Entry 3:

Dear Geoffrey:

Knowing how eloquently you've written about what you call "the disreputable lower tier of genre movies," I was intrigued that you say you miss them. Aren't they still out there, the present-day equivalents of horror and spaghetti Westerns, or is it that the theater venues have changed--no more Times Square-ish "authentic" dives? Or has it something to do with your growing older and becoming more of a 9-to-5 editor and family man, if I may get personal for a moment?

I don't think I ever had that passion for the B- or Z-movie. Ever since I was a teen-ager I've gone in for the difficult, slow, arty stuff--Dreyer, Murnau, Mizoguchi--and now I have a tough time enjoying a film that bypasses or insults my intelligence, though when I tell people this they think I'm a) being pretentious; and b) going in for self-punishment. The fact is, I genuinely get more pleasure from complex, difficult films than I do from obviously entertaining, simplistic ones. My favorite American film this year was The House of Mirth. I had the feeling I was watching an old master like Bresson or Dreyer, who, utterly intransigent, wouldn't give an inch of compromise to orient the audience. One reason I think the movie was so despised by middlebrow and essentially literary critics was that the director, Terence Davies, allowed his heroine to twist in the wind without resolving whether she was entirely sympathetic or unsympathetic--allowed her to do self-destructive and self-serving things one moment, truly touching and gallant things the next. And Gillian Anderson's performance was too vulnerable, made people uncomfortable, didn't have that shield of ironic detachment that allows the audience to know the actor is in on the joke. Every shot is framed and lit and art-directed with a vision, a very strong take, of the Edith Wharton book. Compare its intransigence and complexity with something like Erin Brockovich, which is a setup for the star, who is allowed to dress down corporate lawyers with twice her education and power and leave the audience clapping with pseudo-populist smugness. I agree, Erin Brockovich works as a movie, it's fun, it moves, and it's probably done a lot for the sale of pushup bras. But it's "feel-good" and therefore too easy, whereas House of Mirth got lambasted by the New York Times critics for being a downer, as if they were reviewing for their college frat paper.

Some of my favorite movies this year: House of Mirth, Rosetta, L'Humanité, Best in Show, Almost Famous, Gohatto (Taboo), Voyages, Jesus' Son, Platform, Time Regained, Beau Travail, Yi Yi, Pollock, Before Night Falls, High Fidelity and, I suppose, Crouching Tiger. By the way, what did you think of the two rock movies, Almost Famous and High Fidelity? I kind of liked them.

Yours,
Phillip