Could It Be It Was All So Simple Then
My whole life, I've always prided myself on being a bit of a pop culture aficionado. But just like anything else one is good at, I tend to specialize. You see, there are doctors and there are doctors. After all, you wouldn't want your foot doctor performing your open heart surgery, right?
So when I say I love pop culture I'm usually referring to specifics such as decades like the eighties or nineties. I also tend to sometimes go back a few years before my time to get my pop culture fix. Some years ago I was most definitely working on my PHD in all things Brat Pack and I was only a few credits short before I switched majors to Dawson's Creek like Dissertations and Felicity Philosophy. It's always been this way, trading one pop culture obsession for another with seemingly no end in sight.
But then a few years ago something strange happened. It started becoming harder and harder to get excited about new obsessions. The music of today doesn't do it for me like it once did and the movies, often remakes of plots that have come before them, are reheated rehashes at best. You could say it's cause I'm getting older and maybe that is partly true. But I still stick by the fact that maybe REM got it right. Maybe it almost really is the end of the world as we know it.
This is why lately I have started watching old movies I have never seen before. I look at it like this. They are old, but they are still new to me. But this system is not without its flaws. It used to be that I wouldn't touch any movie prior to 1975 or so. Remember now, I was only born in 1977. I know, I know, there are a lot of "classics" from that era, but somehow classics tend to lose their luster over the years, unless of course you aged right along with them.
I'll give you an example. Over the summer I watched quite a few older movies such as Five Easy Pieces starring Jack Nicholson. I had wanted to see it for awhile because I love all things Jack. But when I ultimately watched it, I still felt letdown. Then I figured out what the problem was. I am watching an old movie starring Jack Nicholson with future Jack Nicholson in mind. It's like I'm Marty McFly who got to travel back in the time machine. I know all the great roles Jack Nicholson will go on to play and that's why for me, in comparison, Five Easy Pieces was just alright.
Sometimes the anticipation kills the mood, too. When I watched Taxi Driver not too long ago I was expecting to see a real eye opening experience. But then I think of all the times DeNiro has gone psycho in cinema and what became of little time "hooker" Jodie Foster and I'm not as jazzed up about it as before. I also think the fact that I watched it on television, where a lot of the supposed gore was edited out, didn't help matters any either. Lucky for me though they couldn't edit out Harvey Keitel's young hoodlum look which in itself, was worth the viewing.
Recently I traveled back even further and gave the movie Philadelphia Story a try. I know it is a classic and it stars an actor everyone loved, Jimmy Stewart. Even I loved Jimmy Stewart, but not because I saw most of his work, I didn't. This didn't stop me from loving him though. I can't explain why. But watching a movie like that now for the first time is next to impossible. It's not the fact that it's in black and white either. To me it's an annoying issue of the way they talked in older movies. As time went on, they slowly moved away from this but it's an interesting phenomena. Virtually all movies prior to 1965, and even some after that, are just completely different beasts than the films of today.
You know what I'm talking about, right? They said and did things with such over the top grandeur back then that it's hard to watch it in a present day mindset and take it seriously. What I can't figure out is if everyone talked like that back then or if they just talked it up because they thought that was the thing to do in cinema? They also had catch phrases and nicknames that have long since been retired sprinkled throughout their films. Things like "swell", "peachy keen" and "dame". No one says these things anymore unless of course they are saying them in jest. Obviously it's not the film's fault, but suddenly every movie ends up turning into a comedy. In fact, my boyfriend and I have a plan to go shopping one time and talk loudly in old time movie voices, just for the hell of it.
And then there are the grand, sweeping epic love stories of yesteryear. Movies like The Way We Were epitomized romance at the time. In fact, you could pair virtually anyone up with Robert Redford and it was cinematic gold. You knew they were classic love stories from the second they started because back then, every grand, sweeping epic love story had an equally grand, sweeping epic of a theme song. Sometimes, if they were lucky, they got a two for one and had the starlet sing the theme, too like was often the case with actresses Barbra Streisand, Judy Garland and Bette Midler. Which brings me to another old time movie gripe, how come they did all the credits at the beginning back then, not the end? I can't tell you how many times I've caught an old movie while flipping through the channels and thought it was going off when it was only beginning. Whoever made the decision to reverse this backwards way of starting movies made a very wise choice.
Regardless of cinematic inconsistencies, I still enjoy taking in an old movie every now and again. It reminds me that there was a time when movies used to tell a story, an original story, without heavy reliance on special effects. I wonder sometimes if people like me felt the same way when there was a transition from old time movie making to the types of movies of the eighties I grew to love. Maybe they thought that was garbage compared to what they grew up with, too.
I can't be certain, but I have a hunch Jimmy Stewart would have agreed with me.
So when I say I love pop culture I'm usually referring to specifics such as decades like the eighties or nineties. I also tend to sometimes go back a few years before my time to get my pop culture fix. Some years ago I was most definitely working on my PHD in all things Brat Pack and I was only a few credits short before I switched majors to Dawson's Creek like Dissertations and Felicity Philosophy. It's always been this way, trading one pop culture obsession for another with seemingly no end in sight.
But then a few years ago something strange happened. It started becoming harder and harder to get excited about new obsessions. The music of today doesn't do it for me like it once did and the movies, often remakes of plots that have come before them, are reheated rehashes at best. You could say it's cause I'm getting older and maybe that is partly true. But I still stick by the fact that maybe REM got it right. Maybe it almost really is the end of the world as we know it.
This is why lately I have started watching old movies I have never seen before. I look at it like this. They are old, but they are still new to me. But this system is not without its flaws. It used to be that I wouldn't touch any movie prior to 1975 or so. Remember now, I was only born in 1977. I know, I know, there are a lot of "classics" from that era, but somehow classics tend to lose their luster over the years, unless of course you aged right along with them.
I'll give you an example. Over the summer I watched quite a few older movies such as Five Easy Pieces starring Jack Nicholson. I had wanted to see it for awhile because I love all things Jack. But when I ultimately watched it, I still felt letdown. Then I figured out what the problem was. I am watching an old movie starring Jack Nicholson with future Jack Nicholson in mind. It's like I'm Marty McFly who got to travel back in the time machine. I know all the great roles Jack Nicholson will go on to play and that's why for me, in comparison, Five Easy Pieces was just alright.
Sometimes the anticipation kills the mood, too. When I watched Taxi Driver not too long ago I was expecting to see a real eye opening experience. But then I think of all the times DeNiro has gone psycho in cinema and what became of little time "hooker" Jodie Foster and I'm not as jazzed up about it as before. I also think the fact that I watched it on television, where a lot of the supposed gore was edited out, didn't help matters any either. Lucky for me though they couldn't edit out Harvey Keitel's young hoodlum look which in itself, was worth the viewing.
Recently I traveled back even further and gave the movie Philadelphia Story a try. I know it is a classic and it stars an actor everyone loved, Jimmy Stewart. Even I loved Jimmy Stewart, but not because I saw most of his work, I didn't. This didn't stop me from loving him though. I can't explain why. But watching a movie like that now for the first time is next to impossible. It's not the fact that it's in black and white either. To me it's an annoying issue of the way they talked in older movies. As time went on, they slowly moved away from this but it's an interesting phenomena. Virtually all movies prior to 1965, and even some after that, are just completely different beasts than the films of today.
You know what I'm talking about, right? They said and did things with such over the top grandeur back then that it's hard to watch it in a present day mindset and take it seriously. What I can't figure out is if everyone talked like that back then or if they just talked it up because they thought that was the thing to do in cinema? They also had catch phrases and nicknames that have long since been retired sprinkled throughout their films. Things like "swell", "peachy keen" and "dame". No one says these things anymore unless of course they are saying them in jest. Obviously it's not the film's fault, but suddenly every movie ends up turning into a comedy. In fact, my boyfriend and I have a plan to go shopping one time and talk loudly in old time movie voices, just for the hell of it.
And then there are the grand, sweeping epic love stories of yesteryear. Movies like The Way We Were epitomized romance at the time. In fact, you could pair virtually anyone up with Robert Redford and it was cinematic gold. You knew they were classic love stories from the second they started because back then, every grand, sweeping epic love story had an equally grand, sweeping epic of a theme song. Sometimes, if they were lucky, they got a two for one and had the starlet sing the theme, too like was often the case with actresses Barbra Streisand, Judy Garland and Bette Midler. Which brings me to another old time movie gripe, how come they did all the credits at the beginning back then, not the end? I can't tell you how many times I've caught an old movie while flipping through the channels and thought it was going off when it was only beginning. Whoever made the decision to reverse this backwards way of starting movies made a very wise choice.
Regardless of cinematic inconsistencies, I still enjoy taking in an old movie every now and again. It reminds me that there was a time when movies used to tell a story, an original story, without heavy reliance on special effects. I wonder sometimes if people like me felt the same way when there was a transition from old time movie making to the types of movies of the eighties I grew to love. Maybe they thought that was garbage compared to what they grew up with, too.
I can't be certain, but I have a hunch Jimmy Stewart would have agreed with me.
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