My wife and I just saw “The Artist” and, though I haven’t seen all 10 nominees for Best Picture, I’ll be stunned if it doesn’t win the Oscar.
“The Artist” is perfect for the Academy, mainly because it’s a movie nobody under 30 would ever go see. The theater I sat in could have been the rec room of the local Senior Center. Plus—it’s a foreign film. And guilty Hollywood liberals “know” that Americans are commercial sellouts, while the furriners make all the real art.
None of this is a criticism of “The Artist” itself. I quite enjoyed it. The shame for Hollywood is that it’s a morality tale for their own industry that, alas, the Academy doesn’t quite get.
Forget all the reviews you’ve read about “Hollywood’s bygone days of lost greatness,” blah, blah, blah. “The Artist” is a story of what happens to people and industries when the dominant media shifts. Going from silent movies to “talkies” didn’t just change the names on the movie marquees. It changed how people watched movies.
If you’re familiar with Neil Postman’s work, you’re probably surprised he didn’t get a screenwriting credit.
Good silent movies became “bad movies” overnight when the expectations of the audience changed. The sort of acting required for silent films because ridiculous when sound arrived—just like the idea of people sitting and reading a 20,000 word magazine article on water rights in Africa because ridiculous when US newsmag readers got access to the internet. The expectation became “You’ll give me stuff I want to read about, or I’ll click and find it somewhere else,” which is very different from “Oh, Newsweek magazine came in the mail. I guess I should care about the justice system on Navajo reservations” back in the day.
Once again, I’m not discounting the movie at all. The two main characters are delightful, compelling and funny. I’m ready to see their next flick. And, surprisingly, my “I hate black and white movies” wife enjoyed it, too.
But the point the movie makes by taking away one dramatic element of the movie medium—dialogue—is that, once the dominant medium changes, everything changes.
One anecdotal example: Sitting in a silent movie, the crunching and crackling of food wrappers and popcorn became almost intolerable. In a regular movie I would have noticed, but not as much. Taking away the dialog (and sometimes all sound entirely) reminded me of how much more I enjoy watching movies at home. No interruptions, no strangers, no watching the movie when the theater decides to show it, no $8.00 popcorn.
And like most Americans, I do watch most of my movies from home now. And with Comcast adding a Netflix-like service, and Google starting up a bunch of web channels with original content on demand, we’ll all be watching from home more and more. Because I can. Because new technology is letting me and, thus, changing my expectations.
Our dominant social medium—video—is undergoing a fundamental shift. This will create many George Valentins and Peppy Millers. Not just actors, but entire industries will win and lose.
“The Artist” is right that something is lost when we “make room for the young.” But something is gained, too.
The true losers are the people who don’t get it.
"The truth is something [Warren] probably prefers not to confront. Harvard doesn’t come calling just because you’re a smart lawyer and a terrific teacher — not with Warren’s modest, Oklahoma upbringing and non-Ivy League education. She is not your typical Harvard professor. At a certain point, when the law school was under pressure to promote diversity, she represented a three-fer: a great lawyer with a national profile, a woman, and a minority, at least by virtue of family lore. "
-- Joan Vennochi
