do change over time.

"The Deer Hunter" and "Heaven's Gate" are very similar in their pacing IMO. The critics savaged "Heaven's Gate" and used it as an opportunity to go back and contemplate whether "The Deer Hunter" was actually a real slog to get through. The sections in "The Deer Hunter" in Pennsylvania are extremely slow-paced. If someone is fond of "The Deer Hunter", it would make sense that he or she would also enjoy "Heaven's Gate". They're similar type of films about different subject matter. But I've only seen the 216 minute cut of "Heaven's Gate". Maybe the 2 1/2 hour cut is really awful.

[malakaheso]

The Deer Hunter has a much clearer narrative structure than Heaven's Gate. You might be right about the pacing, but structurally they are not really comparable.

[mja345]

Originally Posted by malakaheso

The Deer Hunter has a much clearer narrative structure than Heaven's Gate. You might be right about the pacing, but structurally they are not really comparable.

I didn't think many of the problems with "Heaven's Gate" arose from the narrative structure. I thought it was fairly clear, although probably less so than "The Deer Hunter". The final fight in "Heaven's Gate" doesn't work at all. That's a big weakness. And there are all of the excesses that clearly were Cimino's bugaboo (i.e. the roller-skating scene). But there is so much that works in the film IMO. But, based on many of the reviews, you would have thought it was one of the worst films of all-time. Vincent Canby and other critics took legendary shits on the film, almost to the point where it seemed like they had personal problems with Cimino. I can see why Stephen Bach and other United Artists execs had personal problems with Cimino, but that shouldn't be an issue with critics, which it clearly was.

[malakaheso]

One of the common complaints about Heaven's Gate was definitely about the lack of story (i.e slow development) and that it meandered all over the place and was difficult to follow. That is related to structure. Critics thought it lacked a tight structure, which it does.

I like the film a lot, but the script definitely could have been better.

[theater dreamer]

There have been a couple films savaged by the critics largely because a studio stuck their nose where it didn't belong, and the released version could best be described as horribly disfigured. Sergio Leone's epic Once Upon A Time in America is always the first film that comes to my mind when studio or distributor malfeasance is discussed. The prevailing thought process at the time of release was that American audiences would never sit for an almost four hour long film, so the film's distributor, the Ladd Company, had the film cut down from 229 minutes to 139. Not only did they chop off an hour and a half, they did away with the non-linear sequencing of the film. So, what American audiences got was a film that resembled Leone's artistic creation in name only.

[oildude]

Originally Posted by theater dreamer

Ebert is one critic who went back, and reflected on his older reviews. And, he occasionally changed his mind about films. I give him a lot of credit for that. We all grow as people over time, and he, too, matured as a writer, and as one who considered the importance of films he watched.

And yes, opinions change on films in the other direction. While some films are hoisted to greatness, other films do not hold up as well over time, and see their luster wear off somewhat. One Best Picture winner that has not stood the test of time is Cavalcade. There are others. Out of Africa won a handful of awards, including Best Picture, yet now it's viewed as a more flawed film. Shakespeare in Love won in 1998, yet now I question how it beat The Thin Red Line and Saving Private Ryan. Hell, if you ask me, Cate Blanchet's Elizabeth and Life is Beautiful are both better pictures. Of the five films nominated that year, perhaps the weakest of the bunch won the top award. Think How Green Was My Valley would beat The Maltese Falcon or Citizen Kane today? Obviously, these are just a few examples, and re-evaluation of films are not restricted to award winners.

I agree with what you are saying. I would like to comment on a particular year in the academy awards in your post that I have seen cited several times over the years as an example of when a "lesser film" undeservedly won the best picture award. How Green Was My Valley is a wonderful, brilliant, and beautiful film, immortalized in cinema history by stellar performances and John Ford directing at the top of his game. I have seen all of the candidates from 1941 and in my opinion that year the academy got it right.

