{"id":129304,"date":"2015-12-29T11:46:06","date_gmt":"2015-12-29T18:46:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/12\/29\/the-force-awakens-stinks-because-its-not-gasp-high-cinematic-art.html"},"modified":"2015-12-29T11:46:06","modified_gmt":"2015-12-29T18:46:06","slug":"the-force-awakens-stinks-because-its-not-gasp-high-cinematic-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/12\/29\/the-force-awakens-stinks-because-its-not-gasp-high-cinematic-art.html","title":{"rendered":""The Force Awakens" stinks because it's not (gasp) High Cinematic Art"},"content":{"rendered":"

I'm not sure which I find more annoying — the fanboys who can say nothing bad about a movie because it's THE BESTEST MOVIE EVER, dagnabbit,<\/i> or the anti-fanboys who can say nothing good about a movie because (a) it's not the movie they<\/i> would have done or, commonly, (b) it's a commercial success.<\/p>\n

The author here is one of this last group. TFA "stinks" because it is simply a commercial effort, a way to make money, not actual cinematic art. Indeed, it shouldn't be called a movie, just a long commercial for toys and future movie tickets. It's unimaginative and dull. It's a franchise, part of a "formula-bound assembly line." Because Disney. And because Hollywood. And all of this is blindingly obvious<\/i> for anyone who's not too busing being one of the consumer sheeple lining up to see it, if one is one of the "few reviewers who braved the intimidating weight of 'Star Wars: the Phenomenon' to write critical pans."<\/p>\n

Feh. TFA has its weak points, and even some confusing creative decisions, but it's also a lot of fun, vastly entertaining, and I've no regret dropping the money I did, even if it isn't the newest art house phenomenon.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\n
\n
\n<\/a>
\nAdmit it: ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ stinks — and here’s why<\/a><\/span>
\nOn Christmas Day, I fulfilled my duty as an American consumer and took the family to see the new “Star Wars” movie. The excursion solved a mystery: Why do so many of the reviews, even the enthusiastic ones, carry an undertone of disappointment?\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

View on Google+<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I'm not sure which I find more annoying — the fanboys who can say nothing bad about a movie because it's THE BESTEST MOVIE EVER, dagnabbit, or the anti-fanboys who can say nothing good about a movie because (a) it's not the movie they would have done or, commonly, (b) it's a commercial success. The … Continue reading “"The Force Awakens" stinks because it's not (gasp) High Cinematic Art”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-129304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1485,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2001\/12\/27\/for_the_true_lo.html","url_meta":{"origin":129304,"position":0},"title":"For the true LotR fanboys","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 27-Dec-01 11:00pm","format":false,"excerpt":"New Zealand has issued a set of stamps with images from the movie. What's even cooler is that I think a couple of the images (Galadriel on the swan boat,...","rel":"","context":"In "Media & Culture"","block_context":{"text":"Media & Culture","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/secure.nzpost.co.nz\/nzstamps\/recent\/Images\/s_2001_lotr_40.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":51776,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/07\/17\/movie-review-ant-man-2015.html","url_meta":{"origin":129304,"position":1},"title":"Movie Review: "Ant-Man" (2015)","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 17-Jul-15 11:25pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Ant-Man is an interesting film, probably the most idiosyncratic of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, arguably the most flawed, yet in some ways very, very much a comic book movie, for better and worse adopting a lot of the tropes and bad science of the comic book Ant-Man series. It's also\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/MV5BMjM2NTQ5Mzc2M15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwNTcxMDI2NTE40._V1_SX640_SY720_5B15D.jpgimgmax%3D660.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":41605,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/04\/04\/movie-review-captain-america-the-winter-soldier-2014.html","url_meta":{"origin":129304,"position":2},"title":"Movie Review: "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" (2014)","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 4-Apr-14 11:03pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A very solid add to the Marvel Cinematic Universe\u00a0herd. Action, political thrills, a ton of fighting, decent acting, and FX that aren't flashy because they make remarkable things look believably normal. Good stuff, worth seeing in a theater.\ufeff A \u2605\u2605\u2605\u2605 review of Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) Captain America:\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":129150,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/12\/16\/the-ultimate-marvel-cinematic-universe-infographic.html","url_meta":{"origin":129304,"position":3},"title":"The Ultimate Marvel Cinematic Universe Infographic","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 16-Dec-15 11:11pm","format":false,"excerpt":"This is a pretty darned amazing unified history of the MCU (though only as accurate as the latest movie and\/or press release). Brilliantly done. The Thor-y of Everything A visualisation of the links between past, present and future films, shorts and TV shows in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. @FlexibleHead View\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":135385,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/11\/19\/fatherdaughter-movie-week-reviews.html","url_meta":{"origin":129304,"position":4},"title":"Father\/Daughter Movie Week: The Reviews","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 19-Nov-17 11:13am","format":false,"excerpt":"+Margie Kleerup was off in California on a long business trip this past week, so +Kay Hill and I did a Father\/Daughter Movie Week ... which got interfered with mightily by both Dive Practice and NaNoWriMo. But, that said, we got a few movies into play. Time Bandits (1981) Been\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/Time%2BBandits%2Bposter.jpgimgmax%3D660.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":43394,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/07\/08\/the-marvel-cinematic-universe-pushes-out-from-the-familiar.html","url_meta":{"origin":129304,"position":5},"title":"The Marvel Cinematic Universe pushes out from the familiar","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 8-Jul-14 8:29am","format":false,"excerpt":"Honestly, I'd not really considered the unfamiliarity factor regarding Guardians of the Galaxy. Doubtless that's because I'm a comics wonk and naturally I know how the GotG (in various versions) fit into the Marvel Universe, and of course I have informed speculations about the various Marvel Cinematic Universe-related bits and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129304\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}