Conservative and Mannered

In a post reflecting on the career of the recently deceased film director Robert Wise, Flickhead observes that

Nearly a household name during the days of West Side Story and The Sound of Music—their poster graphics were once an inescapable, integral part of ‘60s pop culture—Wise was virtually forgotten a decade later. Whether viewers who are now in their twenties or thirties will ever screen his pictures seems doubtful. Like so much of pre-1980’s American film culture, Robert Wise represents a cinematic language that’s rarely ever spoken anymore.

Wise may not be as well-known as he once was, but in my opinion it's simply incorrect to say that he "represents a cinematic language that's rarely evey spoken anymore." To the extent that Wise possessed "mannered, conservative instincts," as Flickhead also puts it, he seems to me to epitomize current Hollywood filmmaking. (I don't necessarily mean to disparage Wise's achievements; some of his films--The Body Snatcher, Born to Kill, The Day the Earth Stood Still, The Haunting--are very good indeed.) The vast majority of Hollywood movies are every bit as formulaic, predictable, and vacuously "well-made" as most of the films to come out of the "machine" in operation during the so-called "golden era" that also produced a director like Wise. Although there is a more vibrant independent film culture now, I can't say that very many of the films produced by the indies seem to me particularly radical or experimental. At best these films are more idiosyncratic, less obviously commercical in content, but they're hardly groundbreaking in technique. I've seen nothing in recent years that makes me think about the possibilities of the film medium in fresh ways. (Memento came close, but Christopher Nolan's subsequent films have been notably disappointing. And David Lynch continues to provoke.) Slices of life, coming of age stories, and "quirky" comedies predominate, and we're exposed to few characters who can't be played by the likes of Ben Stiller and Jason Lee.

What made the golden age of Hollywood "golden" was that despite the strictures and conservative assumptions of the studio system, directors of more than ordinary talent and with distinctive styles--Ford, Hawks, Hitchcock, Lubitsch, Sturges--were nevertheless able to flourish. There was room for skillful, artistically respectable filmmaking despite the commercial imperatives with which these directors had to live. Now all is commerce, the cost of making films and the need to find financing on a project-by-project basis seemingly requiring an adherence to established codes and conventions. Robert Wise certainly does not belong in the same artistic company as Ford or Hitchcock, but his "conservative" approach has hardly been superseded by contemporary directors of the usual Hollywood product.

Notice: Anyone who would like to set me straight and point me to recent films that do indeed encourage us to "think about the possibilities of the film medium in fresh ways" are hereby invited to do so.

Comments

[Michael]

I don't know the films of Robert Wise well enough to comment on him in particular, but I agree that American independent films, generally speaking, are more idiosyncratic than they are radical or groundbreaking. Hollywood's empire is commercial, not artistic, and the soaring costs of making a film inhibit truly radical thinking about the movies. These days, I think one has to go outside of America to find filmmakers who are trying to move the medium forward; there's Sokurov in Russia, for example, and Hou Hsiao-Hsien in China, among others. The conservatism of American filmmaking is too prevalent, too stifling, and it's unfortunate.

[chris]

One who I believe is thinking about film in fresh ways is Darren Aronofsky. And as flawed as I thought both BEING JOHN MALKOVICH and ADAPTATION were, I am very intrigued by the work of both Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman and I suppose Gondry too. I think at his best Hal Hartley has approached film in a new way. And, leaving the most loaded name until last, I'm a fan of the master bricoleur, Quentin Tarantino. I'm only mentioning those working within the commercial system. I can probably come up with more than a few more.

[Dan Green]

I've seen Aronofsky's *Requiem for a Dream*. I liked it, but it seemed to me its success was due at least as much to Hugh Selby as to the direction.

I'm afraid I can't agree that *Malkovich* and *Adaptation* are in any way innovative. They're bloodless imitations of John Barth.

Hartley has never done much for me. Although he isn't a commercial hack, at least.

I like Tarantino, but he seems to me the epitome of an enthused traditionalist rather than an innovator.

[chris]

Dan,

You may be right, particularly about Jonze/Kaufman/Tarantino, though I would disagree that inventiveness necessarily requires "innovation." Sometimes, a la Tarantino, it's knowing what to steal.

But isn't it ironic that in many ways "Hollywood" has assimilated and regularly avails itself of postmodern narrative techniques, aided by inventive filmmaking, that contemporary commercial literature only infrequently uses and that contemporary book reviewing goes out of its way to disparage? When's the last time a book that got as much attention as ADAPTATION was anything that might bring John Barth to mind?

[Dan Green]

Chris: You make a very good point. There does seem to be less hostility among film critics to adventurous filmmaking than there is among certain book critics to experimental fiction.

[Flickhead]

Far be it for me to "set the record straight," as I can barely remember what I had for breakfast this morning, let alone what I was thinking when I wrote that Robert Wise obit a few weeks ago. But what I believe I had intended when I said "Robert Wise represents a cinematic language that’s rarely ever spoken anymore" was that his old-school approach to character and plot development is radically different from today's mainstream cinema, which has mostly abandoned the fundamentals so as to "cut to the chase."

In any event, I enjoyed reading your comments.

[Dan Green]

Thanks for the clarification. I would still observe, however, that if anything today's independents tend to share Wise's more patient approach to character and plot. There's nothing wrong with this, and it is a respite from the slam-bang thriller, but it's not less conservative than Wise's method.