Amen, Brother!

I love talking about movies.

I don’t think that’s a terrible surprise to any visitor to this site.  Whether I loved a movie or loathed it, I love picking movies apart and analyzing the acting, the directing, the visual effects, the score, the editing, the ins-and-outs of the plot, etc. etc.

Take J.J. Abrams’ recent Star Trek movie, for example.  I really enjoyed the flick, but I also had a lot of problems with the script, problems that I discussed in my review and also in many conversations with friends.  I just love getting into a discussion with other fans about plot points such as “is it plausible or ridiculous that Spock would be able to see the destruction of Vulcan by looking up with the naked eye from another planet.”  But nothing makes me crazier than when someone responds by saying something like “well, it’s just a (sci-fi/comic-book/etc.) movie so you can’t really think about those things.”  AARGH.  That happens to me all the time (and certainly did in the context of discussions of the latest Trek flick).

Drew McWeeny, in his blog over at HitFix.com, gives a response to that sort of attitude better than any I could have ever come up with on my own.  This comes from his review of the Night at The Museum sequel (which, no shock, he rakes over the coals).  After listing several inane plot points in the movie, he writes this paragraph:

“Oh, it’s just a movie for kids.”  Screw you, and screw that answer.  That’s insulting and lazy and, honestly, seems to me to suggest that anyone who says it is disqualified from ever criticizing any story or logic point in any film ever made.  If you’re willing to just concede that anything that happens in any film is fine because it’s “just a movie,” then there is no common ground for us in discussing what works or what doesn’t.  I love seeing movies where the fantastic happens.  That’s one of the reasons I go to films… to see things that could never occur in the real world.  But it has to make SOME SORT of sense, even if it’s just internal logic.  And the rules seem to change from scene to scene here, and beyond that, they just don’t explain so much that after a while, all you can do is either surrender to the idiocy or reject it outright.

Amen, brother.  I could not have asked for a better summary of my attitude about movies (whether I’m watching them, talking about them, or writing about them).  Amen.