Originally Posted By mawnck What this guy says: <a href="http://www.ken-lowery.com/index.php/site/radio_free_id_051908_serious_business/" target="_blank">http://www.ken-lowery.com/inde...usiness/</a> >>In those debates and in those negative reviews, it always came down to this: that serious stories are better than fun stories, and think-pieces are superior to movies that dazzle. The underlying mentality, sometimes stated but more often implied, is that some storytelling goals are simply worthier than others. This was the natural order of things. And I’m given pause, because I wonder what it is that drives these people to the movies, specifically. What about the medium calls to them? If it’s simply exquisitely-turned stories filled with subtle and graceful dialogue, why not seek out novels? If it’s a desire to see that subtlety and grace in visual form, why not paintings, sculpture, or comic books? Why the audio-visual medium? Must movies be literature to be great, or is that shortchanging the full potential of the medium? <<
Originally Posted By jdub Well, that's completely OFF as counter-critique--movies can be fun, escapist, and still great. "Iron Man" is a better film than "Speed Racer"--even when it makes my head hurt. "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" and "Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay" are basically wall-to-wall raunchy fluff--but as being consistently entertaining, they beat Speed to the finish line. You want something highly imaginative, but light, entertaining, and just plain better than "Speed Racer?" Let me recommend "Son of Rambow." "Speed Racer" may win auto races, but he most certainly does not, as the quoted writer seems to suggest, even remotely APPROACH the "full potential of the medium."