Is it my favorite film from that year? No, I have rewatched Bogie in The Maltese Falcon many more times than How Green Was My Valley (although it is Welles' Citizen Kane that is usually held up as an example of academy misjudgment by some professional and armchair critics when this topic pops up). Let's face it, 1941 was an incredible year for best picture candidates (compare that to much of what we see today).

But John Ford hit it out of the park at the right moment with his well written little melodrama. Films are often judged by the current times in which they exist. One of the supplements on the How Green Was My Valley blu-ray delves into how the impact of the film, with its potent cocktail of ethnic traditions, family values, social upheaval, the life of a mining community, their shared joys, loss, and pain, all arriving on the eve of America's entry into WWII, resonated with the public in a way no other film that year ever could. Ultimately the proof of timelessness is in the film itself, and How Green Was My Valley still resonates to this day. It is just as powerful and thought provoking as it was in 1941. Late in his life John Ford was given the chance to choose one film from his vast body of work as his personal best to showcase at a film retrospective on great directors. He chose How Green Was My Valley.

[malakaheso]

I love How Green Was My Valley, but Citizen Kane seems more universal.

[blkhrt]

Originally Posted by nitin

someone else experienced this and posted in the MD thread, and for them it was because the sharpness setting on their tv was enabled and too high.

Interesting. I will have to check that. I normally don't keep any of that stuff turned on, but my TV is getting old and the other day some of the settings reset for some reason. Thanks.

[Member-167298]

To follow up on the conversation a few pages back, I am thankful to say that some of the current generation actually appreciates films that are more than just mindless entertainment.

I teach a high school film class and I constantly include films that will challenge the student notions of narrative and intellectual engagement. Some examples of films that a lot of the students surprisingly enjoyed over the years were L'Eclisse and Through a Glass Darkly! Most students still can't get over open endings, and really hated Picnic at Hanging Rock as result. I am going to start showing them Paris, Texas this week so it will be interesting to see how they react to that.

[malakaheso]

The younger generations have one clear advantage: easy access.

Let's hope they make the most of it, especially the aspiring film makers.

[spargs]

Originally Posted by theater dreamer

There have been a couple films savaged by the critics largely because a studio stuck their nose where it didn't belong, and the released version could best be described as horribly disfigured. Sergio Leone's epic Once Upon A Time in America is always the first film that comes to my mind when studio or distributor malfeasance is discussed. The prevailing thought process at the time of release was that American audiences would never sit for an almost four hour long film, so the film's distributor, the Ladd Company, had the film cut down from 229 minutes to 139. Not only did they chop off an hour and a half, they did away with the non-linear sequencing of the film. So, what American audiences got was a film that resembled Leone's artistic creation in name only.

Yeah, I specifically remember reading Ebert's review in the Chicago Sun Times back in 1984 when the 139 minute cut cut hit theaters in the US... as he had seen the 229 minute version previously at Cannes, he actually addressed both cuts in his review. He gave the 229 minute cut 4 stars, and called the butchered cut a travesty and gave it 1.5 stars.

Edit: the original review posted on rogerebert.com looks to have been slightly tweaked to reference the 229 minute cut being available on video which wouldn't yet have been available at the time of the US theatrical release of the 139 minute cut. It also doesn't show the 1.5 star rating, but I'm pretty confident it was there in print in the original paper review.

[ravenus]

Originally Posted by theater dreamer

If you're a youngster going to work in the film industry as a director/producer, or an intellectual, there is a requisite appreciation of what's gone before. You cannot speak intelligently about film history without experiencing the great works from the past. And to be a truly great director, it seems obvious to me that they need to understand how film has evolved. I liken it to becoming a great chef, or a world class musician. You have to have a solid foundation to build upon. There are disciplines that must be learned to take that next step. When you listen to today's great directors interviewed, like Scorsese, for example, they have a reverence for the greats of the past.

While some kind of artistic foundation is advantageous, it is not IMO necessary and definitely does not have to be in the same medium. There are great directors who have come from other art mediums or who are not products of film school and/or film watching binges. Watching too many films might also be an impediment to developing your own virgin vocabulary.