I Heart Huckabees = Collective Soul?

So we already sort of talked about this, and I talked a little more with Beth about it, but I thought I'd try spelling this out again. The point isn't to be snarky, but to try and figure out exactly why so many of the "indie" movies I've seen lately basically suck.

In going with the title of this post, I was thinking that we're at a moment now with movies where we were with music in 1995. So, a brief history for the music end: after the American and British punk bands of the late 1970's (which were on major labels) were dropped by those labels, the majors turned punk into new wave and then what you typically think of at eighties music. This in turn forced bands who really wanted to build on the punk legacy to find ways to put out their own music- forming their own labels, working out their own tours, etc. This music scene grew until the labels started noticing again and they started signing bands. Eventually Nirvana had a huge hit in 1991, and then everyone was signed (pretty much.) So that by 1995, there were tons of bands with hit singles. Some bands were legit and either had made great music in the past, or were to go on to more success (the Meat Puppets, Flaming Lips, Ween, Radiohead (more or less)), but many many more were third or fourth generation rip-offs of Nirvana or Pearl Jam (Collective Soul, Better than Ezra, Bush, Candlebox, etc.)

I remember being swept up in the hype (MTV, local radio stations) around all this new music and couldn't really make heads or tails of it until around 1995-96, to be able to figure out which bands did suck, and why, and to recognize it early on. So that brings me to movies now- I don't think there is quite the same history, though in a loose metaphor, Pulp Fiction could be the Nevermind- a flashpoint that made movie studios decide to look more closely at indie film directors. I don't know much about the history of this, but at some point Miramax was bought up by a Disney company, and then other companies started having their own "indie" subsudiaries- Fox Searchlight, Focus Features, Lions Gate, Warner Independent.

So I don't know how guilty the studios are in this, but it seems we're at a point where there are a lot of movies coming out marketed as indie, but not really being influenced in a good way- like they're being made to fit that "Middle-Sized Movie" niche (I this the ny times A.O. Scott coined that term, as the movies aren't really indie.) So they kind of force a little bit of the quirky humor that seems as silly and ingeniune as bands wearing flannel and long johns.

I think the movie that sparked this idea in me was Sideways, a pretty terrible and average buddy flick, but wrapped up in it's own pretentions so badly. I kind of wish the director had done the commentary, perhaps he would have tipped his hand and revealed how insightful he thought his movie was... Or, perhaps it really should have been cast with Adam Sandler and Owen Wilson and kept the jokes funny instead of "witty."

I could go on, but I think I should just start a basic list here, for 1995-2005, at least stand ground with some of these movies I do like, and more I don't, and we can discuss this more. (My hope being to perhaps figure out what is working in the movies I like vs. what is missing in what I don't- possibly a way to also talk about music, art, lit, etc. One off the top of my head is the rewatchability of the good ones- American Beauty is just unwatchable after the first time. Or maybe it would seem terrible to watch now, with more, better movies I've seen.) Anyway...



Good

Rushmore/Royal Tenenbaums
Lost in Translation
Before Sunrise/Sunset, Slacker, Waking Life
Broken Flowers
American Splendor/Ghost World
Big Lebowski, Barton Fink


Bad

Virgin Suicides
The Life Aquatic
I Heart Huckabees
Sideways
American Beauty
Being John Malkovich, Adaptation
The Opposite of Sex
Magnolia/Punch-Drunk Love/Boogie Nights

No decision yet

Most David Lynch stuff
recent John Waters
Eternal Sunshine for the Spotless Mind
Memento
American History X
Happiness