knudsen@ihnss.UUCP (12/12/84)
<monolith exhaust> Since others have impugned the value of Hugo Gernsback, I feel ready to get off my chest something that's bothered me for years: "2001" had a lot of faults as a movie, and spoiled a lot of other movies and TV series by establishing some bad habits. Period. Kubrick was a good enough director and had good enough SFX that he brought it off. But 2001 set some rather damaging precedents: --Half-hour worth of plot dragged into a 2+ hour movie --Wooden, emotionless acting (OK, that's part of Kubrick's story, but..) --Slooooowwwww pacing, including long special-effects views and what's really worse, actors' faces "spacing out" staring at those scenes. Certain movies and shows that suffered from the above bad habits were the first Star Trek movie and an otherwise very well done TV series called "The Starlost." The latter was especially troubled by slow pacing and spaced-out characters, although at least they showed emotions. Actually, maybe the real blame is on our culture for changing so much in expectations. 2001 is from 1967, when LSD, Zen, and introspection were big. Today people want action, love scenes, and cocaine rushes. So when "Star Trek: The Movie" was made in 2001 style (actually done a lot better, in my opinion), our late 70's reviewers blamed it for the same things they praised in 2001. Lesson One: Don't believe anything any critic says. Lesson Two: Don't believe anything another person says. Lesson Three: Don't feel bound to what *you* thought five years ago, unless you think you somehow transcend the pop culture of the moment (we all think that, don't we?) mike k
rjw@ptsfc.UUCP (Rod Williams) (12/13/84)
In article <2336@ihnss.UUCP> knudsen@ihnss.UUCP writes: >Kubrick was a good enough director and had good enough SFX that he >brought it off. But 2001 set some rather damaging precedents: > >--Half-hour worth of plot dragged into a 2+ hour movie >--Wooden, emotionless acting (OK, that's part of Kubrick's story, >but..) >--Slooooowwwww pacing, including long special-effects views and what's >really worse, actors' faces "spacing out" staring at those scenes. > > mike k Did you really mean to claim that before '2001' plots didn't drag, actors weren't wooden and pacing wasn't slooooowwwww? (:-)) -- Rod Williams dual!ptsfa!ptsfc!rjw