But when something happens with no intention, that means any quality it has is incidental
In this instance, we are talking about a person who hasn't learned how to use a camera. People can still have intentions about what they hope to say without technical expertise. And their lack of technical expertise can make them say it in ways that those who have it would never consider.
You might get something out of it, the same way someone might have a profound reaction to paint you accidentally spilled on a canvas, but it's not as likely.
Yes, accidentally spilled paint can possibly be beautiful, or make people have profound reactions. But that is for a different conversation. We are talking about people creating art, which at least requires the decision to document that spilled paint. Otherwise, it's just spilled paint that maybe no one would ever look at.
And, yes, probably some of the movies I would champion might not be much more than spilled paint that someone happened to turn their camera towards. But they aren't common. Most of these 'bad movies' I like have at least some intent behind what they are doing.
I think this is a sticking point, with both you and Minio: how much we should care about something being possible
But is it actually only possible if it actually
is? I'm not some dummy just wanting to be duped. And I presume neither is Minio. And both of us, as well as many others who watch lots and lots of things, are no strangers to suddenly stopping and taking notice of what is happening in one of these supposedly bad movies that no one has apparently noticed. Something we haven't seen in anything else. That's definitely something.
Now it isn't that we are techincally
right in noticing it. Or that anyone else must notice it. But if we are compelled to point at it, after seeing so many other things we don't have any remote interest in pointing at, it cant' just
possibly be something. It
is something.
The concern, it seems, is that if people expect these films to be bad, they won't give any of them a chance and will miss out on some meaningful (if unlikely) experience.
It you were to randomly grab some forgotten b movie from whatever decade, yes, there is a good chance it isn't going to be any kind of revelation. And there is also a better than decent chance it might be terrible. Most movies, no matter their pedigree, are probably going to be misses for any one individual.
But by just pushing all of these kinds of films into the 'bad' category before anyone watches them makes it very hard to ever take any of them seriously.
Keeping in mind that I support MST wholeheartedly, the chance that anyone can watch one of these movies they are riffing on, and actually even remotely see the movie past its framing is actually impossible. Maybe that riffing might keep you on board longer than you normally would, but other than this, no one (including myself) is watching those movies in that context to watch the movies. No one. Zero. They are watching the movies exclusively as a springboard for these three guys in the audience to make fun of. And if this attitude bleeds out from simply this one show (which it does, but it also is an attitude that existed long before it as well....but maybe it's now move prevelant) it is the attitude most people are going to have before they even put on one of these films.
And let me be clear, I think it is totally fine to put on one of these movies simply to have friends in and laugh at them. Not take them remotely seriously. But if this is the only time a person watches these movies, how likely is it that they are thinking about the deeper implications of how this movie was made? Appreciating bad movies seriously isn't a whim, as Minio says, it takes some amount of paying attention. And if what the audience is looking for is the next open doorway to make fun of it....um, it's never going to be considered as more than a butt of a joke, is it?
To me, the most valuable and enriching thing about art is the exploration of other minds, which necessarily means having a mind at work on the other end.
And I think this is a perfect example of the kind of derogatory thinking that is attached to b movies right off the bat: the belief that there is no mind on the other end. Because the film might be cheap, or silly, or hard to follow, or technically inept, the people making this don't have anything to show.
But they do. Not all the time. But way more, way way more, than I think you, or most people, would ever give them credit.
Because if someone genuinely thought meaning was just as likely to arise out of randomness, they'd have no reason to seek out art over anything else.
I think there is meaning in randomness, and I still seek out art. Art that is both deliberate and random.
Because it is never entirely random, is it? It's selectively random. They are still choosing what they show and what they don't show. It's not like the movie you are watching is everything they shot. They cut out what they didn't believe worked, and they kept in what they think did (ideally)
I make an important distinction between "amateurism" and, for lack of a better word, laziness.
I'm not here to defend laziness. I think there are very very few movies that I would say are good that I would ever define as lazy. I abhor laziness.
