The English Patient
I just watched The English Patient, and I was rather disappointed. I had been told for years how wonderful a film it was. I found it absolutely pointless. It was riddled with characters for whom I just didn't care, pacing that was abominably slow and so many plotlines packed into its six-hour run (it wasn't six hours? Coulda fooled me) that truly didn't have to BE there to make the main point. Except that there wasn't a main point, so I suppose that makes it even more useless.
So your hands were cut by mean mean Germans? So your girlfriend who was married to someone else died in the desert? So the two people you loved deeply died, only one of whom we ever saw, and for like a minute (so why should I care that they died?), and you believe that all you love deeply are cursed, or that you are cursed? So your friend was blown up by a bomb? So your wife was cheating with your best friend? Tell me why to care, because I only generally listen to the whining of people I actually like. Or at the least, give me some sort of semblence of a plot, for all that's holy. (Or at the least, for all that's actually intelligent and worth watching. And for me.)
They gave this a Best Picture Oscar? I suppose that shouldn't even be a factor, though; Titanic got a Best Picture Oscar as well, and that was some of the most clichéd idiocy written for the screen that ever made millions of dollars. But at least the pacing was good in Titanic, and also, they weren't even trying to be deep in that movie. I can accept Titanic on its own terms and feel ok about it. But The English Patient was trying to be deep, and I think a lot of people must have thought it succeeded.
And this is why there will continue to be bad writing; because people cannot recognize it when they see it, and they think this is good. This spawns new sub-par material which is acclaimed as great. The mediocrity is perpetual.
So your hands were cut by mean mean Germans? So your girlfriend who was married to someone else died in the desert? So the two people you loved deeply died, only one of whom we ever saw, and for like a minute (so why should I care that they died?), and you believe that all you love deeply are cursed, or that you are cursed? So your friend was blown up by a bomb? So your wife was cheating with your best friend? Tell me why to care, because I only generally listen to the whining of people I actually like. Or at the least, give me some sort of semblence of a plot, for all that's holy. (Or at the least, for all that's actually intelligent and worth watching. And for me.)
They gave this a Best Picture Oscar? I suppose that shouldn't even be a factor, though; Titanic got a Best Picture Oscar as well, and that was some of the most clichéd idiocy written for the screen that ever made millions of dollars. But at least the pacing was good in Titanic, and also, they weren't even trying to be deep in that movie. I can accept Titanic on its own terms and feel ok about it. But The English Patient was trying to be deep, and I think a lot of people must have thought it succeeded.
And this is why there will continue to be bad writing; because people cannot recognize it when they see it, and they think this is good. This spawns new sub-par material which is acclaimed as great. The mediocrity is perpetual.