If you don’t subscribe to the The New Yorker magazine and if you love movies, you must beg, borrow or steal the
Denby is the film critic for the magazine. For years, I have had this love hate relationship with him. I enjoyed his tale of returning to college, reading the cannon of required books and his reactions to that experience in his biographical, Great Books. My reaction may have been highly influenced by the fact that I had returned to the classroom to finish my degree at the age of fifty one, but in any case I found it well worth reading even though I disagreed with his opinion of some of the books on the list.
In the early nineties, I was freshly divorced, and it happens that Denby was heading down the same path. In another sign of the times for guys our age, we invested a lot of money in what was to become a bubble market. He wrote a humorous story about his experience in a book called American Sucker. In my case only my broker and the tax man knows for sure.
The area where Denby and I often disagree is his opinion of current film. I find I more often than not like a film he doesn’t review well and dislike many that he thinks are worthy. I do look forward to his columns because even if I disagree with him I learn something and if it isn’t about the film, it’s about writing, because there is no doubt in my mind this guy can write. He is learned in his opinions and direct in his commentary, and he writes in an accessible and concise manner that is a joy to read.
As far as the Big Picture is concerned, I couldn’t agree more with him. His observations on the future of the big screen presentations in the digital age are right on. His observations of the cold and calculating movie production business is eye opening to teary eyed sentimentalist’s like me, but they do answer the question about the quality of movies that are being made and why there aren’t more films that I like being made.
Moreover his analysis of the technical revolution in the near future is interesting. I know I and my peers have always questioned who the hell would watch a film on their ipod or their phone. The answer is not surprising, it’s young people, but the reasons are interesting and logical
What Denby, the critic, the guy that sees more movies than I do, has to say about the experience of seeing a film in a theater and how it will never be replaced by the best home theater system is worth reading the article all by itself. Yes, the theaters are aging, lacking in style or grace, and they have such thin walls that often you are watching one film and experiencing the special effects of the movie next store. Yes, people talk and cell phones ring during the performance. The floors are sticky and the popcorn is outrageously expensive. The commercials, cross promotions and coming attractions are challenging are limits of tolerance for the time they take (twenty minutes at the last film I attended). But after the gab quiets down, the idiot turns off his phone and the film begins, you can lost in a world of make believe that sometimes challenges your mind and instructs you in ways that very few things can. It’s the shared experience that makes it unique. As Denby says, people will go to movies alone, but they really don’t want to be alone.
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