And I've got to say that I think you moving towards a defining word like 'lazy' says a lot. Just because an artist is not interested in doing a number of things well that maybe you think should be done well, doesn't mean they aren't expending energy elsewhere. It doesn't mean they are lazy.
And I would also like to make a distinction between intent and thought. I agree a lot of great things in art were unintended, but I think far fewer were thoughtless.
I think there can be intent without a lot of thought. I think someone can instinctively know what they want, and they just try and get it, without really knowing why.
Maybe some of these movies I might love don't all build towards some kind of accumulated ball of wisdom, but they move from one spontaneously bright and fiery moment to the next. They live in a moment where they don't know where they are going, but they know they want to say something.
Basically, intent and thought can be worlds apart sometimes.
I think it's relevant that both examples involve professionals snapping themselves out of their routine, so to speak, but then applying their expertise and thoughtfulness back to the messy result in some way.
This is a fair distinction, and I agree the analogy isn't perfect, but what I was trying to illustrate is that even if attached to a great artistic mind, a left hand isn't necessarily possessed with any artistic talent. But it can be motivated by artistic intent, and it's awkward movements can have a life and vitality of their own.
Tommy Wiseau did the camera thing (he apparently exclaimed "we'll be making film history!"), but I think for our purposes either's probably as good as the other.
For me The Room is a movie that is good to laugh at and nothing more. Now maybe others have more to say about Wiseau and his artistry, but I actually think he's mostly rightfully considered terrible. His movie is lifeless and cynical and dead. And, yes, it would also be very hard to explain this distinction between him and Breen, but I think it could be done.
What's interesting about this is that the work is valuable for reasons outside of itself. You say it "captures [a] worldview," and I agree with that, but that almost makes it sound like a documentary. I probably need to think more about this (feel free to do the thinking for me if it's crystallized already on your end), but there's something important here about valuing films as time capsules, as useful in some way, compared to valuing them as emotional experiences in and of themselves.
The question I would ask about this is do you believe there would ever be a more comprehensive and maybe even somehow sympathetic way to understand who Neil Breen is, and the type of man he represents, than through him making these weird movies?
Do you think him talking about his ideas at a Ted Talk would really tell you anything about him beyond the fact that he's an insufferable crackpot. And probably also a very boring one if talking for more than five minutes at a time?
Him making his films the way he does, and as badly as he does, crystallizes that man. And sort of humanizes him as well. All because of his 'artistry'.
The one where they did it because they looked at the runtime and thought it didn't seem movie-y enough and included it just to make that number go up, because they wanted to be taken seriously.
This is an obviously bad way to make choices for your film. And I think your right that the context of the reason is fair to disqualify his decision to include all of those shots. But I mention Tarkovsky simply because many people would discount the rationale of doing such a thing for any reason at all. Almost as if the depiction of real time in a film is some kind of sin. But it shouldn't be considered to be innately so. So if someone wants to talk about how those opening scenes of Manos add to the films overall effect, I'm all ears.
But, no, I'm not going to be the one to do that.
The rest of the movie is pretty good though.
Tourists, people with nothing to say, people in filmmaking for fame or prestige or money, as soulless as any studio accountant. Does that mean they can't accidentally make something interesting? Nope.
Of course those people can accidentally make something interesting. If only they were allowed to have more accidents, maybe it would happen eventually.
and I wouldn't expect you to change your posture towards it based on the odd exception.
And I'm not expecting you to change your stance on 'bad movies'. They are a hard sell, and I am an outlier amongst every one I know on these feelings of mine. And I'm okay staying that way.
The only thing I ever ask in these discussions is an openness to discuss the merit of these movies without simply being swatted down with 'but bad movies bad'. Because then I have to start lighting fires.
I [am now curious about how this sentence ends].
That was the exactly moment my manager walked into the closet where I was hiding and things had to be quickly ended. Normally I would never allow such
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