Two thumbs down for films that assault the senses, insult the intelligence
Very early in the movie Independence Day last Sunday afternoon, it suddenly dawned on me why I don’t go to the cinema very much anymore.
Today’s blockbuster films are simply too offensive to the senses, too frazzling for the nervous system and too insulting to the intelligence to be enjoyed by anyone not conditioned to MTV’s standards of entertainment.
Once upon a time, we went to the movies to be diverted and amused, not to have our eyes, ears and brains constantly assaulted by blinding flashes of light, deafening explosions, puerile plots and cardboard stereotypes.
My wife and I weren’t 15 minutes into Independence Day before all of the above-mentioned outrages had been placed into evidence.
Every scene change was accompanied by a sudden burst of nuclear-blast brilliance and a crashing sound that hit the audience with the stereophonic subtlety of a Mike Tyson fist to the forehead.
Within the first half-hour or so, the whole glorious American melting-pot cast that exists only in script-writers’ imaginations had been introduced.
There was the handsome-but-clueless young president (Kennedy-esque Bill Pullman), the idealistic-but-unambitious computer nerd (Jewish Jeff Goldblum) and his kvetching father (Judd Hirsch), the dashing Marine fighter pilot (African-American Will Smith) and his stripper-with-heart-of-gold girlfriend (Vivica Fox), the loony-alcoholic-but-ultimately-heroic Vietnam vet (clownish Randy Quaid), the effete New Yorker (gay Harvey Fierstein, who comes to a bad end), the too-cute kids (white girl, black boy), the slimy aliens. You get the picture.
I had few illusions going in. After three weeks of interviewing scores of candidates for local political offices, I was starved for some sheer escapism. I had read several reviews, and Independence Day sounded like just the ticket. Donna cast her vote for the Rosie O’Donnell vehicle Harriet the Spy, but I prevailed.
Neither of us expected another Gone With the Wind, but then again, we weren’t prepared for John Wayne and His All-American Power Rangers Win the War of the Worlds, either.
I suspect we’re in a distinct minority. Independence Day has already taken in more than $230 million at the box office in little more than a month.
Last Sunday, the audience ranged from small children to graying seniors. Most of them seemed to revel in the mind-numbing parade of collisions, catastrophes and cliches.
Donna and I, however, found ourselves making rolling-eye contact at the blatantly cornball dialogue and hokey plot twists. With eardrums and bladders bursting, we prayed fervently for the film’s climactic Fourth of July to arrive.
Later, after our headaches had subsided, we couldn’t help but compare the experience to our last previous “live” visit to a movie theater. It had been a few months earlier and the film was Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen’s tale of living and loving in 19th-century England.
That evening, the theater was filled with people who had come to immerse themselves in a literate screenplay, not simply to be bombarded by nonstop auditory and visual pyrotechnics. Austen’s (and screenwriter-actress Emma Thompson’s) dialogue never was drowned out by audience conversations or asides.
In short, Sense and Sensibility was two hours of pure pleasure instead of 140 minutes (Independence Day’s running time) of torture.
It took me two full days to recover from the funk brought on by the stirring saga of a handful of plucky Americans saving the Earth from sinister techno-reptiles from outer space.
Months may pass before we return to the cineplex. When we do, I intend to clam up and let my wife pick the movie.
