Conversation about Richard Brody and the passing of Tobe Hooper and George A. Romero, at the NewYorker Movie Facebook Club
In
2017 two great and highly influential american genre directors passed away:
Tobe Hooper and George A. Romero. Richard Brody didn't
write a single sentence about them. Why do think he didn't care to honor them?
(And how do you feel about their work?)
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David Troia Filmmakers who specialize
in Horror are almost always disrespected by critics. Sad but True.
Kai Mihm Not over here in Europe...
(In Germany Romero's death was in every paper and even featured in the
TV-news...)
Brien Rourke He might have doubted
that Romero was really dead.
Ken Eisner Perhaps it was only
temporary.
Brien Rourke "Everything is
temporary!"
Mark Schaffer Tttt
Richard Schilling You may want to use
Google before you post, since he wrote even more than "a single
sentence" about George A Romero in July 2017. I remembered reading it.
Kai Mihm Could you post link? Because
I am unable to find the article you talk about. Thanks a lot!
Patrick McEvoy-Halston Expanded and
transformed the genre of horror: https://www.newyorker.com/.../movies-to-stream-this...
So here, just one sentence, but with that commentary, not quite a slight.Manage
So here, just one sentence, but with that commentary, not quite a slight.Manage
“The Love Witch”
transforms a wide range…
NEWYORKER.COM
Kai Mihm Yes, I saw that. Pretty
meager, I think.
Kai Mihm But that cannot be what Richard Schilling meant.
Patrick McEvoy-Halston Kai Mihm But
it is, I believe -- he references July 2017. To me, what is there really isn't
sufficient to justify telling you to try googling first before... but,
nevertheless, the fact that it is Romero's passing away and a remembrance of
his significant virtues which prompts Brody's discussion of other directors,
could certainly make for it sticking in the mind later on as a whole article
collected all around Romero.
Ryan Spencer Forty-plus years ago,
one of cinema’s most anxiety-inducing spectacles was unleashed. It was a time
of cynicism, violence, paranoia and the collapse of a working class that was
being outsourced and made obsolete by technology. Casual, everyday sexism
undermined women’s equality by systematic objectification and enabling of
abusers. Industrialized slaughter of animals was destroying the environment.
So, not all that different from today. Texas Chainsaw Massacre beautifully
intertwines horror and politics. I recommend everyone here watch (or rewatch)
it immediately.
Patrick McEvoy-Halston Neat post, but
elides the virtues of the rise of the professional class, who have the mental
temperature to actually do something about all these things.
Patrick McEvoy-Halston Kai Mihm Inspired by exceptional critics
of his acquaintance, Richard Brody finds out what he's
missing: https://www.newyorker.com/.../the-deep-emptiness-of...Manage
The modern history of
the cinema (actually, the…
NEWYORKER.COM
Ryan Spencer I have a certain respect
for the Resident Evil series, however I think the point of this article is to
try to elucidate the idea that this particular film is made without irony or
critique. I wouldn't agree with that, nor would I argue that to be the case
with Hooper's Texas Chainsaw Massacre which is maybe your reason for posting it
here? TCM is specifically about those well beneath the "professional
class," but that doesn't mean it is explicitly for them or exclusive of
others.
Patrick McEvoy-Halston Ryan Spencer The reason is actually that
I find the horror genre is becoming big amongst literate twenty-something year
olds -- the men especially. Horror, sci-fi, fantasy, comics -- but all done
with a literary edge. Someone like Brody, who doesn't seem to have any fear of
keeping a distance from a genre to keep himself seeming professional, would
seem a natural critic for some of these bright young minds to engage with. But
there's a difference, in that the way you typify our culture seems a match to
that characterized by Brody as Paul W.S. Anderson's, and which may be a match
for those twenty-somethings making genre the seed from which all varieties of
culture might bloom and which perhaps best reflects the base of the world we
live in (horror?) more than "fiction" does, rather than an adjunct.
Your, "Forty-plus years ago, one of cinema’s most anxiety-inducing spectacles was unleashed. It was a time of cynicism, violence, paranoia and the collapse of a working class that was being outsourced and made obsolete by technology. Casual, everyday sexism undermined women’s equality by systematic objectification and enabling of abusers. Industrialized slaughter of animals was destroying the environment. So, not all that different from today."
does not match up well with Brody's "At the same time, “Resident Evil” is a relentless reflection of the tawdriness of strip malls, of the dun grimness of heavy industry, of the sense of decisions being made by abstract higher-ups that make for a plant closing or a store being shuttered, of the daily threat of violence and the need to stay vigilant and look tough, of the sense of embattlement in a harrowingly desolate landscape, and of the escape into simulation and the vicarious as the only, and fleeting, feeling of heroism that the daily struggle—or the daily round of boredom—offers. The absurd fantasy that Anderson offers up plays like a documentary of an extreme state of mind—and turns it into a stereotype which, in being represented with such efficacy, propagates itself."
One's "reality," the other's an "extreme state of mind." I would guess he'd fear you might be "propagating itself," and so the reason why critics like Brody stay away from "Texas Chainsaw"? Whatever it's actual qualities, qualities they recognize and are drawn to want to salute, they recognize they're being drawn to embrace a source of film culture out of which has mostly come an attitude they're averse to and recognize as a threat.
Your, "Forty-plus years ago, one of cinema’s most anxiety-inducing spectacles was unleashed. It was a time of cynicism, violence, paranoia and the collapse of a working class that was being outsourced and made obsolete by technology. Casual, everyday sexism undermined women’s equality by systematic objectification and enabling of abusers. Industrialized slaughter of animals was destroying the environment. So, not all that different from today."
does not match up well with Brody's "At the same time, “Resident Evil” is a relentless reflection of the tawdriness of strip malls, of the dun grimness of heavy industry, of the sense of decisions being made by abstract higher-ups that make for a plant closing or a store being shuttered, of the daily threat of violence and the need to stay vigilant and look tough, of the sense of embattlement in a harrowingly desolate landscape, and of the escape into simulation and the vicarious as the only, and fleeting, feeling of heroism that the daily struggle—or the daily round of boredom—offers. The absurd fantasy that Anderson offers up plays like a documentary of an extreme state of mind—and turns it into a stereotype which, in being represented with such efficacy, propagates itself."
One's "reality," the other's an "extreme state of mind." I would guess he'd fear you might be "propagating itself," and so the reason why critics like Brody stay away from "Texas Chainsaw"? Whatever it's actual qualities, qualities they recognize and are drawn to want to salute, they recognize they're being drawn to embrace a source of film culture out of which has mostly come an attitude they're averse to and recognize as a threat.
Ryan Spencer I think I agree; you are
correct, I do not share Brody's view as expressed in his piece on Resident
Evil. I would also say that most horror is extreme in it's depiction; Romero's
Night of The Living Dead is about post-war isolationism and fear of "the other"
- same with It Comes at Night which was a very underrated film of 2017. I
suppose a lot of young viewers and upcoming twenty-something story-tellers
(from which I am 20ish years removed, so) have a much more democratic view of
genre. However, I think it's women in horror who are doing the most interesting
things in the past couple of years; Karyn Kusama's The Invitation, Julia Ducournau's
Raw, Jennifer Kent’s The Babadook... (Ducournau cites TCM as a huge influence).
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