Do movies ''age'' or not?

People often talk about how whether a movie has ''aged well'' or does it ''hold up today'', which people often counter by saying it's not a valid thing to ask since it's the same movie it was before. I'm asking you where you stand on that debate.

My stance is that movies don't ''age'' per se, but can be widely misinterpreted at release, or widely misinterpreted now, due to cultural context. For a movie, or any piece of art, to be good, it needs to have something in it that's universal (though not always easy to see).

To give some examples, the original King Kong is talked about for being the first movie to utilize so many special effects, composites, and camera tricks to create believable fantastical imagery. But watching it today, not knowing that, you still end up seeing a well-paced adventure with a lovingly crafted tropical island and giant monke. That doesn't lead you to think it has ''aged well'', just that it's good. No need for forthetimeisms to enjoy it, or to recommend it.

Ghost in the Shell is another example. absolute turd, but how did it gain so much cultural relevance? My guess is that it was the 90s, the grunge era, when everyone loved beating off to depression. Plus it was when that fruity anime cargo cult was still new, so it had a guaranteed niche.

There's a point to be made about movies that focus their stories on current world issues, in that the closer you get to the core of it, the better you will be. Idiocracy is a mid-2000s satire about the dumbing down of society, which only succeeds in some areas. It's still good, still funny, but there are moments when you go ''this is so Bush-era''.
Blade runner (far-fetched comparison, I know) is a story about a world gone confusing and dehumanizing due to too much technology. They had good knowledge of exactly what's wrong with such a world, what lead to it, how one can react to it, etc, and incorporated all that in a cohesive story. It's obvious why it's more appreciated today than it was at release, because the things that inspired it have only become worse and harder to ignore. So you never go ''this is so 80s''. Or maybe because they've been bombarded by bad, vapid imitators like ghost in the shell which completely missed the point of what cyberpunk is. So one good cyberpunk story now seems like mana from heaven.

A specific example, which you amy have an equivalent to, is gone with the wind. I disliked it for its sappiness, which I guess people were more tolerant towards in the 1930s, but I'm not. However I'd write that down as ''not for me'', not necessarily ''bad''. Not at all. I see there's a lot of stuff to enjoy here. After all, a piece of media referenced in Tank Vixens can't be bad.

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I'm the Yugoslav cinema guy. I dig through garbage. I look for gems.

Ghost In The Shell is a turd?

Some do. A lot of movies have key plot points (or even entire premises) that could never exist in the modern world because of one technological advance or another, particularly cell phones.

The best films touch on universal/timeless themes so that it doesn't matter, but some could only exist when they did. Sometimes this even extends to character choices.

I know, right? It's awesome.

I wouldn't say that's aging, though, or otherwise every historical film would have been aged at release.

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Well, tell us how you really feel about Ghost in the Shell! I kinda feel like this post was mostly to get that knock in wrapped in a philosophical wrapper

Ghost in the Shell still plays very well for me. Appleseed, on the other hand, feels very dated. At least from a stylistic and voice acting perspective. Even Akira can sometimes get awkward to revisit for no other reason that the character designs that get more of my attention, today, than they should.

Anyway. Yeah, I think some movies don't age well. Or, at the least, details in the movie might not age as well and can risk becoming distractions to the greater design (e.g., Akira character designs for me). Another example of that would be the green, monochromatic boot-up screen sequence in Alien. The resolution, color, and, now, very obvious old tech doesn't match current design trends in tech. At the time, it was science fiction! Today, that scene risks pulling the younger audience out. For me, it works because it is old, clunky, and mechanical which arguably fits the tone of the film. That might not be the case for younger or future viewers. I'm kind of techie, so that is the type of thing that I usually see first.

I can't imagine anyone younger than 30 could watch The Phone Booth without asking a lot of questions and just being completely removed from the experience. Movies that exist of an era (I don't mean period pieces, though Gone With the Wind fits both thematic and cinematic descriptions), to me, have less risk of aging poorly. Granted, arguments can be make that the topics presented are old and may be viewed as unacceptable (or worse) depending on where the winds of society are blowing at the moment. I would argue that it is clearly of a time (both in theme and cinematic/acting styles) and was never meant to be representative of anything but that time. I can accept that and I think I would struggle understanding anyone that would attempt to apply contemporary social standards to much from our past. We evolve. Technology evolves. Understanding evolves. At risk of my post drifting ever so easily into other topics of conversation, I'll just close this point by offering hope that as we grow, so too does our empathy of both our future and past. If that makes sense. For movies, of course.

I'll lean into the previously made points that if there is a universal/timeless theme at play, and that it works at least on some base level, then the movie is probably going to be fine, barring the potential distractions I've mentioned or similar for whoever fines other details as noticeable. At least for me.

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"My Dionne Warwick understanding of your dream indicates that you are ambivalent on how you want life to eventually screw you." - Joel

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Good thread idea.

It's interesting that many people who only watch the latest movie releases can think that anything made in the 20th century 'hasn't aged well'. The term 'hasn't aged well' is often used by people who almost never watch movies from the mid 20th century or earlier. It only confirms that they are use to modern film esthetics and prefer that. We all can show a preference for that which we are raised with, or are familiar with.

Older films, especially those from the 1930s to 1960s can be misinterpreted by modern/younger audiences who aren't aware of past social norms. I'll give an example: when I first started watching old pre-code (before 1934) movies I watched a movie where a teenage daughter greeted her father by kissing him directly on the lips and calling him 'darling'. Which made me think what the heck is going on there! People today might view that as a hint of incest, which it's not. I've since seen many, many 1930s films and apparently adult children would greet their parents by kissing them on the lips and the films of the day reflected that. So yeah social norms of generations ago might be misinterpreted by today's youth.

Topic matter is a huge asset, if you happen to hit upon it. Is it still relevant today (in some aspect)?

Depends on what they're about. Films set long ago but based entirely on relationships would be relatively unaffected.

Films that can't function unless information cannot travel easily, on the other hand, would be.

Using the Coens as an example here. Most agree that a majority of their films have aged well. Maybe its their topic direction leads to a vast field of "what ifs?"and can be viewed in different ways through the years.


Just spit ballin' here...

If it's a good movie, it doesn't age.

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It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
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Usually when someone says “a movie aged” they mean “the movie doesn’t adhere to my contemporary expectations.”

It’s a shallow criticism.

Movies absolutely age...some age within a matter of a couple of years.

It seems most people who complain about movies not aging well, are basically unhappy with films that signify being made in a different time, by different methods, catering to different tastes.

And most of the time, the answer to this problem is: Who cares?


Even in cases where a film is beholden to a fad that seems stupid or quaint by today's measures (let's say Frankie Avalon beach party pictures), yes they've clearly not aged well in that no teenager is ever going to idolize the likes of Avalon ever again...but, even in extreme situations like this, where very few people are probably still watching these things because they aged out, they are still meaningful cultural artifacts by the nature of how frozen in amber they are.


So the answer to the question becomes, yeah, most things age, but not into total irrelevancy.


So if one is interested in this particular medium, or the art that comes out of it, it's best not to worry too much if a film maintains its contemporary feel. Because, why would we want it to? Part of arts value is to chart its progress through the decades, and to have it reflect back the culture and the society it was made in.

All movies age before they even release. It’s part of what makes it a hollow, pointless criticism.

Everything ages. Everything dies. At most, we can hope for tales that resonate, more or less universally, with our form of life (biological human beings). We are not the apex of evolution, however. We will either go extinct or we will change into something else, with a different form of life, which will have less and less in common with us.

Cinema is presented to us in a grammar that has evolved. There are little things that happen in movies that send signals that people in the 18th century wouldn't understand (e.g., the difference between a quick-cut and slow fade to black and fade in). That grammar is not timeless. It is conventional. It changes with the times. It's a language unto itself that we have learned through thousands of hours of viewing. And it is still changing (e.g., new conventions about speech bubbles for cell phone text messages).

Language is also conventional and also always on the move. Since the first subtitles and "talkies" we have been viewing with language. And language changes. Ever tried reading The Canterbury Tales? Not so easy, is it? Try reading Beowulf in the original "English."

Technology is on the move. Culture is on the move. Nothing is standing still. Yes, films age. If it doesn't feel to you that a film has aged, it is probably because YOU have aged with it and not noticed any disconnect.

Sometimes it can mean "this movie doesn't look how I think movies should look" or "that isn't how acting is supposed to be." And I think that's largely a matter of needing to be exposed to more film. It's like the first time you read a book from the 1700s. Your brain needs to adjust to the language and conventions and rhythms of it.

When I use the phrase "hasn't aged well," what I usually mean is that it seems to want me to feel a certain way about things and those attitudes are really outdated. I suppose you could say that has to do with my "contemporary expectations," or even just how I bring my personal experiences/values to a film.

For example, I've seen two films from the 40s/50s in the last month where a woman was pressured to give up her job either because her husband didn't like it or because it conflicted with her husband's work. The issue isn't that a woman would give up her job---that part fits with the time period. But what hasn't aged well is the film's assumption that of course this is the right choice. In the case of the one film, it didn't seem so obvious to me. She's making more money and she loves her work. The problem is his jealousy, and the film never pauses to consider that maybe he should get over himself.

It makes sense that a film made in the 40s would have an attitude that's at home in the 40s. I don't expect movies to have social politics or attitudes that are 60 years ahead of their time. But there's a chemistry between a viewer and a film, and sometimes I think that the gap between a film's attitude and the viewer's attitude can sour that chemistry. "Hasn't aged well" for me is a convenient shorthand for when I clash with the assumptions and attitudes about the subject being presented in the film.

We all, my friend, through the magic of time.

This is sooo close to being a sentence Rock.

Give it time. It'll eventually age well into our ever evolving languages.