On today's episode of Long Attention Span Theatre: Essays on Directors
October 21, 2017 5:40 PM   Subscribe

Cameron Beyl, creator of The Directors Series has developed an impressive and epic (yet accessable) ongoing series of video essays examing the careers of the Coen Brothers (3.5 hrs in 7 parts), Stanley Kubrick (3 hrs in 5 parts), David Fincher (4 hrs in 5 parts), Paul Thomas Anderson (2.5 hrs in 5 parts), and Christopher Nolan (3.5 hrs in 4 parts.) In addition to the video essays there are many (too many to count) short articles covering everything from Captain Eo to Rob Zombie's CSI: Miami episode, "L.A." (h/t Open Culture)
posted by Room 641-A (12 comments total) 46 users marked this as a favorite
 
Whew, I scrolled that entire site and only found one women on there, Sofia Coppola.
posted by jmhodges at 7:27 PM on October 21, 2017 [4 favorites]


Well don't get me wrong, I'm going to dig into these because I love this kind of stuff but this is just so much the Boring Straight Boy Canon.
posted by octothorpe at 7:41 PM on October 21, 2017 [6 favorites]


Also very white.
The real auteurs of the 21st century are all working in television anyway.
posted by cazoo at 8:05 PM on October 21, 2017 [5 favorites]


Are there decent TV critics working in video essay format?

Thanks for this Room 641-A. I've been enjoying the Youtube film essay community a lot for the past few months. Every Frame a Painting of course, but also Nerdwriter, Lindsay Ellis, Foldable Ideas, etc. So I'm looking forward to this.
posted by tychotesla at 8:20 PM on October 21, 2017


Man, what happened to Every Frame A Painting? I know the literal answer is “the dude does occasional videos for Filmstruck now,” but it’s still weird how much he’s dropped out of sight. He even abruptly stopped updating Twitter after being a fairly regular user. I hope he just suddenly got super-busy at his day job, but the sudden radio silence worries me. I hope he’s doing okay.
posted by Ian A.T. at 8:29 PM on October 21, 2017


I guess it's just the Criterion Collection/Filmstruck work: "Taylor Ramos and Tony Zhou on THE BREAKING POINT". Thanks for mentioning it because I didn't even know that much.

Good for him, but I hope he starts releasing to the filthy penny-pinching public again some day.
posted by tychotesla at 8:54 PM on October 21, 2017


Well, I'm about halfway through the Fincher series (jet lagged and binging these in my hotel room) and it's excellent fare for a deep dive back through an incredible canon of work.

And yeah, I always want more Every Frame a Painting segments. I've watched the whole catalog of them at least twice.
posted by asavage at 9:23 PM on October 21, 2017


Hmm, the articles and videos I read/watched were thorough enough in a fairly straight forward cataloging of general developments in the directors' bodies of work, with plot lines and technical achievements laid out comprehensively enough to be understood and provide a sense of history and direction to their works on a surface level. So if that's what someone is interested in, then they are fine. The pacing of information and attitude of support for the directors should give anyone interested a decent overview of their accomplishments from a perspective of their successes.

Unfortunately they don't go much beyond cataloging, generally celebratory accounting of increases in budget and acclaim, and noting the some general unifying themes. So if you're looking for a more involved aesthetic analysis or critical reading of themes, this might not be the best place to look, judging at least from the little I've examined of the material so far.

Just for a couple examples, in the Christopher Nolan videos, Beyl mentions "The Dark Knight Rises paints a vivid and perhaps extreme picture of what modern life might look like following the violent overthrow of society. A picture that resonated far more than Nolan could ever have anticipated considering the film's release at the height of the Occupy Wall Street movement." Beyl accompanies this idea showing clips of the kangaroo court Bane has instituted, hangings, and mobs taking to the streets ransacking the homes of the wealthy.

