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Burn Hollywood Burn

I consider myself a movie afficionado, and I got the street cred to back it up. I dare say I’m a film snob.

This evening I went to see Bend it Like Beckham. Its a very good movie. Go see it, thumbs up, yadda yadda. However, while I was watching it, it dawned on me just how unbalanced the quality of indie movies has become compared to Hollywood. I’m sure there are plenty of crappy indie movies, but they never make it to the theater, whereas, there doesn’t appear to be any crap filter in Hollywood.

What I find amazing, is that you can smell a crappy Hollywood movie from a mile away, yet people still go to see them and they still keep churning them out. What’s amazing is that the entertainment industry seems willingly ignorant about the whole thing. They can’t say that Gigli is a hunk of crap, because they really just want an excuse to talk about Ben Afleck and JLo. So long as you have an A list star in the film, it gets a free pass. It doesn’t’ mean that anyone is going to see it, but good luck finding a negative word about it on Entertainment Tonight.

Its a real shame that so few people ever bother to see any of the good films that are out there. By failing to go watch them, they are just giving incentive to Hollywood to produce more crap.

One of my favorite questions to ask people is “what are your three favorite movies made from before you were born?” What answer they give isn’t as important as them just having an answer, and coming up with it relatively quickly. I’m even more impressed if they can come up with their three favorite black and white movies, and super impressed if they have even seen three silent films.

By Gary

3 dimples. 7 continents. 130 countries.

5 replies on “Burn Hollywood Burn”

“Also, I think I tend to really enjoy movies that might be more disturbing than the big studios would make.”

Feh.

I got two words for you: War Zone.

disturbing, yes. but it was a good movie – i’ve watched it since.

Three favorite movies from before I was born:

Patton
Lawrence of Arabia
Bridge on the River Kwai

My last movie counts in the black and white category if you’ve seen the original 1957 version.

Honourable mention goes to “Das Boot”, even though it was in 1981. It’s old enough for me to be too young at the time to appreciate anything other than cartoon. Only in the unsubtitled german soundtrack though.

I can’t say I’ve seen many silent/B&W stuff specifically, but I’ve seen most of Charlie Chaplin’s stuff.

well, okay, fine. So the original Bridge wasn’t B&W. I sit corrected 🙂

3 Favorites Before Born (do you ever ask people in their 90’s this question?):

1) Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb [might hold this spot in any time frame on my list of favorites]

2) The Godfather (I & II) [I guess that really dates me]

3) 2001: A Space Odyssey [what can I say: I dig Kubrik]

Of the silent films I’ve seen, everything with Buster Keaton or Charlie Chaplin held my attention even at a young age.

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