Commentary 20 Jul 2013 10:59 am
POV of Me
I owe many thanks to Garrett Gilchrist (as a matter of fact, we all do) for all the work he’s done in saving and restoring the archives of Richard Williams. Now I find that he’s located a copy of the short THE SAILOR AND THE DEVIL which Williams had Erroll LeCain animate, color and completely create singlehandedly while working for the studio in those early days at 13 Soho Square. Gilcrhrist notes that the last seconds of the short are missing, so we’re still short an ending, but there’s a lot there just the same. So enjoy.
In the first script of the first episode of The Soparanos Tony spends much of the time on the therapist’s couch (so to speak – he’s actually in a chair across the room from Dr. Melfi). There he starts to describe himself as one of the last who were in on the beginning of something. He knows he’s the last of the breed to have respect for the “job” he’s been trained to do, and for this he “mourns” the workout for the future of this “business.” Christopher, his nephew, he’d point out, has no respect because he cme in when it was much-too-easy to play at this career.
The lines, as I heard them, could have come from most professional animators talking about their line of work. It isn’t long before we see what Tony was talking about.
I recently saw Monsters University in an Academy screening. During the post film discussion I go ina very short discussion of how little I enjoyed the film and found myself, a party of one, discussing my thoughts.
Within days I couldn’t remember ANYTHING about the Pixar film. It was as though I hadn’t seen it; at least I couldn’t rmember aby of. No gestures, no gags, no animation, no design, nothing. I could not remember much about the film. For this reason, I was glad when Pixar offered Academy members a second chance. Any Monday to Thursday to screening we were allowed to come and see the film with a guest. I decided it was only fair to give Pixar and their artists that second run. I went to see it again.
My memory wasn’t wrong, I found out. I still disliked it. Though Heidi loved it I was completely apathetic to the allure of the movie. I felt it was like watching an excellent animated show made for TV. Nothing in the movie was better than anything done for the small screen. The animation was up to the best cgi standards, the design was equal to Monsters Inc., the first film.The characters, in that first film, had already been developed as far as Pixar would take them. The gags had already played out and there was nothing new offered in the second film. It had already become a generic film, and there was nothing new to ffer me. I felt this on my first viewing and felt the same even more harshly in that second screening. (I did like the way one of the creatures moved, but even that grew stale.) It was like watching yet another of those Donald and Ranger cartoons from the 1950′s. Nothing new in any of the shorts. All perfectly professional; all totally boring.
For the same reason, I’m looking forward to seeing Despicable Me 2. Is there anything new, better, original in this second film? We’ll see. Maybe I’ll get to laugh at least once?
I apologize to those of you who loved Monsters University. However, if you enjoyed it, I’m glad. That’s all you should want from a film. I just wish I had enjoyed it more.
on 20 Jul 2013 at 11:11 am 1.Elliot Cowan said …
Despicable Me 2 is mostly boring.
I took Hugo and by half way I was itching for it to end.
on 20 Jul 2013 at 12:51 pm 2.Roberto Severino said …
I think I’m going to start going to the movies far less often if sequels are the direction that many of these animation studios want to take now. It’s an attempt at trying to financially milk something for all its worth and a quick way to avoid trying to come up with anything new and challenging.
Don’t know anything about Despicable Me 2 or the first one since I never saw either, and I probably wouldn’t be the end of the world for me if I didn’t see either. Good commentary.
on 20 Jul 2013 at 5:58 pm 3.Mark Mayerson said …
In films that are meant to be stand-alone experiences, characters start in one place intellectually or emotionally and end up in another. The problem with sequels is that the character’s arc was resolved in the original film, so any new arc has to be superficial in order to keep the things about the character that the audience finds appealing.
This is why you compared Monsters University to television. TV characters have personalities, but their arcs have to be circumscribed as they can’t change from episode to episode. Homer Simpson can’t change or he’s no longer Homer Simpson.
Sequels are the McDonalds of movies. They’re there to give the audience a predictable experience, but little nourishment.
on 20 Jul 2013 at 9:37 pm 4.Mark said …
I could not agree more about Monsters, U. It’s a loud, unfunny, and forgettable cartoon. Billy Crystal, in particular, is neither fun, nor funny–and he yells a lot with his grating voice. The animation is all over the place, and the lighting looks like a box of melted wax crayons–very strange. I did like the character designs, however. But the biggest problem seems to have been the multiple director/writer and committee approach to film making, which tries to impress everyone and ends up impressing no one.
on 21 Jul 2013 at 7:46 am 5.slowtiger said …
I go out on a limb and say you will enjoy Despicable Me 2. Well, I did. Nothing special about the story, but loads of well-timed gags, and funny movements and exaggerations. This is something I rarely see in today’s animation: 90% of the gags are in the dialogue, 10% are just funny takes. DM2 dares to put about 30% of the gags in the way something/someone *moves*, which is so much harder to achieve.
on 21 Jul 2013 at 6:29 pm 6.Joey P. said …
I have to agree with you, Mark. It baffles me that they choose to make sequels for films with self-contained stories and arcs (Monsters, Inc.) rather than films where the characters and the film’s universe still potentially have room to grow and progress (The Incredibles… maybe). There’s a reason Aliens and The Godfather Part II were better received than Jurassic Park II and Ocean’s Twelve
on 21 Jul 2013 at 7:30 pm 7.the Gee said …
Joey, at least two of your examples are based on novels, right?
I guess it is probably more likely that Puzo envisioned the larger story of The Godfather while Crichton just played off of the success of the first book.
In live action, it seems like so many movies are made with franchises in mind. That can be especially made obvious to the audience by the last scene or the dangling thread which leaves open the chance of a sequel. So, how in the heck do they continually botch the effort of sequels?
I read a Slate Magazine article on a screenwriting book called “Save the Cat! The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need.†which was attributed to how formulaic movies are now. I hadn’t heard of it before but it might be part of the reason why more I keep hearing/reading more about “story beats†(which agitates me to no end).
To me, if the story can’t tell itself and you can’t correct the weak parts, hitting story beats seems like something horribly lazy and misguided like putting a band aid on a mosquito bite or putting one a gaping wound. Applying the same solution to what could be different problems is stupid. I guess cliches and rationalizations and setups for sequels are all easier when following a 15 story beat structure.
Anyway, I’d link the article but lately WordPress has rejected a couple of my comments with links.
The article is worth reading….especially if you are unfamiliar with the book. I’m not a fan of McKee’s book either, for what that is worth. Did Faulkner need a screenwriting guide to make the transition from novels to film? No. There are good writers and there are many many more employed and semi-successful bad writers.
on 26 Jul 2013 at 11:02 pm 8.Laura said …
I enjoyed Despicable Me 2, and was thrilled to see Greg Perler’s name so huge!!