He follows this statement with a clip from the film where Bruce Wayne is dancing with Selina and she whispers a warning to him to "batten down the hatches" for the storm that's coming for the rich who leave nothing for the rest. Fair enough making the connection, but Beyl doesn't even seem to notice what parallels he's presenting either in the moments selected and in how he draws out the further story of Batman's quest for justice and natural alliance with the police. Suggesting Occupy Wall Street resonates with Bane's terrorist overthrow certainly requires some further unpacking as would Batman's insatiable urge for "justice" and his alliance with the police as rightful defenders of whatever justice that might be.

Beyl goes into the plotting that sees Wayne partially losing access to his wealth and some part of his array of fantastic objects, saying that was always a major part of the basis with which he fought crime, then suggesting he becomes somehow equivalent to the rest of us when all he has are a few remaining super high tech unbelievable objects instead of a subterranean fortress filled with them. Beyl takes all this at face value, doesn't even try to dig into what that all might mean within the Nolan's values much less how it relates to the real world and never really seems to even notice there are some serious potential contradictory elements in his own explanation of the plot and its possible meanings. He just accepts it as surface elements that flow into a resolvable narrative goal and pats Nolan on the back for it.

Beyl notes the pedigree of the actors who worked with Nolan and treats that therefore as sufficient evidence of some obvious measure of quality without examining the performances, how Nolan handles the actors and films them or much of anything else save for showing some clips that, at least from my perspective, show anything but what he's implicitly asserting.

The articles on Wes Anderson are much the same, some fine general outlines of his development, some influences, hints at themes and general assertions of value that he doesn't or can't really follow up on since his approach is too broad and rooted in production to examine what the films might mean, how they might suggest those meanings, and how we might relate to them.

Personally, while I'm very impressed with the amount of skill and dedication involved in making these sorts of videos and the clarity of approach in the articles, I'm tired of the cataloging perspective, the general body of work approach, and production detail listings being used as measures of success. Our fetish for cataloging is undermining more involved appreciation for the works created, instead placing emphasis on lists and names, with, seemingly, some notion being that there is nothing more of importance since appreciation is all subjective nowadays, as if that covers it.

It doesn't, and the two minute video by Tony Zhou and Taylor Ramos, a couple posts above, does a better job at suggesting how we get meaning from a movie, and through that at least hinting towards why that matters than the hour of stuff I saw from Beyl. There may be more to the site I haven't yet seen, and, as I mentioned, if you're looking for those more general outlines, then Beyl would seem a fine source for that. It just isn't my thing overall.
posted by gusottertrout at 10:32 PM on October 21, 2017 [11 favorites]


I love a really well-done video essay, but Sturgeon’s Law applies as always. If you’re familiar with the tropes of the form, I highly recommend the channel Movies Brand and their pitch-perfect parodies of the navel-gazing, vapidness, and pseudo-profundity that plagues the bottom 90% of the genre. Start with Pleasantville: Black & White vs Color”
posted by Ian A.T. at 11:13 PM on October 21, 2017 [7 favorites]


It was Metafilter that got me started with Movies With Mikey ( https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdGl5mi0XeW2iK2sVp2ni_VDRKrmfF_-Z ). He kept me coming back. Yeah, he's a white guy. But he does amusing movies, has amazing production values (IMO), and, whenever possible, links back to humanity.

(His Iron Giant review came out right before Orlando, and his impassioned plea for sanity and empathy, looping back to the themes of the review, was heartbreaking.)
posted by Samizdata at 12:25 AM on October 22, 2017


Right around, even. Stupid budget knockoff fingers.
posted by Samizdata at 12:39 AM on October 22, 2017


Thanks to Metafilter I found Lindsay Ellis and her amazing essays. Despite and because of the possible differences of opinion, this place is a great source for cultural critique, both through links to the outside world and through the Mefites who gather on the blue.
posted by njohnson23 at 8:56 AM on October 22, 2017 [1 favorite]


« Older A Friendship Story   |   There was no toilet paper in the bathroom. Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments