Pretentious/Overblown Movies You Have Seen?

I don't think I find any word more annoying than pretentious. But that's mostly because those that use the term do it as a pat dismissal of anything that strives to be more, that has something to say, that defiantly breaks rules, that doesn't give a **** what those who ask nothing of their movies think.


But I've definitely seen movies that adopt mannerisms from smarter films as a front to hide their complete emptiness. Pretentious is the word that would seem to cover that. But it also comes with the presumption that others who might find value in it are being duped, so it's still a pretty shitty word, even when used appropriately


Basically, people need to stop being frightened of thinking a movie is smarter than them. Because they should be smarter. And the more people who embrace the idea that art is better than them, even shitty pretentious art, the better

Pretens-ion-ion

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Letterboxd

You may be right but I think the best out of the series was first episode of season 2. The Jack and Hannibal fight.


We have hope!!!

https://www.looper.com/322601/mads-m...bout-season-4/

Ah. Seen that before. See, I’m a bit apprehensive about that one. What if it’s not as good as the rest?

More importantly (for me), the ending was relatively subtle (in my view, given how outlandish the show could be). It would be a shame to take away that subtlety.

Boy, I haven't seen anything that even tries to be anything but the mediocre crap that it is in a long time.

I used to love Rohmer, though I remember one reviewer claiming watching his stuff was like watching paint dry. But that was a long time ago. How one finds movies to watch has become a free for all. I used to read the paper on Friday and there would be lots of reviews of whatever was new. I would then go to the local art house cinema. But those days are over. the art house is not what it once was. The have to show first run American hack stuff just to get by. And there are no reviewers I trust anymore. I used to like Fandango and Rotten Tomatoes but even they are not what they used to be. Especially Fandango. You just know that the viewer likes are inflated by the industry somehow. At least they seemed to be when I stopped using that as a way to find films. Now I just browse around and hope for the best.

I’ve been thinking about that since I was a kid as I grew up in a household oversaturated by film where there was no time/organised way to watch everything. From the age of about 15-16, I’ve had a list of all films I want to eventually see written down/in notes on my phone. It’s not organised, there is no order (though the newer films I have recently seen trailers for and wanted to see for that reason tend to find their way to the top). I find it still works very well. You open a list that’s already been filtered and especially with the lesser known films, you look at a title and think, I don’t know what this film was but I know I definitely wanted to see it, so I can just put it on and give it a try.

The best film-finding strategy is:
1. Make a Letterboxd account.
2. Spend time looking for people who seem to share their tastes with you.
3. Look into their highest-rated films that you haven't seen.
4. ???
5. PROFIT!

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Look, I'm not judging you - after all, I'm posting here myself, but maybe, just maybe, if you spent less time here and more time watching films, maybe, and I stress, maybe your taste would be of some value. Just a thought, ya know.

Low key, I've actually done that with you before heh.

I also sometimes look for movie lists I really like and use a random number generator to pick movies from them I find interesting.

There for a few years in December, I would go to a website that showed every movie coming out the next year and write it down. I knew then what I planned on seeing at the cinema and mark them off as I saw them.

I haven't done that in years. Maybe I should go back to doing it since they now list films that are on streaming services.

I think it’s a very good strategy. And yes, I also mark things as “seen”.

Thief!!!

I used to think pretentious meant snobby.

The Force Awakens and its two sequels are the most pretentious movies ever. They're garbage parading around as the phenomenon which is Star Wars.

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Boldly going.

So the use of the word "pretentious" is itself pretentious?

I only pretend to be pretentious.

I am not always pretentious, but when I am it is a pretense.

I am not always pretentious... but when I am, I prefer to be so with Dos Equis.

Stay pretentious, my friends.

I can't spell pretntious so does that make me non-pretentious?

(500) Days of Summer comes to mind. Even the title is so self-conscious.

It does unfairly get applied to arty films, probably because there's a perceived arrogance from the filmmaker that what they're going to show you is weighty and meaningful and that audiences will come out enlightened. And people argue that if you don't like it, it's just because you don't 'get it'. There's always someone who'll get meaning from a film, regardless of whether the filmmakers/actors were motivated by anything other than money.

Referring to Star Wars as a "phenomenon" with the implication that everything in it from the prequels to the Holiday Special is inherently sacrosanct compared to these three sequels (to say nothing of the implication by omission that Rogue One and Solo were perfectly adequate in comparison) is in itself one very pretentious claim to make.

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Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

I love the word pretentious. It says it perfectly, if you're cynical enough, pretending to be something that's not true, claiming higher values. All movies are entertainment, intended to sell tickets and food and to put butts in theater seats, after which some other people will stream, rent or purchase it.

In that context, a movie is great if it makes lots of money or at least makes as much money as its backers expect. Money wise, they can shoot high or low, but fulfilling expectations is the key here. As a marketing strategy, pretense is one where you claim high culture or a higher moral purpose, even though it's hard to define either. "Art" (note the capital A) gets mixed in there when something about the movie defies entertainment conventions. Making a pretentious movie or Art becomes a matter of marketing and expectations, the target audience and investors' willingness to fund something that's not just another reliable Batman movie.

Pretense is about making the audience think THEY are high culture because they are watching it, making it a bit obscure or rewarding thinkers who see a message in the movie. None of this is about a suffering artist laboring away in his garret, inhaling paint fumes until madness ensues. It's a corporate strategy, funded by guys who invest millions, expect to get additional millions in profit and want to show up in their nice clothes at the Oscar ceremony. As a consumer and producer of art who is pretentious enough to think somebody might like my stuff, I love movies, but I have no illusions.